By Jessianne CastleEBS ENVIRONMENTAL & OUTDOORS EDITOR
BIG SKY – Sixty-four percent of homes in
Montana are tucked among trees and sage, within an area known as the
wildland-urban interface. This region, recognized as a land-use type by federal
agencies, county officials and the fire department, is defined as an area where
homes and flammable vegetation meet. Approximately 90 percent of homes in Big
Sky exist within this category.
Currently, there are about 4,200 homes in Big Sky and 90 percent of them are within this wildland-urban interface, according to Big Sky Deputy Fire Chief Dustin Tetrault. He added that an estimated 2,000 more homes are expected to pop up throughout the mountain town’s forest over the next 10 years.
Facing such growth projections and aware
of the warming climate that is making the fire season longer and more intense,
the Big Sky Fire Department partnered with Bozeman’s Headwaters Economics on
Sept. 18 to host a Building for Wildfire Summit at Buck’s T-4 Lodge.
Approximately 100 of the area’s architects, builders, county government officials, fire personal, private business owners and residents piled into the conference room. Research engineer Daniel Gorham with the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety shared the latest science in fire-resistant building materials, while physical scientist Jack Cohen, now retired from the U.S. Forest Service, discussed wildfire behavior.
“Wildland-urban fire disasters are a home
ignition problem not a wildfire problem,” Cohen said. “There are things that we
can do that are easy.”
Kathy Clay, Battalion Chief Fire Marshal
in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and Vail, Colorado’s Wildland Program Manager Paul
Cada shared experiences within their own mountain communities in order to
explore best practices and potential solutions to create a fire-resilient
community.
The speakers’ recommendations were clear:
build homes using fire-resistant designs and materials, minimize flammable
items around the exterior of a home, and participate in community-wide wildfire
risk reduction ethics.