What Saved The ‘Miracle House’ In Lahaina?
The historic structure on Front Street is the last house standing in a neighborhood reduced to rubble.
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During renovations, Millikin installed a commercial-grade steel roof, something that definitely would have provided better protection from flying embers than shingles. At first, Millikin thought this might have made the biggest difference in why his home was spared.
But Michael Wara, the director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program at the Stanford Wood Institute for the Environment, said it was likely the Millikins’ decision to dig out the existing landscaping directly surrounding the house and replace it with river stones that made the biggest difference.
“What folks in the wildfire business call the zone zero or the ember ignition zone, is kind of a key factor in whether homes do or do not burn down,” Wara said.
Having nothing combustible in the 5 feet directly around a house is enormously important.
Millikin said the decision to install river stones for about a meter around the house was not actually aimed at fire prevention. He wanted to prevent runoff from landscaping from creating water and termite damage. But it may have saved his home.
Regulations in California have typically focused on a 30-foot perimeter around homes known as “Zone A” in firefighting. But Wara said that research on the thousands of homes that have burned in California in recent years has shown that it’s really what’s installed in the immediate few feet of a home that makes the biggest difference.
https://www.civilbeat.org/2023/08/what-saved-the-miracle-house-in-lahaina/
A couple years ago there was a fire at (I think) Laguna Beach, CA. All the houses on the hillside burned except ONE.
The house did NOT have soffit vents in the overhangs. The house also did not have ridge vents.
They figured that other houses on the hillside burned even though they had taken measures to fire proof their homes too. However, the temperatures in the fire made the air being sucked into the soffit vents so high that the lumber and plywood/osb INSIDE the attic were actually spontaneously combusting. Not from flying embers landing on the roof.
I recall seeing it because the pictures after the fire showed that this house was the only structure left out of about 100 homes on the hill side.
It is similar to pictures of a house in Florida that was left after a hurricane hit directly on that beach. All other structures were completely gone and it remained with superficial damage.