Reduce the risk of your home being hit by wildfire by creating a defensible space and upgrading your home exterior.
Rocky Mountain Insurance Information Association provides some crucial tips for protecting your home from wildfire that you can do before fire season hits. Their article “Wildfire” includes the following advice on reducing the risk of a wildfire hitting your home.
Tips for helping prevent a wildfire from destroying your home:
- Create a 30-foot defensible space around your home by removing as much flammable material as you can. Replace flammable vegetation with fire resistive plants.
- Reduce the number of trees in heavily wooded areas by spacing native trees and shrubs at least 10 feet apart. On trees taller than 18 feet, prune lower branches within six feet of the ground.
- Remove branches overhanging the roof or coming within 10 feet of the chimney. Clean all dead leaves and needles from the roof, gutters, and yard.
- Install a roof that meets a fire classification of “Class B” or better. Cover the chimney outlet and stovepipe with nonflammable screening no larger than half-inch mesh.
- Install dual- or triple-paned windows, and limit the size and number of windows that face large areas of vegetation.
- Put woodpiles and liquid propane gas tanks at least 30 feet from all structures and clear away flammable vegetation within 10 feet of those woodpiles and propane tanks.
- Check out additional resouorces on the National Fire Protection Association’s (NFPA) Firewise Communities website for homeowners.
- Check out the Federal Alliance for Safe Homes interactive WildFIRE Wizard tool designed to help those in wildfire prone areas understand how landscaping, terrain and structural features increase or decrease a home’s vulnerability during a wildfire. Input details about features including windows, doors, roof, exterior walls and landscaping and create a customized report that includes specific recommendations about how to reduce your home’s potential to ignite during a wildfire.
Be sure to head over to “Wildfire” to read the excellent information on dealing with wildfires before, during, and after they hit.