@WakeUpCall – Waking Up with the House Whisperer

The House Whisperer Dean Sharp is back on Wake Up Call for another edition of ‘Waking Up with the House Whisperer!’ Today, Dean talks about the fire hardening frenzy and what you can do to protect your home from fires.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's say good morning now to our house, whisper the
host of Home on KFI. It's Dean Sharp.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Good morning, Dean, who was also born in January.

Speaker 1 (00:09):
So what's your birthday?

Speaker 2 (00:11):
It was the eleventh.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Oh, happy birthday. I didn't even know it was your birthday.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
I turned twenty nine for the second time, and you.

Speaker 1 (00:20):
Don't look a day over it. Okay, let's talk about fires.
We want to keep focusing on that because you know,
homes and so many were affected, and so many are
at risk. So let's separate some fact from fiction when
it comes to fire hardening your home.

Speaker 2 (00:41):
Yeah, that's kind of where we're turning our attention this
weekend because already, thank you social media, there are a
slew of what I call gimmicks and kind of ignorant
based ideas out there about Okay, everybody, here's how we're
going to fire proof our homes. And they're expensive, they're

(01:04):
a little bit wacky, and they're really kind of most
of them a waste of time.

Speaker 1 (01:09):
Okay, and you're going to be talking about this all
weekend on Home with Team Sharp. Right here on KIF,
I write six ' eight on Saturday, the nine to
noon on Sunday. But let's talk Dean, just now real
quick about a few of the things you'll be talking
about that are absolutely dead wrong. Like you said, they're
out on social media and they're not going to do
any good. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:27):
Well, here's the thing. Let's these have been in the
news lately. Rooftop sprinklers always get very very popular right
after a wildfire event or even edge of property sprinkler.
Just about any sprinkler, any idea that has the word
sprinkler in it, other than full on interior home fire sprinklers,

(01:49):
you know, the official kind of fire sprinklers inside a home.

Speaker 1 (01:53):
Really interesting because I know, as somebody who is building
a home in Pacific, is it in the Palace says, yes,
it's in Pacific Palisades, and they're putting fireproofing stuff and
they plan to have sprinklers on the roof.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
Really well, so here's the thing, I mean, just to
comment on that as an example, if they're building a
home in California, then they are required to put Class
A rated shingles on their roof. Their roof is going
to be a Class A fire rated roof, meaning it's

(02:28):
a roof that's hard to burn. And yet and yet
people are still embracing this idea. I need to put
sprinklers up on my roof and keep it wet and
so that it doesn't burn. This is not how houses burn.
We don't have things dropping onto roofs or flames dropping

(02:49):
onto a roofing material and catching it on fire.

Speaker 1 (02:52):
Okay, so how are they starting.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
Well, when you see a roof burning, ninety nine times
out of one hundred, it is burning from the attic
out from underneath where the flame has got into the attic,
and now it's burning the roof rafters and the plywood underneath,
and we're seeing that flame emerge from the attic, not
burn from the roofing materials down. And so sprinklers just

(03:18):
don't even enter into the factor of how it really happens.
And that's why I don't really want people to waste
their time on this. What I do want people to
focus on is what you and I have talked about
many times before, but I'm going to say it again
because I feel like we have everybody's attention now in
a new way, at least for a little bit of time.
And that is ninety percent of the homes that burn

(03:41):
in a wildfire ignite before the fire arrives at the house.
How and how oh, flames are something that of course
you want your home ready to deal with flames if
flames arrive. But embers are the primary enemy in a

(04:03):
wildfire event. And this has been true of all wildfire
events for as long as we know. This was true
of the Palisades fire. It was true of the Eaten fire.
And imagine this. Imagine a few hundred dollars spent on
a flame on emberproofing attic and subfloor vents, A few

(04:28):
hundred dollars spent. If most of the homes in the Palisades,
which were very wealthy homes, had spent a few hundred
dollars on those emberproof vents, statistics tell us that the
fire would have moved ninety percent slower through that neighborhood,
and only a fraction of the homes would have actually

(04:49):
been affected by the flames. It would not have been
the catastrophe that we've just witnessed.

Speaker 1 (04:56):
It was probably a wake up call of the very
very worst kind, but important, important for us to be ready. So, Dean,
you're gonna be focusing on all of this during the
weekend shows right here on KFI again. It's Home with
Dean Sharp. You can hear at six to eight am
on Saturday and nine to noon on Sunday. You're gonna

(05:20):
bust up some more of the myths and tell people
how to get your homes ready. Thank you so much,
Deane appreciate it. Thanks Amy, all right, we'll talk to
you soon.