No matter where you live, fire is always a hazard that could come into your life. Whether it’s a house fire that starts unintentionally or a wildfire that makes its way to your home and property, it’s vital that every adult knows what to do to best protect their home and property from the ravages of a fire.
To help you prepare your home and property for the possibility of a fire and take steps that will help you minimize your risk, here are three things you can do to reduce your risk of property loss from fire.
Properly Maintain Your Appliances
To start, you’ll want to first take a look around the interior of your home and check that none of your appliances are increasing your risk for a fire starting. While house fires can’t always be attributed to something like a transformer failing, if you take steps preventatively to keep your appliances in good working order, the chances of a malfunction causing a fire can be reduced.
For your appliances that create a lot of heat, like your stove, oven, and clothes dryer, you’ll want to make sure that you’re operating these appliances in safe ways. You should never leave a hot stove unattended. And for your clothes dryer, you should regularly blow out the exhaust vents to ensure that too much lint isn’t being built up, which can quickly and easily catch fire.
Additionally, you’ll want to be careful with things like space heaters or electric blankets, as they have been known to cause house fires as well. And if you ever notice an appliance getting too hot or having electrical issues, make sure you get it looked at as soon as possible.
Take Care With Hazardous Materials
Both in and around your home, there will come times when you have hazardous materials that need to be disposed of in specific ways. Some of these items can be particularly dangerous to keep around your home because they are very flammable and could easily cause a small spark to become a large fire. Knowing what these materials are and how to best dispose of them can help to keep your fire risk lower.
With things like fireplace ash or charcoal briquettes, you’ll need these items to be completely cold before disposing of them. And for flammable materials like gasoline or propane, you’ll want to keep these items stored well away from your home and any other flammable items.
Keep Debris Away From Your House
Moving to the outside of your home, there is a lot that you can do around the perimeter of your home and property to help reduce your chances of fire outside of your home becoming a fire enveloping your home. The best way to keep the area immediately outside of your home less prone to fire is to keep all debris away from this space.
Leaves, needles, stacks of wood, dry trees and other vegetation can all easily catch on fire and push a wildfire closer to your home. So as soon as you notice any of these items piling up around your property, it’s best to remove them as soon as possible. This should include cleaning off your roof, clearing your gutters, sweeping up your decks and porches or patios, and keeping flower beds or other landscaping trimmed back and well watered. Especially during dry times of the year, you’ll want to be particularly vigilant with these tasks.
Use The Right Building Materials
Using fire-resistant materials both on your roof and on your other exterior wall coverings can help these structures withstand heat from close fires and keep embers or other sparks from quickly and easily igniting to set the entire structure on fire.
The materials that your home and other outbuildings are built from can make a big difference in how vulnerable your structures are to fire. Ideally, you should have all of your buildings created with Class A-rated roofs that are constructed with noncombustible materials.
Understand Radiant Heat
It’s not only actual flames from fires that you need to worry about when it comes to wildfires near your home.
Due to the heat associated with wildfires, materials can ignite from up to 100 feet away from the actual flames. Knowing this, you’ll want to have space between your home and outside debris that could be the first things to catch fire during a wildfire. This way, even if the fire isn’t right up to your home, the heat won’t have a chance to catch other things on fire and lead that fire right to you.
Whether you’ve had a few close calls with fire in the last few years or you just don’t want to be caught unaware in a potentially dangerous situation, consider implementing the tips mentioned above to help you know how you can reduce the risk of losing your property to a house fire or wildfire.
Neha Nidhi
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