Shelter in Place Strategy Research: Assess Potential in WUI Areas at Risk of Wildfires that Outpace Ability to Evacuate (Fire Proof Emergency Shelters)

Home hardening increases the likelihood that a home survives a wildfire, but hardened homes do not provide a safe place of refuge in the event that a fast moving wildfire cuts off evacuation routes and forces residents to shelter in place. Given the rapidly increasing intensity of fires in California over the past decade, the likelihood and incidence of fires trapping residents is increasing. This reality opens up the question of whether homeowners and perhaps neighborhoods consider creating fallback plans and the ability to shelter in place safely in specially designed fire shelters in high risk areas. It may be ideal for certain areas in the WUI with very high likelihood of such events to have capacity to shelter all residents of the area in such shelters while fires burned through. Yet such shelters have not been a part of our fire adaptation strategy to date. There is little data about such structures for interested residents or neighborhoods to turn to for guidance, and the building codes do not address the need for shelters that cannot burn and that can provide refuge for necessary periods of time during intense fires. Research and development work is needed to address the gap in data on the potential for such shelters to play an important role in fire safety alongside of early evacuations, home hardening, defensible space and other critical elements of a regional fire resilience strategy. We recommend assessing the merits and risks of such a strategy and whether other options are more efficient and effective.

Status: Conceptual

Cost: Medium

Partners:

Permitting: This is a research and assessment project and thus at this stage would not require any permitting. There are site-specific permitting considerations if the project were to move forward.

Funding Sources: