美国国家公共电台 NPR How Houses Themselves Become Fuel For Wildfires

 

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

This year, California saw the most destructive wildfire season in its history. Take last month's Camp Fire in Northern California, which decimated more than 18,000 structures, many of them homes in the town of Paradise. It's bringing attention to the emerging science around how and when homes burn during wildfires, and that science is not what you might expect. NPR's Kirk Siegler explains.

KIRK SIEGLER, BYLINE¹: When firefighter and Malibu Town Councilman Rick Mullen got the call last month for the Woolsey Fire, he set in motion a plan his family had long practiced. While he and his crew mobilized to the front lines, his son stayed home and defended their house, even though they were under evacuation orders.

RICK MULLEN: He and a couple buddies² executed the plan we've been training on for years and did a great job.

SIEGLER: We talked as Mullen drove through a burned-out Malibu neighborhood. At his house, it was a small crew who knew what to do, didn't panic and stuck to the plan. They had supplies to survive for days. They had well water they could pump. And they kept an eye on embers landing on the roof or near the house or deck and douse³ them. And their home - it survived.

MULLEN: It can be visually terrifying. And if you don't understand fire behavior, that can be panic inducing. The reality is, even though it looks bad, you're in a very survivable position.

SIEGLER: There are stories like this in Malibu and even Paradise. Hundreds of homes were destroyed, but hundreds were spared, and some likely due to the fact that there was just somebody there watching over it with a hose.

MULLEN: After that big fire front comes through, since there's nobody around, a lot of these homes can burn down.

SIEGLER: What he's saying right there is key. It's long been a misperception that most homes burn when that initial big, dramatic wall of flames from the fire blows through. But the science shows most homes actually tend to burn long after this, sometimes even a day or more later.

JACK⁴ COHEN: We tend to pay attention to the flames, and that's not the biggest part of the problem.

SIEGLER: The biggest problem is often the stray ember after the main fire that lands on some pine needles in a gutter⁵ or an outdoor furniture cushion. Jack Cohen is a wildfire behavior scientist who pioneered this home ignition research for the U.S. Forest Service.

COHEN: If the homeowner is present, then a little bit of water is quite effective in putting that smoldering⁶ combustion⁷ out.

SIEGLER: Now, Cohen isn't encouraging people to defy sheriff's orders and stay behind to protect their home, but he is trying to get a conversation going about this new fire reality. They may begin as forest fires, but they're turning into urban structure fires, jumping from one house to the next.

COHEN: Why would we stay at the house? Well, the bottom line there is that a house that doesn't ignite and burn is the safest place to be.

SIEGLER: A house that doesn't ignite, like one with fiberglass shingles⁸, vents⁹ that embers can't squeeze through, that may may be a safer place to be than getting stuck on a road while thousands of people try to evacuate¹⁰. Right now, public officials like Rick Mullen in Malibu don't have the data that would allow them to identify homes or neighborhoods where people could safely shelter in place.

MULLEN: I'm not going to encourage anybody to stick around. OK? I accept the reality that some people do that. But that's the biggest responsibility for public safety professionals is to save people's lives.

SIEGLER: Still, fire managers are keenly interested in this idea of creating more so-called stay-and-defend communities. Scientist Jack Cohen says this doesn't mean a neighborhood full of homes made of concrete.

COHEN: We don't necessarily need to build ammo bunkers to live in in order to deal with this.

SIEGLER: Instead, he says it's often just those little things left unattended that have the biggest consequences. It's the stuff right by the house, what he calls the home ignition zone - the debris¹¹ in the gutter, the dried-out hibiscus hanging in a planter.

COHEN: We're fighting, really, against a culture and a perception of how the ignitions occur.

SIEGLER: Cohen says we need to stop fighting these megafires like forest fires, and instead, build or redesign neighborhoods that are more resistant¹² to the urban fires these have become. Kirk Siegler, NPR News, Los Angeles.

(SOUNDBITE OF KURT VILE'S "BASSACKWARDS")

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 buddies   

n.密友( buddy的名词复数 )；同伴；弟兄；（用于称呼男子，常带怒气）家伙v.（如密友、战友、伙伴、弟兄般）交往( buddy的第三人称单数 )；做朋友；亲近（…）；伴护艾滋病人

参考例句：

• We became great buddies. 我们成了非常好的朋友。 来自辞典例句
• The two of them have become great buddies. 他们俩成了要好的朋友。 来自辞典例句

3 douse   

v.把…浸入水中，用水泼；n.泼洒

参考例句：

• Men came with buckets of water and began to douse the flames.人们提来一桶桶水灭火。
• He doused the flames with a fire extinguisher.他用灭火器把火焰扑灭。

4 jack   

n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克

参考例句：

• I am looking for the headphone jack.我正在找寻头戴式耳机插孔。
• He lifted the car with a jack to change the flat tyre.他用千斤顶把车顶起来换下瘪轮胎。

5 gutter   

n.沟，街沟，水槽，檐槽，贫民窟

参考例句：

• There's a cigarette packet thrown into the gutter.阴沟里有个香烟盒。
• He picked her out of the gutter and made her a great lady.他使她脱离贫苦生活，并成为贵妇。

6 smoldering   

v.用文火焖烧，熏烧，慢燃( smolder的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• The mat was smoldering where the burning log had fallen. 燃烧的木棒落下的地方垫子慢慢燃烧起来。 来自辞典例句
• The wood was smoldering in the fireplace. 木柴在壁炉中闷烧。 来自辞典例句

7 combustion   

n.燃烧；氧化；骚动

参考例句：

• We might be tempted to think of combustion.我们也许会联想到氧化。
• The smoke formed by their combustion is negligible.由它燃烧所生成的烟是可忽略的。

8 shingles   

n.带状疱疹；（布满海边的）小圆石( shingle的名词复数 )；屋顶板；木瓦（板）；墙面板

参考例句：

• Shingles are often dipped in creosote. 屋顶板常浸涂木焦油。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• The roofs had shingles missing. 一些屋顶板不见了。 来自辞典例句

9 vents   

（气体、液体等进出的）孔、口( vent的名词复数 )； （鸟、鱼、爬行动物或小哺乳动物的）肛门； 大衣等的)衩口； 开衩

参考例句：

• He always vents his anger on the dog. 他总是拿狗出气。
• The Dandelion Patch is the least developed of the four active vents. “蒲公英区”在这四个活裂口中是发育最差的一个。

10 evacuate   

v.遣送；搬空；抽出；排泄；大(小)便

参考例句：

• We must evacuate those soldiers at once!我们必须立即撤出这些士兵！
• They were planning to evacuate the seventy American officials still in the country.他们正计划转移仍滞留在该国的70名美国官员。

11 debris   

n.瓦砾堆，废墟，碎片

参考例句：

• After the bombing there was a lot of debris everywhere.轰炸之后到处瓦砾成堆。
• Bacteria sticks to food debris in the teeth,causing decay.细菌附着在牙缝中的食物残渣上，导致蛀牙。

12 resistant   

adj.(to)抵抗的，有抵抗力的

参考例句：

• Many pests are resistant to the insecticide.许多害虫对这种杀虫剂有抵抗力。
• They imposed their government by force on the resistant population.他们以武力把自己的统治强加在持反抗态度的人民头上。