Don’t Think It Will Be Easy to Fireproof California
Millions of the state’s residents live in the danger zones where development and nature meet.
People, meet Mother Nature.
Photographer: Mario Tama/Getty ImagesA few miles west of the Northern California city of Redding is the local station of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, aka CalFire. Most of the area along state Highway 299 between the city and the station is now scorched earth, with only foundations and chimneys and heavily singed trees remaining of the residential neighborhood devastated this summer by the Carr Fire, which burned 229,651 acres and destroyed 1,079 homes and 22 commercial buildings.
The CalFire station, though, is still standing. When I drove by it in mid-September there was a big sign out front reading “DEFENSIBLE SPACE?” To the right, amid a small but thick stand of trees and undergrowth, was a “NO” sign. To the left, among well-spaced trees with nothing growing between them, was a “YES.”