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A Case Study of a Community Affected by the Witch and Guejito Fires

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A Case Study of a Community Affected by the Witch and Guejito Fires NIST Technical Note 1635 A Case Study of a Community Affected by the Witch and Guejito Fires Alexander Maranghides William Mell NIST Technical Note 1635 A Case Study of a Community Affected by the Witch and Guejito Fires Alexander Maranghides William Mell U.S. Department of Commerce Technology Administration Building and Fire Research Laboratory National Institute of Standards And Technology Gaithersburg, MD 20899 April 2009 U.S. Department of Commerce Gary Locke, Secretary National Institute of Standards and Technology Patrick D. Gallagher,Acting Director Certain commercial entities, equipment, or materials may be identified in this document in order to describe an experimental procedure or concept adequately. Such identification is not intended to imply recommendation or endorsement by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, nor is it intended to imply that the entities, materials, or equipment are necessarily the best available for the purpose. National Institute of Standards and Technology Technical Note 1635 Natl. Inst. Stand. Technol. Technical Note 1635, 59 pages (June 2009) Cover Page Photo: The Trails Monday 22 October 2007, Photo Courtesy of Mark Weir, Used by Permission ii Table of Contents List of Figures................................................................................................................................ iv List of Tables .................................................................................................................................. v List of Tables .................................................................................................................................. v Abstract........................................................................................................................................... 6 1.0Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 7 1.1 Previous Case Studies........................................................................................................... 8 2.0 Objective of Case Study............................................................................................................ 9 3.0 Area of interest – Rancho Bernardo, The Trails Community................................................... 9 4.0 Witch Creek and Guejito Fire Ignitions.................................................................................. 10 5.0 Weather................................................................................................................................... 11 6.0 Data Collection ....................................................................................................................... 12 7.0 Wildland Fuel and Fuel Moisture ........................................................................................... 12 8.0 Fire Approach Timeline.......................................................................................................... 13 8.1 Timeline within The Trails ................................................................................................. 13 8.2 Fire Spread within The Trails ............................................................................................. 16 9.0 Structure Exposure to Fire and Embers .................................................................................. 17 10.0 Defensive Actions................................................................................................................. 18 10.1 Timeline of actions ........................................................................................................... 19 11.0 Partly Damaged Structures ................................................................................................... 20 11.1 Interior versus Perimeter Structural loses......................................................................... 22 12.0 Structure Ignition Data.......................................................................................................... 22 13.0 Commonly held beliefs in light of these findings................................................................. 24 14.0 Summary of findings and discussion .................................................................................... 25 14.1 General Fire Behavior....................................................................................................... 26 14.2 Structural Loses and Defensive Actions........................................................................... 26 15.0 Unanswered Questions.......................................................................................................... 26 16.0 Future Work.......................................................................................................................... 27 17.0 Acknowledgments................................................................................................................. 27 18.0 References............................................................................................................................. 58 iii List of Figures Figure 1: The Trails Community, Destroyed Homes (in Yellow) and Fire Perimeter after the Guejito and Witch Fires ............................................................................................... 29 Figure 2: Destroyed Structures in the vicinity of Rancho Bernardo, CA..................................... 30 Figure 3: Structure Densities in Three Different WUI Settings ................................................... 31 Figure 4: Origins of the Guejito and Witch Creek Fires, the combined perimeter of both fires and the locations of the weather stations used later in the report. (map Courtesy of CALFIRE).................................................................................................................... 32 Figure 5: Weather data from Ramona Airport.............................................................................. 33 Figure 6: Northwest Corner of The Trails .................................................................................... 34 Figure 7: North Side of The Trails................................................................................................ 35 Figure 8: East Corner of The Trails.............................................................................................. 36 Figure 9: Southeast Corner of The Trails – Sycamore Creek....................................................... 37 Figure 10: West side of The Trails ............................................................................................... 38 Figure 11: Southwest side of The Trails....................................................................................... 39 Figure 12: Angosto Way before October 22nd , 2007 (circa 2005)................................................ 40 Figure 13: Angosto Way after October 22nd 2007........................................................................ 41 Figure 14: Topographic mps of The Trails................................................................................... 42 Figure 15: The Trails - Fire approach........................................................................................... 43 Figure 16: Timeline of Structures Burning in The Trails ............................................................. 44 Figure 17: The Trails - Flame Spread and Needle Freeze ............................................................ 46 Figure 19: Golf Ball Providing Direction of Highest Heat Flux .................................................. 47 Figure 20: Fire Line progression within The Trails...................................................................... 48 Figure 21: Rock Outcrop Acting as a Fire Break ......................................................................... 49 Figure 22: The Trails Defensive Actions...................................................................................... 50 Figure 23: Impacts of the Defensive Actions Taken at The Trails............................................... 51 Figure 24: Damaged Structures. See Table 6 for further information on each house according to number on figure.......................................................................................................... 52 Figure 25: The Trails - Ignition categories of destroyed structures and perimeter/interior outline ...................................................................................................................................... 53 Figure 26: Structure Ignition Category A Fire from the wildlands burns uninterrupted up to the structure........................................................................................................................ 54 Figure 27: Structure Ignition Category B ..................................................................................... 54 Figure 28: Structure Ignition Category C ..................................................................................... 55 Figure 29: Potential Structure Ignition Categories A, B and C .................................................... 56 Figure 30: House burning times, fire spread and fire jumps ........................................................ 57 iv List of Tables Table 1: Geographic Locations of Four Weather Stations ........................................................... 11 Table 2: Weather Summary .........................................................................................................
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