Not mentioned in TFA is that the owner saturated everything with water prior to evacuating. Note his large yard full of vegetation didn't catch fire, that alone put a huge buffer zone on that side of his house.
Also I'll never understand why asphalt shingles are so popular, metal is better in every way.
Used to live in rural Colorado and have had our house threatened by wildfires multiple times. We did the same thing and set up large volume pivot sprinklers that formed both a perimeter and kept the roof+deck wet when the fires got within a mile of us. Glad to hear it worked for this person. Wildfires are scary.
https://firegel.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Barricade-GHS...
Steel is becoming more popular these days though because it has gotten way cheaper while asphalt shingles have gotten a bit more expensive. But like 30+ years a steel versus asphalt roof was a huge step up in cost, and 50 years ago the paint on steel wasn't as good as it is today and could fail and start rusting within the time frame that a quality shingle roof would. You don't see rusted steel roofing very often any more though because most of that failed and was replaced 20 years ago or so.
If you can afford it though steel is definitely the way better deal today, provided you aren't doing your own roof and are tearing it down to the wood instead of just shingling over the old stuff.
From the wider angle shot[1], there's some other nearby land with small greenery and no structures that also appears mostly unburnt. (On the left hand side, on the other side of what looks like a major road). Perhaps the other land was also saturated with water, or perhaps the absence of large trees made it hard to catch or some other reason.
> Also I'll never understand why asphalt shingles are so popular, metal is better in every way.
Metal roofs cost more, can be more dangerous to work on (making anything else that happens on the roof more expensive), significantly louder in rain and hail. They certainly have the potential of lasting longer and they're more difficult to ignite.
[1] https://d1l18ops95qbzp.cloudfront.net/wp-content/2023/08/111...
> They first heard about the fire from a man who lives in
> Lahainaluna, a neighborhood about three and a half miles away, and
> uses two rooms beneath the house as a workshop. His home burned
> first, so he evacuated to the Millikins'. Then he had to evacuate
> from there, too, she said. [0]
[0] https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-08-18/how-did-...
It may pay off in the long term but most homeowners don't think in a 50 year time horizon.
Rainy season lasts 4-5 months where our house is and its the kind of rains that make you fear the wrath of God.
The article says the owner was was in Massachusetts during the fire. So not sure how the owner saturated everything??
I generally agree that metal is better, but want to point out that there are fire rated asphalt shingles, but they are rarely used unless required.
I kept waiting for someone else to notice this.
There is clearly more to the story here.