BUTTE COUNTY, Calif. – As we move past the wet winter and into the hotter months, Cal Fire says this is the perfect time to prepare for fire season.
Defensible space inspectors are making their way around Northern California to make sure homeowners have plenty of time to prepare ahead of fire season.
“I’ve had inspectors on since February 1st, and right now we reached 3,000 households. We’re projected to reach 9–10 thousand households this year alone,” CAL FIRE Captain and coordinator of Butte County Defensible Space, Jake Gilliam, said.
As we move into warmer months, Gilliam says this is the time for homeowners to prepare for their defensible space.
As homeowners work on each zone of their space over the next few months, the goal is that going forward homeowners would simply have to maintain it rather than rushing to prepare it so late in the year.
“Trying to get people to 100 feet around their house of that defensible space. We’re just looking at that first 5 feet—the non-combustible zone—and then that 30 feet—that’s the lean and green, then once you go out to 100 feet—that’s your reduced fuel zone section, and we’re really encouraging people to do it now, so if you wait too long to start working on defensible space, it’s going to get hot, it’s going to get dry, and one little spark from the hot summer months can light a fire,” Gilliam said.
Cal Fire says this fire season is looking pretty similar to last season, with the wet weather causing a late start to the season, but they’re preparing the same. Cal Fire will be bringing more firefighters in as we get closer to the fall.
“Some will be coming right now, some in the next couple weeks, and then our last group comes on in June. And they’re going to be trained and getting ready for fire season. So the firefighters are getting ready; we need the homeowners to get ready; they’re going to do their part; we need you to do your part,” Gilliam said.
For those who can’t make their space defensible due to disability or age, Gilliam says inspectors provide options for resources to use to help set up the defensible space.
According to the Cal Fire incident report, there were just over 7,100 wildfires last year in the state of California. It was the smallest number of wildfires on a 5-year average.
For more information on defendable spaces, click here.
