A builder has raised questions about provincial and federal guidelines, after the cabin he built in British Columbia was burned to the ground in recent wildfires. Says Murray Frank, owner and operator of Building It Right, of his loss to the CBC, “It’s disappointing. But the building scientist in me realizes that this is the first opportunity we’ve had to put all of the common knowledge and the current thinking of fire resiliency into a build and then to actually have it face a wildfire.”
Frank notes the house was built to the province’s fire-smart guidelines and the federal fire-resistant building codes, used fire-resistant cladding and roofing materials, ensured there weren’t openings greater than 3 millimetres, and care was taken to remove flammable materials from around the home. Says Frank to the CBC, “We actually had a professional forester help us reduce the amount of material and fuel sources … at least to the extent of our lot.”
Despite these efforts, it was unable to resist the wildfire. Says Frank to the CBC, “I think with our house, the challenge that we had was the intensity.” Frank is not all negative about the loss, however, noting he’d hired a fire investigation team, “to learn everything we can about what more needs to be considered in wildfire resiliency provisions.”
Source:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/fire-resilient-cabin-burns-1.6958898
