You have a lot to say about fire defense in the Santa Monica Mountains and the urban interface, but if I can boil it down to a paragraph, it’s this: “Once a wind-driven firestorm goes out of control - and that can happen in minutes - no fire department is equipped to knock it down. That means citizens building homes in the Santa Monica Mountains and the urban interface have to accept responsibility for their own homes and property.”
Correct. The responsibility for home safety has to shift to the homeowner.
Let’s go back a bit. Where were you for the Broad, Franklin and Palisades Fires?
Broad Fire, I was at my business which is located in Agoura Hills, building pump systems. I didn’t feel the urgency as the fire was mere feet away from the Great Pacific Fire Break and resources were heavy including the first activation of our newly formed LA County Community Fire Brigade.
Great Pacific Break is good. Years ago a Fire Captain told me: “Malibu has the best firebreak in the country: The Pacific Ocean.”
Franklin Fire, I was boots on the ground immediately. I was part of the Community Brigade Division that protected the Malibu Pacific Church and was directly involved in the save of their preschool, other duties on that fire were mopping up spot fires up on the knolls and down throughout Serra Retreat.
Palisades Fire, I was in the thick of it for days, from Rustic Canyon, to Pacific Palisades, Big Rock and beyond, it was a real heavy and heartbreaking event.
Were you threatened by any of them?
Well being boots on the ground I am directly putting my life in a very dangerous situation , but due to my training, experience, critical thinking, equipment, and strict adherence to the rules of fire fighting I minimized the chances of a bad outcome.
You lived on Malibu Road for quite a while but now live at Malibou Lake.
Yes, 18 years on the road, we moved to Malibou Lakeside summer before last,
Were you there before or after Woolsey, because I think Malibou Lake got scorched by Woolsey?
I lived on Malibu Road during Woolsey and yes Malibou Lake area got scorched badly.
You saved Calamigos during the Woolsey Fire and I’m sure they are very glad of that.
Yes, everyone involved in the Calamigos Ranch from the owners to all the employees are more than glad we pulled that one off. I was not alone in that accomplishment, we had trained a number of their ground staff, regularly did drills, and religiously maintained the equipment.
On the phone you said you used a million gallons of water to defend Calamigos? Where did that come from?
In the 1978 big Kanan Fire, Calamigos burned to the ground. The Gersons lost everything. The lake I used to defend the ranch during the Woolsey Fire, in 1978 Glen Gerson dived into it and saved his life. For the Woolsey fire we used about 700,000 gallons from the lake and another 150,000 gallons from the pools, and the rest from hydrants. We had multiple pump systems and the pump in the lake was moving at 3500 gallons of water a minute. We also had sprinklers that are three feet long and they were doing 750 gallons a minute.
We were only about 75% built in at that time, so we also had Lady Luck on our side.
And LACO or CalFire equipment there?
It was my truck and their water trucks and their crew of about 18 - all trained by us. There were no firefighters from outside. The story of Calamigos hasn’t been told and it was probably the largest wildfire save in the state if not the country.
When people complain about the Palisades Fire and say that reservoirs weren’t full and hydrants weren’t working, I say that when the wind is blowing 80 MPH and heat is bending steel, you could have dumped every gallon of water in LA County on that firestorms and it would have made zero difference.
For the most part, the general public has unrealistic expectations of what our fire departments are capable of. There is an extremely small window to control a fire start on a red flag day, and that window is five acres. If it can’t be held to that, it’s going to burn until one of two things occur: The fire hitting the ocean or the wind either stopping or shifting thus blowing the fire back into the black which is the area previously burned. There is not a City in this world that has the infrastructure to deliver the amount of water needed to combat a wind-driven fire. Dry hydrants have always been a routine side effect of our wildfires.
These fires have inspired choruses of kvetchers the same way police sirens inspire howling choruses of coyote in Legacy Park. Some of the kvetching is along the lines of “California has no forest or brush management.” When I’m arguing online, I usually say: “Firestorms are brush management and forest management. Humans are just in the way of a natural process.”
Fires have been burning our hills and mountains for a millennia, the difference now is people are building homes and choosing to live where maybe they shouldn’t. I think it was Juan Cabrillo the Spanish explorer, he arrived off our coast in 1542 , the hills were on fire and the sky was covered in smoke. He named San Pedro Bay, “Bahia de Los Fumos o Fuegos” Although this fire started in the brush, once it got into the neighborhoods the homes became the fuel. A combination of unhardened homes in high density areas with a lack of defensible space led to the urban conflagration.
Did you have any other successes during the Woolsey Fire?
We enabled many successful defenses during the Woolsey Fire . Pre-Woolsey our systems were not fully automated. We built manned standalone pump systems and trained the home owners how to use them. We would use gels and other additives to enable homeowners to Gel their properties and evacuate to safety, or stay and defend through proper training and auxiliary safety equipment.
How many homes in Malibu and Palisades are employing your system right now?
Currently we have maybe 25 homes with fully autonomous systems requiring no human involvement, and over the years probably another 75-100 non-autonomous systems.
How long does it take to install it and what is the range of costs?
Length of time depends on the property. Our systems are not off the shelf components. Our pump systems are proprietary and custom built for each property. Our sprinklers - which we refer to as RainGuns - are not the type available at your local garden or hardware store. Our wildfire sensors are also built in house and can detect a square foot of flame at a quarter mile.
Range of cost: our Portable Fire cart systems start at $7k, a hard-mounted manned system starts around $25k, a Series One fully autonomous system will start around $110k, and our Estate systems start around $220k.
Do homeowners who use your system get breaks on fire insurance?
Most of our clients with our fully autonomous systems have had drastic reductions in their premiums. A few have solely gotten coverage due to them, and a couple have had reductions so large the system paid for itself within the first year. We regularly meet with insurance underwriters at our clients’ homes to help them achieve coverage.
One client up one of the canyons had our system for three years and then AIG pulled out of the market. He called me, panicked, because the best price he could find for coverage was $700K a year. Through one of the companies who really likes our systems, we got him coverage for $120K a year. Total savings to date, well over $2,500,000
To quote Spicoli: “Righteous bucks!” Can you point to homes in Malibu and Palisades that were protected by your system while the rest of the neighborhood was destroyed?
We only had four homes with fully autonomous systems in the direct path of the Palisades Fire. Three survived, but unfortunately we lost one. They were all up in Big Rock which was one of the Malibu neighborhoods that got utterly decimated by the Palisades Fire.
When we were talking on the phone you said you saved the home of a well known actor. I saw the aerial photos. The houses around looked like they’d been hit by a Death Star or something, but the actor’s house was still standing.
That house had a complete property system protecting all the landscaping as well. We were able to achieve that save due to the fact he had a pool which held about 45,000 gallons which is equivalent to 90 Type One fire trucks on site.
That’s their private reservoir? Not city or county water?
Yes, all of the people I work with have to have their own water supply. We do nothing on municipal water. There's companies doing stuff with municipal water and I think it's highly irresponsible, because as we know, the hydrants go dry.
Is it correct in Palisades the water pressure in the tanks was created by the weight of the water?
Well it’s not just the weight of the water, but its the weight of the water and the elevation of where the water tank is located. For every 2.3 feet of elevation you get one PSI. So if you want 100 PSI you need the tank 230 feet above the neighborhood.
What is the ideal PSI?
The more the better. The problem in the neighborhoods of Malibu is the water’s pumped out along PCH and then additional pumps are required to flow water up to the tanks in the canyons above the neighborhoods. For instance, Big Rock has three pump stations and Big Rock was supposedly the only neighborhood that had hardened the water system, meaning the neighbors of Big Rock worked with the water district, and there were three backup generators on the pumps to fill it in the event of power loss - which we always have in our big wildfires.
So what happened in Big Rock was: when the water district installed the generators, they chose to run the power line to the transfer switch in PVC conduit above the ground.
The very first generator at the bottom was taken out as the fire came across the field where it was sitting, and it was down. So the tanks up on the hills aren't refilling because there's no power. And then as homes burn in the neighborhood, every home, all the burned pipes, water is pouring out of the foundation.
Your pumps are custom-made by your team and powered by propane?
Yes.
Zuma Jay said he goes around and turns off water in houses that are leaking.
Every home is free flowing water. So basically, the tank’s draining because of all the burned homes, and there's nothing refilling the tank, and there is no water left in the hydrants for the fire trucks to pump or refill.
So again you’re saying, you can’t rely on municipal systems. Your pumps run on propane. You have your own water supply. It’s self contained, and it works.
Correct. What we build is known as a standalone system. The world could be collapsing around and it’s not going to affect our ability to pump water and protect your home.
Do you think every home in Malibu should have a standalone system?
Everything in wildfire defense is a layer, and a standalone system is the last layer. Home hardening and defensible space are the most important aspects of trying to protect a home.
We’ll get into that in part two.
Thank you.