Wildfire Safety Tips When Hiking and Outdoors
Find out wildfire safety tips if you plan on being outside in wildfire prone areas during wildfire season including what not to do and suggested supplies.
Explore strategies for wildfire mitigation that will help reduce the risk of damage to your home and surrounding areas with expert guidance from the WFCA.
Published:April 11, 2023
Edited:September 17, 2024
Explore strategies for wildfire mitigation that will help reduce the risk of damage to your home and surrounding areas with expert guidance from the WFCA.
As housing developments spread and the wildland-urban interface grows, there is a greater risk of wildfire threatening human lives and structures. Individuals can take steps to reduce the risk of fire damaging their own property. It is also highly effective to connect with your community in areas with high fire danger and engage in risk mitigation programs to reduce fire danger throughout your neighborhood.
Before a fire threatens your home, you can practice wildfire mitigation strategies to stop or slow fires. These precautions make your house more likely to resist damage from fire. Wildfire mitigation strategies also help protect your neighborhood and the firefighters defending your community from fire.
Clearing any possible fuel that could ignite in your area is the first step to reducing fire risk. There are also several strategies to help mitigate the damage that wildfire can cause to your house.1
Firewise USA® is a national program that offers a framework for communities and neighborhoods to collaborate and reduce wildfire risk. A Firewise® site is any natural and/or landscaped area around a home that is designed to improve the structure’s chance of surviving a wildfire.
Firewise USA® has a set of specific criteria that communities can follow to maximize their home’s resistance to wildfire. This includes organizing a neighborhood committee, performing a community wildfire risk assessment, and engaging in education and risk reduction activities.2
You can build out the defensible space around your house to act as a buffer between the home and any trees, grass, or shrubs nearby. This will help slow the spread of fire. The area of defensible space around your home, called the home ignition zone, is divided into three areas.
Incorporating hearty, fire-resistant plants into your landscaping can reduce the risk of fire spreading on your property. Fire-resistant plants have moist leaves, watery sap, and thick bark that keep them from easily combusting.4
However, even fire-resistant plants can be damaged or killed by fire if they are not maintained. Ensure your plants are more likely to resist wildfire by regularly watering, fertilizing, pruning, and clearing away dead branches and dry debris.5
To prepare your home for the possibility of wildfires, you can implement home-hardening techniques. Protect your house from flames, embers, and sparks by using fire-resistant building materials and a fire-safe home design.6
In addition to individual actions to protect your home and property, an essential way to mitigate wildfire damage is by engaging your community. Neighbors can share home-hardening resources and take care of shared defensible space. A community wildfire protection plan (CWPP) can help identify local risks, plan ways to mitigate those dangers and establish risk reduction activities within the community.9 One important example of a community risk reduction activity is working to reduce flammable fuel on federal and non-federal land. This may include prescribed burns or home hardening and defensible space strategies implemented throughout the community.10
High- and medium-risk communities should discuss wildfire mitigation practices that residents can collectively take in the area. For example, the Firewise® defensible space framework helps to bring communities together to create and implement local plans to protect their homes against the risk of wildfire. Implementing a CWPP can follow a structure similar to the one outlined below:
Find out wildfire safety tips if you plan on being outside in wildfire prone areas during wildfire season including what not to do and suggested supplies.
Learn how the elements of the fire triangle drive fire behavior from WFCA. Understand the science behind wildfires, fuel and ignition in fire management.
Get detailed information on fire season in the US from the Western Fire Chiefs Association (WFCA). Learn when it starts, regions most affected, how it's changing and more.