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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday November 29 2018, @05:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the a-seller's-market dept.

With California experiencing two years of unprecedented wildfires that have left more than 20,000 homes destroyed and scores dead, the private firefighting business is booming. These brigades work independently from county firefighters; their job is to protect specific homes under contract with insurance companies.

Their work can vary from pushing back flames as they approach properties to reaching the site before the blaze arrives and spraying homes with fire retardant.

But the private forces have generated complaints from some fire departments, who say they don't always coordinate with local crews and amount to one more worry as they try to evacuate residents and battle the blaze.

"From the standpoint of first responders, they are not viewed as assets to be deployed. They're viewed as a responsibility," said Carroll Wills, communications director for California Professional Firefighters, a labor union representing rank-and-file firefighters in the state.

What began more than a decade ago as a white-glove service for homeowners in well-to-do neighborhoods has expanded in recent years as the wildfire danger has increased, said Michael Barry, a spokesman for the Insurance Information Institute, a not-for-profit organization that educates the public about the insurance industry.

https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-private-firefighters-20181127-story.html


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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by edIII on Thursday November 29 2018, @11:41PM (13 children)

    by edIII (791) on Thursday November 29 2018, @11:41PM (#768030)

    Entirely correct. Having been within miles of this shit happening, I can tell you that your butthole will hit a pucker factor of 11 when you see tall flames moving at you at over 5 miles per hour. In Paradise, I heard an official claiming that in the high winds it was moving many ACRES per minute. So many people died because they couldn't move fast enough. One of my friends, who was kinda of an idiot, was rushing in to save equipment, and turned back when his engine started stuttering from a lack of oxygen. He's very lucky to still be here with us today, and his pictures/video are haunting.

    Private firefighting crews in Paradise would've just died. Period. There was no saving jack shit, and the only sane action anyone can take is RUN. There is no saving any structures, and fire insurance for that purpose is just fucking stupid and wishful thinking on the part of the insurance companies and property owners. A regular fire in town, under normal weather conditions, might be handled by private fire crews. That's assuming that they don't get in the way of the official firemen. A forest fire with tinder built up for decades and a good portion of the forest dead under wind conditions of +80mph? RUN. Don't stop. Don't look back. RUN. I can't imagine the level of technology required to stand your ground and fight that.

    I can say it, and keep trying to explain it, but there is nothing more terrifying than trying to escape fast moving fire that is engulfing trees all around you and 50 ft. tall. Experiencing a black wall of smoke going high up into the sky, and as far to the left and right as you can almost see, that is also moving towards you? I'm still dealing with a high pucker factor, and the smell of smoke gets me nervous :)

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @12:31AM (7 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @12:31AM (#768059)

    I don't think you get what more firefighters would have been able to do. Yea, protecting individual houses under that circumstance is not going to work. The problem is letting it get to that point in the first place by not having enough people to clear out the fuel in the fire's path.

    • (Score: 4, Informative) by edIII on Friday November 30 2018, @01:30AM (6 children)

      by edIII (791) on Friday November 30 2018, @01:30AM (#768089)

      No, No, No. You're not fucking listening. 5 MILES PER HOUR. By the time you organize and get 1,000 firefighters, or even 50 firefighters, ready to counter-burn, clear out brush with heavy equipment, it's already all over. In 12 minutes, just 12 minutes, the fire has already consumed everything for a mile. So you already giving up a mile or two of structures and/or forest, just to have 12 minutes ahead of it to clear out what amounts to a couple square miles of fuel? Really? You think more could've helped? Not even 10,000 people working as hard as they could, could stop such a beast in its tracks.

      You're not fucking getting it at all. People barely made it, and that was running the moment they saw the fire, as fast as they could. Even if the firefighters could've responded in 60 seconds, it would've still been pointless. They're were people that died in their cars, and if you can't make it out in a car, what the fuck are firefighters going to do? You think they have special fire trucks that breathe something other than oxygen?

      Fuel plus +80mph winds and low humidity conditions is not something that firefighters can handle. It's just not. You don't understand the sheer order of magnitude involved in this, the number of square miles that needs to be contained, or the timing. Too much work, in too little time, under too dangerous of conditions.

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      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @01:54AM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @01:54AM (#768095)

        Relax. I think GP's argument is just "rake the forest" to get rid of that pesky fuel. GP is trolling or lost in propaganda. Poe's law is a bitch.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @02:06AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @02:06AM (#768103)

          What is trolling or propaganda about that post? It is literally what I was told by someone who does that. They manage forest fires by doing pre-emptive controlled burns. It sounds like Fahrenheit 451 for firefighters to be lighting fires, but so be it.

      • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @02:03AM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @02:03AM (#768100)

        No, No, No. You're not fucking listening. 5 MILES PER HOUR. By the time you organize and get 1,000 firefighters, or even 50 firefighters, ready to counter-burn, clear out brush with heavy equipment, it's already all over.

        Well, what I was told by my buddy (who does this for a living) is that this should have all been cleared long ago but the government refuses to fund it due to "muh deficits or whatever". AFAIK, It isn't something you would do once there is a fire nearby. But I guess hes doesn't know anything about it.

        • (Score: 3, Informative) by edIII on Friday November 30 2018, @04:25AM (2 children)

          by edIII (791) on Friday November 30 2018, @04:25AM (#768150)

          We are talking about two different things.

          1) Reactive
          2) Proactive

          You are correct about funds and the proactive efforts, and your buddy is correct that prescribed burn activities wouldn't be performed during a reactionary event.

          Under appropriate guidance, I can't see why a private firefighting company cannot be contracted to perform a prescribed burn, as long as everyone is following the regulations and certified. The major problem has been that funds have been allocated for #1, but never enough for #2. There is a difference between state and federal budgets too, as well as what they're doing to prevent fires in the future.

          My points are about the sheer silliness of expecting #2 operations during an extreme #1 event. You don't have a lot of time for prescribed burns, at least not near the epicenter. Not in a way that you could've saved everything. With the winds these fires were jumping 10 lane highways. If it can do that, then just how much do you think you need to clear, and in what time frame? Adding private resources doesn't change the fate of these properties, even if private is allocated on a 1:1 basis somehow. Not in this kind of event, with these very extreme conditions.

          Under the conditions of #1, as experienced by Northern California, I agree they shouldn't attempt it. Which was my point. That even with those resources, both private and public, it will be about containment, and you have to give up properties to the fire. You can't stand your ground with the conditions we faced. You just can't, and you would understand that if you were there. It was pure hell, and a testament to all the firefighters that they even slowed it down, much less contained it.

          Having private companies involved during these kinds of events is nonsensical, unless they are directly tied in to the chain of command. They'll give up the properties too, or they'll just die. The problem I have with that, is that the public firefighters will disengage from their efforts to save the men trying to save the unsavable properties. I would rather see the private firefighters team up with public firefighters and coordinate their efforts at containment. *THAT* could actually make a real difference.

          This perceived pissing match doesn't help anyone, and the request the private agencies coordinate with public isn't unreasonable. At all.

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          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @06:46AM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 30 2018, @06:46AM (#768195)

            Ok, there is a fire. And there is a clear path that fire will take. And there are people who say lets cut this fire off weeks/months/years ahead of when it reach the target at the fastest rate a fire has ever spread. Would you hire them?

            • (Score: 2) by edIII on Friday November 30 2018, @09:28PM

              by edIII (791) on Friday November 30 2018, @09:28PM (#768469)

              Uhhh, no, because they're fucking dipshits according to you.

              Not sure what you are saying either. They can cut off the fire off weeks ahead of time? Do they have Miss Cleo on the payroll? Or are you talking about proactive behavior to reduce the availability of fuel, create fire breaks where possible, and take the necessary steps to make sure our forests get the water they need (Kick Nestle out)? First there is a fire, and then somehow there is a clear path it will take? Really? Right there you are full of it. Nobody is predicting in advance how a fire will move, because almost nobody can predict the winds in advance.

              Proactive steps make sense, and I already said that private companies that can meet the certifications (they have proper training) should be able to be hired by the state, to be MANAGED by the state in performing prescribed burns in our forests. That is what happens "years" ahead of the possible fire.

              During reactive situations, in which your "weeks/months/years" makes zero sense, private companies should be forced by law to be cooperating with the public agencies handling the catastrophe. There are no proactive measures possible during these events, not ones that can happen within hours, or the minutes required. Containment means giving up properties, which goes against the goals of the private companies, but is chosen because those properties have ZERO chance.

              You and the others are actually quite cute with your insistence that private efforts could somehow trump public ones, and they could've saved Paradise. Get this through your head; Paradise was doomed the second the fire started.

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  • (Score: 1) by deimtee on Friday November 30 2018, @12:35AM (4 children)

    by deimtee (3272) on Friday November 30 2018, @12:35AM (#768063) Journal

    at over 5 miles per hour

    Is that a typo? Aussie bushfires with a tailwind have hit 50 miles per hour. (although that is extreme, Check out the Black Saturday article on wikipedia).

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    • (Score: 2) by edIII on Friday November 30 2018, @01:42AM (3 children)

      by edIII (791) on Friday November 30 2018, @01:42AM (#768091)

      Not a typo. I remember that the night the fires started there were +80mph winds going through the mountains and hills around us. With the winds at 80mph, the front of the fire was consuming everything and moving at 5mph. So, walking at a brisk pace, while everything around explodes into flames, was the way I heard it described. I know the +80mph winds is not a typo. I could be wrong, and it may have been moving at some points much faster than 5mph, and probably closer to the wind speed. The recent fire in Paradise I'm told, moved even faster. At some points, it must've been moving damn near wind speed, because people in cars couldn't make it out in time.

      That's why a lot of people around here are full of shit today acting like armchair firefighters with plenty of assumptions. When something moves at even 5mph, coordinating and containing it is quite a task, and it won't be possible to save everything. 12 minutes per mile, or if you're correct, less than that.

      What do you do with catastrophe moving that fast towards you? I don't think any number of firefighters could've stopped it quick enough, which is why these things last for weeks at a time now, and take out entire towns, and whole parts of cities.

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      Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
      • (Score: 1) by deimtee on Friday November 30 2018, @04:29AM

        by deimtee (3272) on Friday November 30 2018, @04:29AM (#768152) Journal

        What do you do with catastrophe moving that fast towards you?

        You Die.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Saturday_bushfires [wikipedia.org]
        Scroll down to Overall Statistics. Equivalent to 1500 Hiroshima bombs. Flames over 100 metres high. Pyrocumulous clouds. The fire was intense and energetic enough that it was causing lightning within the firestorm. The foliage on trees at the front didn't catch fire, it exploded and added to the rolling blast.

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        If you cough while drinking cheap red wine it really cleans out your sinuses.
      • (Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Friday November 30 2018, @06:13AM (1 child)

        by Magic Oddball (3847) on Friday November 30 2018, @06:13AM (#768187) Journal

        I'm not sure how it would work out in terms of miles per hour, but according to SFGate [sfgate.com]:

        The Camp Fire erupted about 6:30 a.m., spreading to more than 18,000 acres by 3:15 p.m. At that rate, the fire is burning the equivalent of about 10 Costco warehouses per minute.

        I might be wrong, but that sounds like it'd have to be moving more than 5 miles per hour.

        • (Score: 2) by PinkyGigglebrain on Friday November 30 2018, @08:26AM

          by PinkyGigglebrain (4458) on Friday November 30 2018, @08:26AM (#768208)

          Been awhile since I did this kind of math, feel free to correct if I messed up.

          Lets say the fire burns outward in perfect circle to keep it simple.

          time = 0 hr radius= 0 surface area=0
          time =1 hr radius =5mi surface area =~78 square miles
          time = 2 hr radius = 10mi surface area =~314 square miles
          time = 3 hr radius = 15mi surface area =~ 706 square miles
          time = 4 hr radius = 20mi surface area =~ 1,256 square miles

          and the bigger the radius the faster the surface area goes up, so even a "slow" fire can eat up a lot of area in very little time.

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