It's a bitch - do you stay and protect your livelihood in your house or business, knowing that sometimes being there can make all the difference to saving it? Or do you go - these fires would suggest a precedent that going is less risky to life.
Neither: you build bushfire-proof homes. I've got friends who live in a timber home bordering a National Park who've done just this; they've things similar to the sort of automatic sprinklers you get in office buildings, except mounted on the outside of the roof, fed by large water tanks that are kept permanently full
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Well - it sounds great. But how come more people don't have this kind of setup? There have been so many fires in the last decade, even, that surely people would have thought of more foolproof ways to preserve their homes? I dunno. And I'm not sure about the design - even if the system runs on gravity and the tanks are full, what if the water tanks are somehow damaged? I've seen pictures of all kinds of sturdy metal stuff just melted away in these fires. What if the tap and pipe infrastructure is damaged? You would need some kind of 'layer' system so that the protective water mechanism is itself protected.
That said, what your friends have done shows foresight, kind of a cool apocalypse survival technique, though I hope they never have to use it.
Well - it sounds great. But how come more people don't have this kind of setup?
For the same reason why there are still people living on the San Andreas fault in houses that aren't earthquake-proof (for example). A little bit of "lack of forethought" and a large amount of "lack of money". These sorts of things are becoming increasingly common on newly-built bushland housing, but I don't know of any of these systems being retrofitted to old housing stock.
(however, you wouldn't notice it unless you were looking: the only external sign is a couple of inch-high metal bits on the peak of the roof)
And you can bet your arse that no landlord is ever going to pay to fit this to their rental properties unless they're legally compelled to do so; there are a lot of renters up in the mountains.
And I'm not sure about the design - even if the system runs on gravity and the tanks are full, what if the water tanks are somehow damaged?If you're placing the tanks outside the radius of the sprayers, you need to bury both tank and pipes
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Neither: you build bushfire-proof homes. I've got friends who live in a timber home bordering a National Park who've done just this; they've things similar to the sort of automatic sprinklers you get in office buildings, except mounted on the outside of the roof, fed by large water tanks that are kept permanently full ( ... )
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That said, what your friends have done shows foresight, kind of a cool apocalypse survival technique, though I hope they never have to use it.
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For the same reason why there are still people living on the San Andreas fault in houses that aren't earthquake-proof (for example). A little bit of "lack of forethought" and a large amount of "lack of money". These sorts of things are becoming increasingly common on newly-built bushland housing, but I don't know of any of these systems being retrofitted to old housing stock.
(however, you wouldn't notice it unless you were looking: the only external sign is a couple of inch-high metal bits on the peak of the roof)
And you can bet your arse that no landlord is ever going to pay to fit this to their rental properties unless they're legally compelled to do so; there are a lot of renters up in the mountains.
And I'm not sure about the design - even if the system runs on gravity and the tanks are full, what if the water tanks are somehow damaged?If you're placing the tanks outside the radius of the sprayers, you need to bury both tank and pipes ( ... )
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