February 20, 2024 • 35 mins
February 20, 2024
123. Disaster Prep Essentials for Every Homeowner with Roy Wright
In today's eye-opening episode, we dive deep into the critical importance of preparing homes to withstand the wrath of severe weather and wildfires. George Siegal's guest is Roy Wright, CEO of the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety. Roy talks about practical steps homeowners can take to fortify their homes against natural disasters. Discover the innovative testing methods used to simulate catastrophic conditions and understand why building to higher standards is not just an option, but a necessity. This conversation sheds light on the stark realities of disaster impact and offers actionable insights for enhancing home safety and resilience. Whether it's facing hurricanes, wildfires, or other severe events, learn how to give your home a fighting chance in the face of nature's fury. Don't miss this crucial discussion on safeguarding your most valuable asset – your home.
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Website: https://ibhs.org/
Website: https://fortifiedhome.org/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/IBHSorg
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ibhs_org/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/institute-for-business-&-home-safety/
X: https://twitter.com/IBHS_org
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Here's the link to the trailer for the documentary film I'm making: Built to Last: Buyer Beware.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
George Siegal (00:00):
In today's program, you are going to learn
some important things that youcan do to save your home.
It's one thing to talk abouthow a house will perform in a
major disaster.
It's another to actually see itput to the test.
When you see a live example ofwind or fire destroying a house,
you get a clear picture ofwhat's going to get destroyed
and what has a chance ofsurviving.
(00:21):
My guest today is Roy Wright,the CEO of the Insurance
Institute for Business and HomeSafety.
Their focus is to identify waysto strengthen homes and
businesses to reduce damagecaused by severe weather and
wildfires.
I'm George Siegal, and this isHomeowners Be Aware, the podcast
that teaches you everything youneed to know about being a
(00:42):
homeowner.
Roy, thank you so much forjoining me today.
Roy Wright (00:46):
It's so good to be with you, George.
George Siegal (00:48):
Yeah, I really appreciate your time.
You were in my documentary film, the Last House Standing.
You played a big part of thatfilm and I really like the work
you guys do For people who don'tknow about you.
Tell us about that amazingtesting facility you have and
the kind of things that go on inthere.
Roy Wright (01:03):
Yeah, so the Insurance Institute for Business
and Home Safety I'll call itIBHS, but the Institute.
It's been around since the late70s, but about 15 years ago the
insurance industry cametogether and said there's a
whole set of things that wedon't understand well enough
about how mother nature crashesinto people's homes, and we got
(01:25):
to do something about that.
We're in the wake of what wewatched Florida 04, hurricanes,
katrina in 05, and thenLouisiana and Texas again
getting hit in 08.
And so they looked at wind,rain, hail and ultimately
brought wildfire.
I'll give you that moment.
And so we're a nonprofit 501c3Research Institute that is
(01:49):
looking to fill the gap inunderstanding how the built
environment performs againstmother nature.
So what do we do?
We literally recreated mothernature in a really gigantic box.
So just south of Charlotte,north Carolina, in Richburg,
south Carolina, we have afacility.
(02:10):
It imagine a six-story airplanehangar, but across one wall are
105 turbines and we can't eachof those turbines six feet
across.
We can recreate cat three-ishup to some of the elements the
gusts into fours of hurricanes,135 mile an hour, hurricane
(02:35):
elements, and we do all of thistesting then against structures
at full scale.
There are other research placesthat'll build dollhouses and
test them for pressure loads andthat is an important role, I
guess, in some of the science.
But we don't do dollhouses, wedo full-size structures in this
space and we test the variousdimensions against wind, wind
(03:00):
and rain, as well as hail.
And then we have a uniquecapability in the wildfire lane.
Again, we're doing it at fullscale, but we're the only
facility that can recreatewildfire, ember storms.
That's how those conflagrationsout west occur Something burns
(03:23):
and it becomes embers that startflying forward.
Well, we recreate that and wecan watch the point of attack
from a structure to structurebasis, have the wind dimensions
brought in and, again, just theonly facility that can fill
those gaps.
George Siegal (03:38):
Yeah, we used some of that footage in my film,
the Last House Standing, andit's really powerful to see that
.
And it's even more frighteningwhen you see how a house blows
apart and you're saying categorythree may be close to a
category four and then trying toimagine sustained winds in a
category five, what that woulddo.
It's really a powerful exampleof seeing all those forces at
(03:58):
work.
Roy Wright (03:59):
It is, and for us it serves those two purposes.
On the one side, there'sscientific information we need
to collect so that we can designbetter, but the other piece is
most of us, most Americans,cannot imagine that bad day.
They can't imagine beingpummeled by the wildfire.
They can't imagine the catthree or cat four actually
(04:24):
getting to them Someone elsewill get it, I won't and
bringing people inside that riskin a way by which they can
imagine it is one of the mostpowerful ways to communicate
risk, yeah, and we'veinterviewed people from my
current film that actually havelived through category four and
category five hurricanes.
George Siegal (04:41):
They've lost everything and you never want to
end up like that.
Roy Wright (04:45):
Anything you can do to avoid that, you want to do
that worst day the one you can'tever imagine coming or invading
your home, displaces so much ofyour family, disrupts so much
of your life and really drivesso much financial uncertainty.
(05:06):
In short or not, there's somuch that that brings to the
table.
It's hard and I think thatwe've got more and more work to
do in the space to be able tobuild because we do know how to
build to withstand much of whatwill come our way.
George Siegal (05:25):
You were very close to the Paradise Fire
situation.
You had family there.
How are they doing now?
How is everybody?
Roy Wright (05:32):
Yeah, so my parents as well as my brother lived in
Paradise, California, before thefire came through.
They lost their homes.
They were insured and pieceshave played out on that side.
But you know, they temporarilymoved to the next city over.
(05:53):
But my mom came back.
She is in a townhouse inParadise.
My brother is just north of thecity limits in McHalea.
They're really committed to thelife and vitality of that
community and it's really hardbecause they're not even they're
(06:18):
nowhere close even to half ofthe tax base being back.
George Siegal (06:22):
Wow that's pretty unbelievable because that was
2018, right, so that's been along time.
Roy Wright (06:29):
Yeah, it's a very, very long road to see the
vitality and robust nature of acommunity's economy come back.
George Siegal (06:41):
Now that kind of brings me to what I wanted to
ask you for my next question,but we can also apply it to
Paradise.
When they built back, did theydo anything different?
I know wildfires different thanhurricane, possibly and how you
prepare, but is Paradiserebuilding with wildfires in
mind?
Because I'm not seeing that inMexico Beach so much?
I don't know about Fort Myersyet.
(07:02):
We were down there because it'stoo early, but what are you
seeing or what are they tellingyou about Paradise rebuilding?
Roy Wright (07:08):
So Paradise is rebuilding back, very mindful of
this risk.
So they have the top end of thebuilding code in place.
They incorporated elements ofdefensible space and the
certifications that are tied tothat into their land use codes.
Now they just need to have thepatience and the
(07:35):
stick-to-itiveness not to backoff.
Because I contrast Paradisewith Santa Rosa, the coffee park
at Tubbs Fire and 1,200 homeswere lost in one community they
built back because they were notin the map.
Dairy that required thewildfire, the wooly building
code pieces they didn'tincorporate it.
(07:57):
In fact they built the homeseven closer together.
And you watch this, that speedturns into haste.
They have a near-term need toget the economy back, to get the
folks in the community back,and I don't hold that against
anyone.
(08:17):
But these calamities come back.
They revisit communities insuccessive decades and you gotta
apply what you've learned.
A good friend of mine from aretired professor, craig Colton
from LSU, who loves to talkabout lessons lost, because so
(08:41):
few of the lessons and disastersare learned, they're observed
and many of the lessons are justlost.
George Siegal (08:51):
Yeah, that's a very powerful and true statement
and we saw it firsthand inMexico Beach when we went up
there and we interviewed agentleman who was a floodplain
manager and he was telling ushow they originally changed the
flood level rating.
They raised it up still nothigh enough that would have
survived Hurricane Michael, butthey raised it.
But pressure from the residentsby 2020 was so strong they
(09:13):
lowered it again.
So the code is nowhere close towhat would withstand another
powerful category five hurricaneand certainly not a 20-foot
storm surge.
Why do you think that happens?
Roy Wright (09:28):
Because politicians have a very short time horizon.
So I watched this in Louisiana.
So communities of Baton Rougeand Livingston had put in those
extra layers of protection.
So in their highest hazard forflood of their floodplain they
put an extra three feetrequirement of elevation.
(09:49):
It says we're gonna buildhigher and they had had this in
place for a number of years.
And then there was a great daylose.
That happened in 2016.
They got 39 inches of rain on aday 39 inches and three months
later they removed therequirement to build higher.
George Siegal (10:10):
And there's some short-term economic drivers that
I'll never win the argumentagainst, but as I look over the
life of just the next 10 yearsof living in that home, that is
unwise very unwise and we see alot of unwise up in the
panhandle where there's onebuilder we won't name him, dr
(10:32):
Horton who's doing a lot ofslab-on-grade houses that are
really close to the water and Iunderstand that particular area.
The flood designation isn'tthat high but we had a couple
experts up there tell us waterdoesn't know where to stop.
You've now seen 20 feet ofwater.
It doesn't stop at A Street andnot go to B Street, so it
really seems like people aremoving in from out of state.
(10:55):
They're taking a risk and itjust had the twilight zone,
feeling that it could happenagain there and be really bad.
Roy Wright (11:02):
This is why building codes are so important.
I know that for most peoplethey think about building codes
and like, oh, there must be someinstruction book.
They keep it city hall for thebuilders.
Most folks just don'tunderstand what it is and there
are some instructions that areincluded there.
But building codes are aboutsafety and survivability.
(11:25):
That's why they are in place.
And you look in these elementsthat the point that a builder
comes in to a community, youknow they most have a three year
time horizon on theirinvestment, so they're concerned
about the risk during thatwindow.
(11:45):
But then a homeowner they makethis purchase becomes the
biggest, most valuable assetthey have and they now have to
carry the entire tail of thatrisk.
And so I look at whether you'reputting slab on grade in a
flood prone area, not giving theelevation you need not putting
the right kind of wind loads andbuilding for those purposes.
(12:07):
We know those events not onlycan happen, but they will happen
in that area.
And so how do you get theprivate economy chugging in the
right direction?
You put the right Jerseybarriers in place to nudge them
in those places, because theyknow how to build more resources
and build more resilient andthere may be a small increment.
(12:30):
It may add three or 5% to thecost of that home upfront.
But that becomes value.
That increases with the valuehome and lowers the operational
cost, particularly in the caseof insurance, let alone what it
takes to rebuild.
George Siegal (12:47):
Yeah, I wonder how many of these people are
gonna get insurance.
Now, all the houses that are onthe water side of the highway
seem to be elevated 10 to 14feet, but now the framing is all
wood.
Roy Wright (12:58):
And I had an engineer tell us.
George Siegal (12:59):
I don't presume to know anything as much as you
guys.
That's why I try to talk topeople a lot smarter than me,
which is a wide open field.
They say when you're up higherthe wind is actually stronger,
that a woodhouse on stiltsraised up might be more
vulnerable up there and thatthey really should be building
with concrete block.
Is it crazy that they'rebuilding with wood?
Roy Wright (13:21):
So it's not crazy that they're building with wood.
What the science says is youneed to design, you need to
engineer for the continuous loadpath that's going to come.
It has so much to do with theconnections.
It's less about the wall thanhow the wall connects to the
roof, how the wall connects tothe foundation pieces that are
(13:44):
there.
I hear you.
You know, using concrete blocksappear stronger and they
absolutely are strong.
My dad was a bricklayer.
I'm all on board down the ICFline of the equation, but I
would caution us just to go oh,wood must be flimsy.
If you engineer that structureand particularly deal with those
(14:11):
elements, we can engineer awood frame construction building
to withstand those very highwinds.
It can be done.
There's trade-offs and buildingapproaches that are there.
I'm a bit more agnostic onwhich approach you take Really
firmly in the lane that says thecontinuous load path, which is
how the floor, the walls and theroof all connect together so
(14:37):
that you can let the wind circlearound it rather than break it
apart.
George Siegal (14:43):
Yeah, you know, to me it's like seeing the house
we featured in the last housestanding, the one that survived
on the beach.
That was built out of concrete.
It was tested in a categoryfive.
It survived.
Everything around it did not.
But they're not building backaround that house that way.
It's like you see somebody witha bulletproof vest that works,
(15:03):
and then somebody comes up witha different vest and they go
yeah, this should be okay.
No, I would agree.
Roy Wright (15:07):
I want the vest.
That worked.
Yeah, clearly the ICF approachis super strong if it's done
properly, right.
But you can screw that piece upas well.
What I'll tell you abouteverything else that was in that
neighborhood?
Florida had pulled back oncodes along the panhandle.
They were designing to lowerwind speeds.
(15:28):
Just 200 miles away, they wereemploying different standards
that they knew were better, butsomeone made a short-term choice
, to use a technical term.
There was a recency bias.
I talked to folks it can'thappen to the panhandle, right?
We don't get hurricanes here,let alone strong hurricanes here
(15:51):
.
Which is to say, I haven't seenhurricanes here, I haven't seen
strong hurricanes here, andyour life is way shorter than
history.
George Siegal (16:06):
Yeah, and you've probably seen the pictures of
that house in Panama City thathas now blown over twice and it
happened in January with atornado.
Do you know the picture I'mtalking about?
I've seen it.
Roy Wright (16:20):
I have not been on the ground there, so I want to
be cautious about coming to afirm conclusion there.
And I'm not asking you for aconclusion, I just want to give
you a thought, but what I willtell you is a building, a newly
constructed building, should beable to withstand what came
through.
George Siegal (16:42):
Yeah, and right behind that building we got a
lot of footage of that entireblock of apartments that looked
like they were brick but theywere really old, that were
completely leveled.
Roy Wright (16:52):
Because of unreinforced masonry in a wind
event we'll go down.
George Siegal (16:56):
Yeah, so is there anything with newer
construction of survived thekind of tornado that rolled
through there?
Absolutely.
Roy Wright (17:02):
We know how to construct to withstand 135 mile
an hour coming through.
So, particularly EF-012, ifyou're using the high wind
engineering that is available inthis country, you can withstand
.
There's no question about this.
You just have to choose to doit.
You go down to the Miami-Dadestandards that people talk about
(17:24):
.
Well, the reason why they talkabout them so much is because
they are so strong and, to theircredit, they've been relentless
about it, because they knowwhat can come their way.
Well, how do you take thosepieces in the bottom third of
Florida and pull them through?
It requires politicalleadership, because we know
these things can happen.
(17:44):
But the kind of thing that cameback through Panama City should
have been survivable for newconstruction.
Yeah, for that house to stilllike that.
George Siegal (17:54):
You need to get down there and see it.
It was unbelievable.
We got pictures and video fromthe water side and the other
side.
It doesn't even look real.
It looks like a movie set wherethey just tipped something over
and then to find out ithappened to them one other time.
That is really bad luck.
Roy Wright (18:11):
There is something about the workmanship there that
I would ask some questionsabout.
Yeah, there's no question aboutthat Now.
George Siegal (18:17):
Yet the other day I interviewed a gentleman who's
the CEO of the Tampa HousingAuthority and it was interesting
what he told me.
For their residents they'reonly building concrete block
apartment buildings, yet allthroughout Florida they're
building huge apartmentcomplexes out of wood.
We saw it in the Panhandle, wesaw it in Tallahassee and Pasco
(18:38):
County and here in Tampa, like amile from my house, there's a
huge four building complex allof wood, right on the water.
That seems kind of crazy.
Roy Wright (18:49):
So I think that this is an element where I'll leave
you to tell you that you getmore value out of that.
So I'll remain agnostic.
I'm not going to tell you oneis superior to the other, but I
will tell you that when you dothat block construction there's
energy efficiencies, they pickup, there's absolute ability to
withstand high winds, presumingthat the roof is attached
(19:11):
properly, because there's not ablock roof on that structure.
But I do think that that's aplace where resilience and
energy efficiencies, thesustainability elements, all
come together and I hope we seemore of that.
I think, for the people wholive in that new apartment
(19:34):
building or complex you'retalking about, they're going to
see value.
They're going to see value intheir operational cost of
heating and cooling.
They're going to see resiliencevalue in that space.
They're probably going to seevalue on the insurance front.
George Siegal (19:49):
That would be nice, and I had an engineer
explain to me why what hethought the risk of wood was
it's where, because of all thewind, where the stucco cracks
and then water gets in.
That's why Florida has such abad termite problem because of
water intrusion.
So I hadn't really even thoughtof that, but it's like, wow,
it's just another thing to worryabout.
Roy Wright (20:08):
Yeah, water intrusion is a very real concern
in all kinds of construction,particularly around windows,
whether that's the stucco aroundthe windows or the like, your
windows and openings are mostvulnerable on that front Now on
your on your research summarypage on the website you rate
states along the Atlantic andGulf Coast based on building
(20:31):
code, adoption, enforcement,contractor licensing.
George Siegal (20:34):
Now Florida and South Carolina scored very well,
but Texas, alabama, mississippiand Georgia did not get a very
good score.
Roy Wright (20:40):
They did not.
George Siegal (20:42):
Why is there such a discrepancy with that?
Roy Wright (20:44):
Because politically, they haven't chosen to do the
right thing.
It really is that simple.
They have not chosen to do theright thing.
We've gotten very close in acouple of rounds on Alabama to
see a statewide code come intoplace.
Maybe this is the year that thelegislature will push it
through.
They do have it for their twocoastal counties in Alabama,
(21:06):
baldwin and Mobile, but theydon't have it farther up.
But those states that you seewith those bottom-end scores do
not have statewide codes.
Let me give you this kind ofperspective on codes, the
genesis of building codes.
It has become the basis of theinternational residential code,
the international building codethat comes from here in the
(21:29):
United States.
I think that most people thinkthat their home was built to a
code, that someone followed aset of guidelines.
It's not an unreasonable thingto think, but it's not true.
About 32% of US jurisdictionsactually have codes in place and
(21:50):
enforced today Only 32%, andthe biggest bulk of that 32% is
generated out of California andFlorida.
But it's this piece that, if youhave a, if you buy a baby crib,
you presume that it met safetystandards and is not going to
(22:13):
endanger your baby.
Yet when we walk into homeswhere our entire family lives.
We have states that are willingto go.
Yeah, let them build what theywant to build.
You choose what you want.
Just, it leaves me in thisspace.
(22:34):
That goes I can't believe thatthe homeowner that comes in
initially, let alone the secondor third generation down of
homeowner, has any ability tocomprehend the kind of risk that
they're taking on because wisechoices weren't made out of the
gate.
George Siegal (22:54):
Yeah, I hear that loud and clear and I'm
surprised people don't ask morequestions.
I think we assume well, this isa complicated thing.
If they can build it, they mustbe building it right.
But we do put much more concernin.
I bet, I guarantee you, mostpeople know more about the
safety features of their carthan the safety features of
their house, and that houseprobably costs 100 times more.
Roy Wright (23:16):
So another corollary though, on autos.
People think they know abouttheir safety features and they
disproportionately do understandthose compared to their home.
But their car was manufacturedat one or two locations in a
controlled environment focusedon unadulterated quality.
(23:37):
Your home could be as many as100,000 systems all being
brought together.
All different kinds ofcontractors came in and did
their piece, combined in thenext piece, the next piece, and
then people start renovatingthose homes and expanding those
(23:58):
homes.
There is no integrated qualitycontrol going on in the place
that you call home.
George Siegal (24:09):
That's why the conductor, I think, is such an
important role.
It's either the superintendenton the job then the person who's
in charge of them.
You need to really interviewyour builder and understand
where are they finding thosesubs?
Who are the people that aredoing all that work?
Because every time I don't aska question it always comes back
to bite me and I feel like I'msomebody that should know better
.
So I imagine most people justassume they're being taken care
(24:31):
of.
Roy Wright (24:32):
They do, and this is why the fortified program that
IBHS runs has become sought outin so many communities, because
it adds a set of standards thatrequire verification.
So there's a roof dimensionthat is most prevalent, but a
fortified gold designation thatlooks at the entire house on new
(24:53):
construction against this windand wind-driven rain risk.
What are you doing with thesepieces?
And as I talked with folks,they go well.
I think it's in my buildingcode.
I'm like no one checked it Likewell, I'm sure there was a
building inspector.
I said do you realize thatbuilding inspectors aren't even
(25:14):
allowed to get on the roof?
I'm like their role isimportant.
I'm not trying to set themaside, but they're not
comprehensively there to seeeach one of the steps.
And so in our fortified programwe require contemporaneous
pictures to be taken geotag tothat location, show us the
(25:35):
connection, show us the nailpattern, show us the sealed roof
deck A little kind ofReaganesque view of it.
We're going to trust, butverify.
George Siegal (25:47):
Well, and I think that's so important.
I wish everybody took advantageof that, because you just don't
know, and in a lot of statesthe building lobby, the builders
lobby, is such a powerfulorganization I know it was in
Texas when I lived there thatyou can't even sue builders
there.
All you can get is arbitrationout of it, and then they just go
out of business and open upwith a new name the next week
(26:08):
and they're building housesagain.
It's like the Wild West and Ithink people have to stop
rewarding that by buying thosekind of homes.
Yeah agreed, but they're notgoing to do it based on me
telling them They've got to bebeaten over the head with that.
So what can a homeowner do,then, to give themselves the
best chance of getting a housethat would protect them from a
(26:29):
disaster?
Roy Wright (26:30):
Yeah, learn enough to ask the questions To your
point.
Very few people buy in homes orexperts in construction, and so
the best we can do is give themthe questions to ask that lead
them down a path.
So let's kind of walk down theperils in sequence.
So, on wind and this is truefor hurricane as well as tornado
(26:53):
prone areas it's about theconnections of the structure,
and so you wanna make sure thatthe roof can withstand the wind.
But if, particularly withasphalt shingles, you are going
to lose those, and are you going, the question then is will you
have water intrusion?
There's a five to seven timesmultiplier on the damage if
(27:15):
water gets in.
So can you seal that roof deckand lock it in.
But then I turn to youropenings.
The biggest opening in any home, the garage door.
The garage door, when it'scompromised, even subtly, it
changes the pressure, creates adifferential.
That basically is a balloonthat explodes.
(27:36):
That's why the roof pops off.
So what can you do?
Ask about your roof, includingwhat's under the shingles.
You want a wind rated garagedoor.
There's a sticker It'll tellyou if it is or is not.
We offer the fortified program.
On those wind side of theequations there are homes along
(27:59):
the Gulf Coast as well as theCarolina Coast that have these
designations.
You should have confidence ifyou're buying something that's
in that space.
We haven't talked about hail,but I think there's elements of
hail about how you look and testand look at the testing that is
out there about what canwithstand hail, but I'll focus
on wildfire.
(28:19):
You can find out if it wasbuilt to the wildfire standard.
It's, from a building codeperspective, california leads
the way there, but we've foundthat, because embers drive so
much of the risk, thatdefensible space is everything
which is the first five feetclosest to your home need to be
(28:43):
entirely noncombustible, andthen five to 30 feet away needs
to be lean and green, and sowe've put together a companion
to fortified on the wildfireside, called Wildfire Prepared
Home.
That is there to help preventignition from embers, so that
when the embers do come and fly,they will land, smolder and
(29:05):
extinguish, because once thatpathway begins to happen and the
house next to you is burning,you create that conflagration of
dominoes that begins to move.
You gotta change yourperspective, though, about what
you want a home to look like andwhat kind of questions you're
gonna ask.
George Siegal (29:26):
Yeah, there was an interesting article that I
read about.
With the Maui fire, one of thehouses, one of the few houses
that survived they had actuallycleared a bunch of stuff away
because of termites and the fearfor something else.
They weren't even thinkingabout fires, but they survived.
Roy Wright (29:40):
Yeah.
So I joined our research teamon some of the post-event
investigation in Lahina and morethan one house survived.
So the first thing is peoplesee on TV the Red Roof house
survived yes, it did, and someothers did as well, but in the
core area, more than 90% of thestructures were lost.
(30:01):
If they survived, defensiblespace played a really, really
key role, To your point.
They were driven by otherthings Termites.
They don't really use a lot ofgutters and so the water rolls
off of the roof, and so peoplewould have rock around their
(30:24):
house so that you could collectthat and move it out without
getting mud.
Well, that all created gooddefensible space in that space.
The other thing that a few ofthe neighborhoods had, that
homes were more likely tosurvive is the houses were
spaced farther apart, which isto say, if the house next to you
(30:44):
wasn't totally engulfed inflames, you had a survivable
chance.
George Siegal (30:50):
Yeah, I mean, that's just a horrible situation
.
I had a friend of mine on wholives over there on a previous
podcast and he said it was justunbelievable that the place is
still fenced off.
You can't even get in there.
Have you guys done muchstudying in how this escalated
so bad and became such a tragedy?
You know?
Roy Wright (31:12):
there are others doing the forensic studies of
the particulars on it.
There's a grass fire thatcatches that they thought was
entirely put out.
There were some smolderingpieces of that that ignited, but
really the tipping pointhappened when it got to
structures, because once it gotto structures, the structures
(31:36):
became the embers that startedcreating the splatter of
ignitions all over the community.
And we watch this every singletime in conflagrations.
Fire will make its move howeverit starts, and sometimes it
starts naturally, and sometimesit starts because of
technological things that fail,and sometimes it starts because
(31:59):
there are stupid human tricksgoing on.
Whatever the ignition is, onceit starts moving particularly
over the day like that where thewinds were as they were that
smoldered ember then got fannedback up and started to make its
progression.
You get the first fewstructures and it creates that
(32:22):
spider web effect.
It was so devastating.
George Siegal (32:26):
Yeah, I mean the stories they told of people.
You know the fire departmentobviously couldn't do anything
at that point, but people had tojump into the ocean to try to
save their lives and everything.
It's just another example ofwhy you want to avoid disaster
at all costs, no matter what youhave to do.
Roy Wright (32:41):
And being able to walk in some of the streets of
Lahaina reminds me so much ofwalking the streets of Paradise,
california.
Some of the same experiencesrelated to evacuation.
I think the evacuation wasbetter in Paradise it was at
least there was an organizationto it in that space but again
(33:06):
just profound loss of life inways that we just we must find
better ways to be prepared,teach folks what to do and then
to act.
George Siegal (33:17):
Yeah, well, keep doing what you do on your end,
because I know you guys arehelping a lot of people with
that kind of research and we'regoing to put the links, I guess,
so people can find you guys andfind fortified, so they can
take advantage of all theseprograms.
Roy Wright (33:32):
Yeah, and then we'll go to testorg.
We'll send you to everything.
Go to fortifiedhome.
org.
We'll give you the elementsthat are there.
You can find us on theInstagram, the Facebook, the
place formerly known as Twitter.
All those kinds of pieces thatare there.
And all of that element iswhere we take our science and
(33:53):
try to translate it forconsumers.
You're not going to stumble intothe engineering differential
equations.
You're going to find somereally practical things.
It says this is what you can do.
These might be the actions youtake for just 500 bucks on a
do-it-yourself.
These might be the actions thatcost you a few thousand dollars
that if you saved up and had acontractor come in and do it,
(34:16):
would better position you towithstand these disasters.
We're not going to stop thedisaster, but I am convinced we
can narrow the pathway ofdestruction.
We can get it to just thecenter point.
If you're at the outer bands ofthe hurricane or tornado, your
winds are south of 135.
(34:38):
We can build to withstand Withthe wildfires.
The ignition may happen on abad windy day, but let's make
sure that we don't get all thedominoes knocked over.
Let's find a way and box thatin.
Let's narrow that path ofdestruction.
George Siegal (34:53):
Great advice, roy .
Thank you so much for your timetoday.
I appreciate it.
Great to hear from you.
George.
If you enjoyed what youlistened to today, please become
a subscriber so you don't missan episode.
A new show comes out everyTuesday morning.
There's also a contact form inthe show notes.
I'd really like to hear aboutyour experiences as a homeowner,
good or bad.
Fill that out and you might bea guest on an upcoming podcast.
(35:17):
Thanks again for listening.
See you next time.
In today's program, you are going to learn
some important things that youcan do to save your home.
It's one thing to talk abouthow a house will perform in a
major disaster.
It's another to actually see itput to the test.
When you see a live example ofwind or fire destroying a house,
you get a clear picture ofwhat's going to get destroyed
and what has a chance ofsurviving.
(00:21):
My guest today is Roy Wright,the CEO of the Insurance
Institute for Business and HomeSafety.
Their focus is to identify waysto strengthen homes and
businesses to reduce damagecaused by severe weather and
wildfires.
I'm George Siegal, and this isHomeowners Be Aware, the podcast
that teaches you everything youneed to know about being a
(00:42):
homeowner.
Roy, thank you so much forjoining me today.
Roy Wright (00:46):
It's so good to be with you, George.
George Siegal (00:48):
Yeah, I really appreciate your time.
You were in my documentary film, the Last House Standing.
You played a big part of thatfilm and I really like the work
you guys do For people who don'tknow about you.
Tell us about that amazingtesting facility you have and
the kind of things that go on inthere.
Roy Wright (01:03):
Yeah, so the Insurance Institute for Business
and Home Safety I'll call itIBHS, but the Institute.
It's been around since the late70s, but about 15 years ago the
insurance industry cametogether and said there's a
whole set of things that wedon't understand well enough
about how mother nature crashesinto people's homes, and we got
(01:25):
to do something about that.
We're in the wake of what wewatched Florida 04, hurricanes,
katrina in 05, and thenLouisiana and Texas again
getting hit in 08.
And so they looked at wind,rain, hail and ultimately
brought wildfire.
I'll give you that moment.
And so we're a nonprofit 501c3Research Institute that is
(01:49):
looking to fill the gap inunderstanding how the built
environment performs againstmother nature.
So what do we do?
We literally recreated mothernature in a really gigantic box.
So just south of Charlotte,north Carolina, in Richburg,
south Carolina, we have afacility.
(02:10):
It imagine a six-story airplanehangar, but across one wall are
105 turbines and we can't eachof those turbines six feet
across.
We can recreate cat three-ishup to some of the elements the
gusts into fours of hurricanes,135 mile an hour, hurricane
(02:35):
elements, and we do all of thistesting then against structures
at full scale.
There are other research placesthat'll build dollhouses and
test them for pressure loads andthat is an important role, I
guess, in some of the science.
But we don't do dollhouses, wedo full-size structures in this
space and we test the variousdimensions against wind, wind
(03:00):
and rain, as well as hail.
And then we have a uniquecapability in the wildfire lane.
Again, we're doing it at fullscale, but we're the only
facility that can recreatewildfire, ember storms.
That's how those conflagrationsout west occur Something burns
(03:23):
and it becomes embers that startflying forward.
Well, we recreate that and wecan watch the point of attack
from a structure to structurebasis, have the wind dimensions
brought in and, again, just theonly facility that can fill
those gaps.
George Siegal (03:38):
Yeah, we used some of that footage in my film,
the Last House Standing, andit's really powerful to see that
.
And it's even more frighteningwhen you see how a house blows
apart and you're saying categorythree may be close to a
category four and then trying toimagine sustained winds in a
category five, what that woulddo.
It's really a powerful exampleof seeing all those forces at
(03:58):
work.
Roy Wright (03:59):
It is, and for us it serves those two purposes.
On the one side, there'sscientific information we need
to collect so that we can designbetter, but the other piece is
most of us, most Americans,cannot imagine that bad day.
They can't imagine beingpummeled by the wildfire.
They can't imagine the catthree or cat four actually
(04:24):
getting to them Someone elsewill get it, I won't and
bringing people inside that riskin a way by which they can
imagine it is one of the mostpowerful ways to communicate
risk, yeah, and we'veinterviewed people from my
current film that actually havelived through category four and
category five hurricanes.
George Siegal (04:41):
They've lost everything and you never want to
end up like that.
Roy Wright (04:45):
Anything you can do to avoid that, you want to do
that worst day the one you can'tever imagine coming or invading
your home, displaces so much ofyour family, disrupts so much
of your life and really drivesso much financial uncertainty.
(05:06):
In short or not, there's somuch that that brings to the
table.
It's hard and I think thatwe've got more and more work to
do in the space to be able tobuild because we do know how to
build to withstand much of whatwill come our way.
George Siegal (05:25):
You were very close to the Paradise Fire
situation.
You had family there.
How are they doing now?
How is everybody?
Roy Wright (05:32):
Yeah, so my parents as well as my brother lived in
Paradise, California, before thefire came through.
They lost their homes.
They were insured and pieceshave played out on that side.
But you know, they temporarilymoved to the next city over.
(05:53):
But my mom came back.
She is in a townhouse inParadise.
My brother is just north of thecity limits in McHalea.
They're really committed to thelife and vitality of that
community and it's really hardbecause they're not even they're
(06:18):
nowhere close even to half ofthe tax base being back.
George Siegal (06:22):
Wow that's pretty unbelievable because that was
2018, right, so that's been along time.
Roy Wright (06:29):
Yeah, it's a very, very long road to see the
vitality and robust nature of acommunity's economy come back.
George Siegal (06:41):
Now that kind of brings me to what I wanted to
ask you for my next question,but we can also apply it to
Paradise.
When they built back, did theydo anything different?
I know wildfires different thanhurricane, possibly and how you
prepare, but is Paradiserebuilding with wildfires in
mind?
Because I'm not seeing that inMexico Beach so much?
I don't know about Fort Myersyet.
(07:02):
We were down there because it'stoo early, but what are you
seeing or what are they tellingyou about Paradise rebuilding?
Roy Wright (07:08):
So Paradise is rebuilding back, very mindful of
this risk.
So they have the top end of thebuilding code in place.
They incorporated elements ofdefensible space and the
certifications that are tied tothat into their land use codes.
Now they just need to have thepatience and the
(07:35):
stick-to-itiveness not to backoff.
Because I contrast Paradisewith Santa Rosa, the coffee park
at Tubbs Fire and 1,200 homeswere lost in one community they
built back because they were notin the map.
Dairy that required thewildfire, the wooly building
code pieces they didn'tincorporate it.
(07:57):
In fact they built the homeseven closer together.
And you watch this, that speedturns into haste.
They have a near-term need toget the economy back, to get the
folks in the community back,and I don't hold that against
anyone.
(08:17):
But these calamities come back.
They revisit communities insuccessive decades and you gotta
apply what you've learned.
A good friend of mine from aretired professor, craig Colton
from LSU, who loves to talkabout lessons lost, because so
(08:41):
few of the lessons and disastersare learned, they're observed
and many of the lessons are justlost.
George Siegal (08:51):
Yeah, that's a very powerful and true statement
and we saw it firsthand inMexico Beach when we went up
there and we interviewed agentleman who was a floodplain
manager and he was telling ushow they originally changed the
flood level rating.
They raised it up still nothigh enough that would have
survived Hurricane Michael, butthey raised it.
But pressure from the residentsby 2020 was so strong they
(09:13):
lowered it again.
So the code is nowhere close towhat would withstand another
powerful category five hurricaneand certainly not a 20-foot
storm surge.
Why do you think that happens?
Roy Wright (09:28):
Because politicians have a very short time horizon.
So I watched this in Louisiana.
So communities of Baton Rougeand Livingston had put in those
extra layers of protection.
So in their highest hazard forflood of their floodplain they
put an extra three feetrequirement of elevation.
(09:49):
It says we're gonna buildhigher and they had had this in
place for a number of years.
And then there was a great daylose.
That happened in 2016.
They got 39 inches of rain on aday 39 inches and three months
later they removed therequirement to build higher.
George Siegal (10:10):
And there's some short-term economic drivers that
I'll never win the argumentagainst, but as I look over the
life of just the next 10 yearsof living in that home, that is
unwise very unwise and we see alot of unwise up in the
panhandle where there's onebuilder we won't name him, dr
(10:32):
Horton who's doing a lot ofslab-on-grade houses that are
really close to the water and Iunderstand that particular area.
The flood designation isn'tthat high but we had a couple
experts up there tell us waterdoesn't know where to stop.
You've now seen 20 feet ofwater.
It doesn't stop at A Street andnot go to B Street, so it
really seems like people aremoving in from out of state.
(10:55):
They're taking a risk and itjust had the twilight zone,
feeling that it could happenagain there and be really bad.
Roy Wright (11:02):
This is why building codes are so important.
I know that for most peoplethey think about building codes
and like, oh, there must be someinstruction book.
They keep it city hall for thebuilders.
Most folks just don'tunderstand what it is and there
are some instructions that areincluded there.
But building codes are aboutsafety and survivability.
(11:25):
That's why they are in place.
And you look in these elementsthat the point that a builder
comes in to a community, youknow they most have a three year
time horizon on theirinvestment, so they're concerned
about the risk during thatwindow.
(11:45):
But then a homeowner they makethis purchase becomes the
biggest, most valuable assetthey have and they now have to
carry the entire tail of thatrisk.
And so I look at whether you'reputting slab on grade in a
flood prone area, not giving theelevation you need not putting
the right kind of wind loads andbuilding for those purposes.
(12:07):
We know those events not onlycan happen, but they will happen
in that area.
And so how do you get theprivate economy chugging in the
right direction?
You put the right Jerseybarriers in place to nudge them
in those places, because theyknow how to build more resources
and build more resilient andthere may be a small increment.
(12:30):
It may add three or 5% to thecost of that home upfront.
But that becomes value.
That increases with the valuehome and lowers the operational
cost, particularly in the caseof insurance, let alone what it
takes to rebuild.
George Siegal (12:47):
Yeah, I wonder how many of these people are
gonna get insurance.
Now, all the houses that are onthe water side of the highway
seem to be elevated 10 to 14feet, but now the framing is all
wood.
Roy Wright (12:58):
And I had an engineer tell us.
George Siegal (12:59):
I don't presume to know anything as much as you
guys.
That's why I try to talk topeople a lot smarter than me,
which is a wide open field.
They say when you're up higherthe wind is actually stronger,
that a woodhouse on stiltsraised up might be more
vulnerable up there and thatthey really should be building
with concrete block.
Is it crazy that they'rebuilding with wood?
Roy Wright (13:21):
So it's not crazy that they're building with wood.
What the science says is youneed to design, you need to
engineer for the continuous loadpath that's going to come.
It has so much to do with theconnections.
It's less about the wall thanhow the wall connects to the
roof, how the wall connects tothe foundation pieces that are
(13:44):
there.
I hear you.
You know, using concrete blocksappear stronger and they
absolutely are strong.
My dad was a bricklayer.
I'm all on board down the ICFline of the equation, but I
would caution us just to go oh,wood must be flimsy.
If you engineer that structureand particularly deal with those
(14:11):
elements, we can engineer awood frame construction building
to withstand those very highwinds.
It can be done.
There's trade-offs and buildingapproaches that are there.
I'm a bit more agnostic onwhich approach you take Really
firmly in the lane that says thecontinuous load path, which is
how the floor, the walls and theroof all connect together so
(14:37):
that you can let the wind circlearound it rather than break it
apart.
George Siegal (14:43):
Yeah, you know, to me it's like seeing the house
we featured in the last housestanding, the one that survived
on the beach.
That was built out of concrete.
It was tested in a categoryfive.
It survived.
Everything around it did not.
But they're not building backaround that house that way.
It's like you see somebody witha bulletproof vest that works,
(15:03):
and then somebody comes up witha different vest and they go
yeah, this should be okay.
No, I would agree.
Roy Wright (15:07):
I want the vest.
That worked.
Yeah, clearly the ICF approachis super strong if it's done
properly, right.
But you can screw that piece upas well.
What I'll tell you abouteverything else that was in that
neighborhood?
Florida had pulled back oncodes along the panhandle.
They were designing to lowerwind speeds.
(15:28):
Just 200 miles away, they wereemploying different standards
that they knew were better, butsomeone made a short-term choice
, to use a technical term.
There was a recency bias.
I talked to folks it can'thappen to the panhandle, right?
We don't get hurricanes here,let alone strong hurricanes here
(15:51):
.
Which is to say, I haven't seenhurricanes here, I haven't seen
strong hurricanes here, andyour life is way shorter than
history.
George Siegal (16:06):
Yeah, and you've probably seen the pictures of
that house in Panama City thathas now blown over twice and it
happened in January with atornado.
Do you know the picture I'mtalking about?
I've seen it.
Roy Wright (16:20):
I have not been on the ground there, so I want to
be cautious about coming to afirm conclusion there.
And I'm not asking you for aconclusion, I just want to give
you a thought, but what I willtell you is a building, a newly
constructed building, should beable to withstand what came
through.
George Siegal (16:42):
Yeah, and right behind that building we got a
lot of footage of that entireblock of apartments that looked
like they were brick but theywere really old, that were
completely leveled.
Roy Wright (16:52):
Because of unreinforced masonry in a wind
event we'll go down.
George Siegal (16:56):
Yeah, so is there anything with newer
construction of survived thekind of tornado that rolled
through there?
Absolutely.
Roy Wright (17:02):
We know how to construct to withstand 135 mile
an hour coming through.
So, particularly EF-012, ifyou're using the high wind
engineering that is available inthis country, you can withstand
.
There's no question about this.
You just have to choose to doit.
You go down to the Miami-Dadestandards that people talk about
(17:24):
.
Well, the reason why they talkabout them so much is because
they are so strong and, to theircredit, they've been relentless
about it, because they knowwhat can come their way.
Well, how do you take thosepieces in the bottom third of
Florida and pull them through?
It requires politicalleadership, because we know
these things can happen.
(17:44):
But the kind of thing that cameback through Panama City should
have been survivable for newconstruction.
Yeah, for that house to stilllike that.
George Siegal (17:54):
You need to get down there and see it.
It was unbelievable.
We got pictures and video fromthe water side and the other
side.
It doesn't even look real.
It looks like a movie set wherethey just tipped something over
and then to find out ithappened to them one other time.
That is really bad luck.
Roy Wright (18:11):
There is something about the workmanship there that
I would ask some questionsabout.
Yeah, there's no question aboutthat Now.
George Siegal (18:17):
Yet the other day I interviewed a gentleman who's
the CEO of the Tampa HousingAuthority and it was interesting
what he told me.
For their residents they'reonly building concrete block
apartment buildings, yet allthroughout Florida they're
building huge apartmentcomplexes out of wood.
We saw it in the Panhandle, wesaw it in Tallahassee and Pasco
(18:38):
County and here in Tampa, like amile from my house, there's a
huge four building complex allof wood, right on the water.
That seems kind of crazy.
Roy Wright (18:49):
So I think that this is an element where I'll leave
you to tell you that you getmore value out of that.
So I'll remain agnostic.
I'm not going to tell you oneis superior to the other, but I
will tell you that when you dothat block construction there's
energy efficiencies, they pickup, there's absolute ability to
withstand high winds, presumingthat the roof is attached
(19:11):
properly, because there's not ablock roof on that structure.
But I do think that that's aplace where resilience and
energy efficiencies, thesustainability elements, all
come together and I hope we seemore of that.
I think, for the people wholive in that new apartment
(19:34):
building or complex you'retalking about, they're going to
see value.
They're going to see value intheir operational cost of
heating and cooling.
They're going to see resiliencevalue in that space.
They're probably going to seevalue on the insurance front.
George Siegal (19:49):
That would be nice, and I had an engineer
explain to me why what hethought the risk of wood was
it's where, because of all thewind, where the stucco cracks
and then water gets in.
That's why Florida has such abad termite problem because of
water intrusion.
So I hadn't really even thoughtof that, but it's like, wow,
it's just another thing to worryabout.
Roy Wright (20:08):
Yeah, water intrusion is a very real concern
in all kinds of construction,particularly around windows,
whether that's the stucco aroundthe windows or the like, your
windows and openings are mostvulnerable on that front Now on
your on your research summarypage on the website you rate
states along the Atlantic andGulf Coast based on building
(20:31):
code, adoption, enforcement,contractor licensing.
George Siegal (20:34):
Now Florida and South Carolina scored very well,
but Texas, alabama, mississippiand Georgia did not get a very
good score.
Roy Wright (20:40):
They did not.
George Siegal (20:42):
Why is there such a discrepancy with that?
Roy Wright (20:44):
Because politically, they haven't chosen to do the
right thing.
It really is that simple.
They have not chosen to do theright thing.
We've gotten very close in acouple of rounds on Alabama to
see a statewide code come intoplace.
Maybe this is the year that thelegislature will push it
through.
They do have it for their twocoastal counties in Alabama,
(21:06):
baldwin and Mobile, but theydon't have it farther up.
But those states that you seewith those bottom-end scores do
not have statewide codes.
Let me give you this kind ofperspective on codes, the
genesis of building codes.
It has become the basis of theinternational residential code,
the international building codethat comes from here in the
(21:29):
United States.
I think that most people thinkthat their home was built to a
code, that someone followed aset of guidelines.
It's not an unreasonable thingto think, but it's not true.
About 32% of US jurisdictionsactually have codes in place and
(21:50):
enforced today Only 32%, andthe biggest bulk of that 32% is
generated out of California andFlorida.
But it's this piece that, if youhave a, if you buy a baby crib,
you presume that it met safetystandards and is not going to
(22:13):
endanger your baby.
Yet when we walk into homeswhere our entire family lives.
We have states that are willingto go.
Yeah, let them build what theywant to build.
You choose what you want.
Just, it leaves me in thisspace.
(22:34):
That goes I can't believe thatthe homeowner that comes in
initially, let alone the secondor third generation down of
homeowner, has any ability tocomprehend the kind of risk that
they're taking on because wisechoices weren't made out of the
gate.
George Siegal (22:54):
Yeah, I hear that loud and clear and I'm
surprised people don't ask morequestions.
I think we assume well, this isa complicated thing.
If they can build it, they mustbe building it right.
But we do put much more concernin.
I bet, I guarantee you, mostpeople know more about the
safety features of their carthan the safety features of
their house, and that houseprobably costs 100 times more.
Roy Wright (23:16):
So another corollary though, on autos.
People think they know abouttheir safety features and they
disproportionately do understandthose compared to their home.
But their car was manufacturedat one or two locations in a
controlled environment focusedon unadulterated quality.
(23:37):
Your home could be as many as100,000 systems all being
brought together.
All different kinds ofcontractors came in and did
their piece, combined in thenext piece, the next piece, and
then people start renovatingthose homes and expanding those
(23:58):
homes.
There is no integrated qualitycontrol going on in the place
that you call home.
George Siegal (24:09):
That's why the conductor, I think, is such an
important role.
It's either the superintendenton the job then the person who's
in charge of them.
You need to really interviewyour builder and understand
where are they finding thosesubs?
Who are the people that aredoing all that work?
Because every time I don't aska question it always comes back
to bite me and I feel like I'msomebody that should know better
.
So I imagine most people justassume they're being taken care
(24:31):
of.
Roy Wright (24:32):
They do, and this is why the fortified program that
IBHS runs has become sought outin so many communities, because
it adds a set of standards thatrequire verification.
So there's a roof dimensionthat is most prevalent, but a
fortified gold designation thatlooks at the entire house on new
(24:53):
construction against this windand wind-driven rain risk.
What are you doing with thesepieces?
And as I talked with folks,they go well.
I think it's in my buildingcode.
I'm like no one checked it Likewell, I'm sure there was a
building inspector.
I said do you realize thatbuilding inspectors aren't even
(25:14):
allowed to get on the roof?
I'm like their role isimportant.
I'm not trying to set themaside, but they're not
comprehensively there to seeeach one of the steps.
And so in our fortified programwe require contemporaneous
pictures to be taken geotag tothat location, show us the
(25:35):
connection, show us the nailpattern, show us the sealed roof
deck A little kind ofReaganesque view of it.
We're going to trust, butverify.
George Siegal (25:47):
Well, and I think that's so important.
I wish everybody took advantageof that, because you just don't
know, and in a lot of statesthe building lobby, the builders
lobby, is such a powerfulorganization I know it was in
Texas when I lived there thatyou can't even sue builders
there.
All you can get is arbitrationout of it, and then they just go
out of business and open upwith a new name the next week
(26:08):
and they're building housesagain.
It's like the Wild West and Ithink people have to stop
rewarding that by buying thosekind of homes.
Yeah agreed, but they're notgoing to do it based on me
telling them They've got to bebeaten over the head with that.
So what can a homeowner do,then, to give themselves the
best chance of getting a housethat would protect them from a
(26:29):
disaster?
Roy Wright (26:30):
Yeah, learn enough to ask the questions To your
point.
Very few people buy in homes orexperts in construction, and so
the best we can do is give themthe questions to ask that lead
them down a path.
So let's kind of walk down theperils in sequence.
So, on wind and this is truefor hurricane as well as tornado
(26:53):
prone areas it's about theconnections of the structure,
and so you wanna make sure thatthe roof can withstand the wind.
But if, particularly withasphalt shingles, you are going
to lose those, and are you going, the question then is will you
have water intrusion?
There's a five to seven timesmultiplier on the damage if
(27:15):
water gets in.
So can you seal that roof deckand lock it in.
But then I turn to youropenings.
The biggest opening in any home, the garage door.
The garage door, when it'scompromised, even subtly, it
changes the pressure, creates adifferential.
That basically is a balloonthat explodes.
(27:36):
That's why the roof pops off.
So what can you do?
Ask about your roof, includingwhat's under the shingles.
You want a wind rated garagedoor.
There's a sticker It'll tellyou if it is or is not.
We offer the fortified program.
On those wind side of theequations there are homes along
(27:59):
the Gulf Coast as well as theCarolina Coast that have these
designations.
You should have confidence ifyou're buying something that's
in that space.
We haven't talked about hail,but I think there's elements of
hail about how you look and testand look at the testing that is
out there about what canwithstand hail, but I'll focus
on wildfire.
(28:19):
You can find out if it wasbuilt to the wildfire standard.
It's, from a building codeperspective, california leads
the way there, but we've foundthat, because embers drive so
much of the risk, thatdefensible space is everything
which is the first five feetclosest to your home need to be
(28:43):
entirely noncombustible, andthen five to 30 feet away needs
to be lean and green, and sowe've put together a companion
to fortified on the wildfireside, called Wildfire Prepared
Home.
That is there to help preventignition from embers, so that
when the embers do come and fly,they will land, smolder and
(29:05):
extinguish, because once thatpathway begins to happen and the
house next to you is burning,you create that conflagration of
dominoes that begins to move.
You gotta change yourperspective, though, about what
you want a home to look like andwhat kind of questions you're
gonna ask.
George Siegal (29:26):
Yeah, there was an interesting article that I
read about.
With the Maui fire, one of thehouses, one of the few houses
that survived they had actuallycleared a bunch of stuff away
because of termites and the fearfor something else.
They weren't even thinkingabout fires, but they survived.
Roy Wright (29:40):
Yeah.
So I joined our research teamon some of the post-event
investigation in Lahina and morethan one house survived.
So the first thing is peoplesee on TV the Red Roof house
survived yes, it did, and someothers did as well, but in the
core area, more than 90% of thestructures were lost.
(30:01):
If they survived, defensiblespace played a really, really
key role, To your point.
They were driven by otherthings Termites.
They don't really use a lot ofgutters and so the water rolls
off of the roof, and so peoplewould have rock around their
(30:24):
house so that you could collectthat and move it out without
getting mud.
Well, that all created gooddefensible space in that space.
The other thing that a few ofthe neighborhoods had, that
homes were more likely tosurvive is the houses were
spaced farther apart, which isto say, if the house next to you
(30:44):
wasn't totally engulfed inflames, you had a survivable
chance.
George Siegal (30:50):
Yeah, I mean, that's just a horrible situation
.
I had a friend of mine on wholives over there on a previous
podcast and he said it was justunbelievable that the place is
still fenced off.
You can't even get in there.
Have you guys done muchstudying in how this escalated
so bad and became such a tragedy?
You know?
Roy Wright (31:12):
there are others doing the forensic studies of
the particulars on it.
There's a grass fire thatcatches that they thought was
entirely put out.
There were some smolderingpieces of that that ignited, but
really the tipping pointhappened when it got to
structures, because once it gotto structures, the structures
(31:36):
became the embers that startedcreating the splatter of
ignitions all over the community.
And we watch this every singletime in conflagrations.
Fire will make its move howeverit starts, and sometimes it
starts naturally, and sometimesit starts because of
technological things that fail,and sometimes it starts because
(31:59):
there are stupid human tricksgoing on.
Whatever the ignition is, onceit starts moving particularly
over the day like that where thewinds were as they were that
smoldered ember then got fannedback up and started to make its
progression.
You get the first fewstructures and it creates that
(32:22):
spider web effect.
It was so devastating.
George Siegal (32:26):
Yeah, I mean the stories they told of people.
You know the fire departmentobviously couldn't do anything
at that point, but people had tojump into the ocean to try to
save their lives and everything.
It's just another example ofwhy you want to avoid disaster
at all costs, no matter what youhave to do.
Roy Wright (32:41):
And being able to walk in some of the streets of
Lahaina reminds me so much ofwalking the streets of Paradise,
california.
Some of the same experiencesrelated to evacuation.
I think the evacuation wasbetter in Paradise it was at
least there was an organizationto it in that space but again
(33:06):
just profound loss of life inways that we just we must find
better ways to be prepared,teach folks what to do and then
to act.
George Siegal (33:17):
Yeah, well, keep doing what you do on your end,
because I know you guys arehelping a lot of people with
that kind of research and we'regoing to put the links, I guess,
so people can find you guys andfind fortified, so they can
take advantage of all theseprograms.
Roy Wright (33:32):
Yeah, and then we'll go to testorg.
We'll send you to everything.
Go to fortifiedhome.
org.
We'll give you the elementsthat are there.
You can find us on theInstagram, the Facebook, the
place formerly known as Twitter.
All those kinds of pieces thatare there.
And all of that element iswhere we take our science and
(33:53):
try to translate it forconsumers.
You're not going to stumble intothe engineering differential
equations.
You're going to find somereally practical things.
It says this is what you can do.
These might be the actions youtake for just 500 bucks on a
do-it-yourself.
These might be the actions thatcost you a few thousand dollars
that if you saved up and had acontractor come in and do it,
(34:16):
would better position you towithstand these disasters.
We're not going to stop thedisaster, but I am convinced we
can narrow the pathway ofdestruction.
We can get it to just thecenter point.
If you're at the outer bands ofthe hurricane or tornado, your
winds are south of 135.
(34:38):
We can build to withstand Withthe wildfires.
The ignition may happen on abad windy day, but let's make
sure that we don't get all thedominoes knocked over.
Let's find a way and box thatin.
Let's narrow that path ofdestruction.
George Siegal (34:53):
Great advice, roy .
Thank you so much for your timetoday.
I appreciate it.
Great to hear from you.
George.
If you enjoyed what youlistened to today, please become
a subscriber so you don't missan episode.
A new show comes out everyTuesday morning.
There's also a contact form inthe show notes.
I'd really like to hear aboutyour experiences as a homeowner,
good or bad.
Fill that out and you might bea guest on an upcoming podcast.
(35:17):
Thanks again for listening.
See you next time.
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