# Should anyone build a home in a fire-prone area? If so, with what safeguards? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [August 21, 2022, 1:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020 "2022-08-21T01:17:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Sooner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sooner/32/7875_2.png) [@Sooner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sooner)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2022, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020/81 "2022-08-24T21:02:59Z")
After losing two homes to tornados, my aunt and her husband build an underground home. It was undoubtably an effective solution to that particular problem, but it wasn’t very pleasant; and came with a whole set of other problems. Most people in the region have tornados shelters or steel safe rooms; which seem a rational level of protection. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2022, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020/82 "2022-08-25T03:28:07Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > Y’all do realize that the old flood risk maps and “1-in-500” assessments are [often](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/06/29/climate/hidden-flood-risk-maps.html) [quite](https://www.nrdc.org/experts/joel-scata/femas-outdated-and-backward-looking-flood-maps) [obsolete](https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/4066233/OIG-17-110-Sep17.pdf), right? My area’s 5 dam system is designed to handle 11 inches of rain over 3 days plus 40%. And that was before retention pond requirements seen in modern developments. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2022, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020/83 "2022-08-25T04:58:44Z")
So how ill it handle 18 inches in one day? Twice in one rainy season? Because that might become the new normal. If you design for 1-in-500 but those now happen every year, will the design hold up? That’s the fundamental question. Or, more importantly, if you discount the 1-in-1000 risk completely and those now happen every few years, what then? ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [August 25, 2022, 11:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020/84 "2022-08-25T11:34:08Z")
ISTM i’s way past time for all the authorities to drop the entire “1-in-X-years” phraseology. It’s terrible public communications even if the rate wasn’t / isn’t accelerating over time. Which it most definitely is, deniers be damned. It seems many (most?) people’s understanding of probability comes down to this: > [@Typical Citizen](#): > > 1. Odds above ~90% mean [whatever] will definitely happen and will probably affect me, but only a little. > 2. Odds above 50% mean [whatever] will definitely happen but won’t affect me at all. > 3. Odds less than 50% means [whatever] won’t ever happen at all and we should all ignore it. All “1 in X years” messaging is heard as Door #3 by almost everybody, and especially by those steeping in the propaganda. The only message they need to keep hammering is “This [destructive whatever] is going to keep happening more and more frequently and worse and worse. Get used to it, and work hard starting right now to build in resiliency for worse than this.” ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2022, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020/85 "2022-08-27T03:28:07Z")
I think it’s a bit more nuanced than that; I think that people hear “1 in X years” or “X year ”, and if X is reasonably short, they have a fairly intuitive understanding. For example, if someone hears about a “5 year flood”, they’ll probably have an idea of what that is, having lived through some in their lifetime. This probably holds true up to about X = 50 or thereabouts. But beyond that, it’s outside of the realm of a human lifetime, so it’s effectively academic to them. Saying it’s a 1000 year flood means that it’s something that happens once a millennium, and they have no real idea of when the last event like that happened, or when the next is likely to happen. Or for that matter, if the current event is “out of cycle” so to speak. To use a recent example, the recent Dallas rainfall is a 1000 year flood. So it’s hard for people to tease out whether climate change had a hand in it, or if it’s just one of those things that happens on average every 1000 years and the dice came up this last Monday (Aug 22, 2022). They don’t have the perspective on it, neither temporally or geographically to know whether it’s unusual or just unlucky. In fact, there have been 5 1000 year floods in the US in a _five week period_. That IS unusual, and does point to climate change. But somehow the news media ends up too local, and shows stories of people whose houses flooded, or dramatic fireman rescues, but doesn’t point out that this is the fifth similar event to happen in five weeks. Without that perspective, a lot of people are willing to chalk it up to bad luck, not climate change. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2022, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020/86 "2022-09-09T03:09:45Z")
They are rebuilding and working with a company that makes log homes–it mentions them on their homepage: [Montana Log Homes | Amish Log Builders | Meadowlark Log Homes - Meadowlark Log Homes](https://www.meadowlarkloghomes.com/) Isn’t all wood flammable, though? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-anyone-build-a-home-in-a-fire-prone-area-if-so-with-what-safeguards/970020.md?page=4)