NFPA Journal - July/August 2017 - 77

Wildfire by Lucian Deaton

NEWS FROM NFPA'S
WILDLAND FIRE
OPERATIONS DIVISION

Structural Lessons
WHAT WILDLAND FIREFIGHTING AGENCIES CAN LEARN FROM STRUCTURAL
FIREFIGHTERS ABOUT FACING THE CHALLENGE OF AN ESCALATING FIRE THREAT

t might seem odd to think

increased significantly over the past
that current fire science
two decades, and these fires are having
research on the spread
a dramatic impact on federal budgets.
of interior structure fires
Between 2000 and 2016, annual federal
could shed light on a
fire suppression costs surpassed $1 billion
growing wildfire issue. A wildland fire
in every year but four.
and a house fire, after all, are affected
In many cases, the scale and scope
by different variables, require different
of the changing wildfire problem are
response techniques, and call for differpresenting firefighting agencies with
ent equipment. Yet both types of fires
challenges that their training has not
have changed dramatically in recent
prepared them to anticipate or handle.
decades, and the ways the fire service has
As wildfires behave differently than we've
adapted to the new realities of structure
come to expect, the answer is not just
Like their
fire hold important lessons for how wildthrowing more wet stuff on the red stuff.
counterparts on the
land firefighting agencies can approach
Sensational approaches, such as Boeing's
the new reality of wildfire.
2016 patent for artillery shell-delivered
structural side,
The parallels struck me recently as I
wildfire retardant, aren't likely to achieve
wildland firefighting
revisited an NFPA Journal article from a
the necessary adaptation to this new
agencies have
couple years ago. "New Fires, New Tacthreat, just as adding more trucks won't
observed changes
tics," which appeared in the January 2015
sufficiently help the fire service adapt to
in fire behavior
issue, details the research being done on
the changing dynamic in structural fires.
for years.
modern residential structural fire behavInstead, wildfire agencies and land
ior. The gist is that modern construction
management organizations should
materials and methods, as well as the conconsider how the fire service came to
tents of home furnishings, have led to fires
understand the emerging shift in the
that can burn much more aggressively
structural fire threat and how it identified
and pose greater dangers to inhabitants and responders alike. the necessary changes to training, response, and fire education to
Fires that used to take more than 20 minutes to reach flashover meet it. Like their counterparts on the structural side, wildland
can now reach the same point in under five. This significant shift agencies have observed changes in fire behavior for years, and
in the severity of the hazard is changing how fire departments this anecdotal evidence can inform further scientific study. As
train and respond to fires, the equipment they use to do it, and science helps us understand the new wildfire dynamic, we need
the resources they deploy to educate and inform the public.
to apply that knowledge to planning and strategy, including how
Similarly, the nature of wildfire is changing. Variables includ- we communicate with the public in both preparation and emering a warming planet, drought, and excess fuel loads have gency scenarios. Our training needs to adapt to accommodate
caused wildfires to take off faster, burn more aggressively, and new expectations and firefighting techniques, and our equipment
become larger than ever before. Millions more acres of wildland needs to complement those techniques.
are burning each season compared to what we saw just a few
In one way or another, structural firefighters are already
decades ago; between 2000 and 2016, a total of approximately addressing their version of these issues, and the wildfire world
114 million acres burned in the United States, compared to about needs to do the same. The scale of the wildfire challenge cer51 million acres over the previous 17-year span (1983 to 1999), tainly goes beyond a single structure, but so do the stakes.
according to the National Interagency Fire Center. The annual
number of megafires-fires larger than 100,000 acres-has LUCIAN DEATON is a project manager in NFPA's Wildfire Division.

MICHAEL HOEWELER

N F PA J O U R N A L . O R G * NFPA JOURNAL

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - July/August 2017