Some sought shelter from the fast-moving fire in vineyards. Some were plucked from the mountains by California Highway Patrol helicopters and taken for a wild ride amid 70 mph gusts. An elderly couple who had just celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary were trapped and perished.
Nearly eight years later, this month's Pickett Fire is threatening Napa County. Two Napans say the FORT would be a help in such situations.
Think of a shed-like emergency shelter that can withstand heat and keep out smoke. The FORT is designed to be the wildfire version of a tornado cellar, only above ground. It is supposed to be a refuge amid an inferno.
“It really could save lives and property,” said Mike Wilson, a former firefighter with Cal Fire and Napa County Fire.
Lives, because people with no evacuation options could ride out a wildfire in the FORT. Property, because if they were able to evacuate and could take only so many valuables, they could leave some in the FORT, the makers say.
Linda Cantey lives in the Silverado area that was hit by the Atlas Fire. She evacuated and her house didn't burn, though homes around it did. The experience led her to ask how people trapped by wildfires might survive.
Cantey works for Strata Worldwide, which makes refuge chambers for tunnels and mines. Those chambers provide a safe place and breathable air for trapped workers until rescue crews can reach them below ground. She reasoned that Strata’s refuge chamber technology could be adapted for wildfire shelters.
With that, the FORT was born.
Strata spun off Wildfire Safety Systems LLC to develop and build it. Cantey, a co-inventor, called the FORT “a last-resort option if evacuation is not possible.”
Wilson has a demonstration version of the FORT on his Mount George-area property east of the city of Napa and endorses the product on the Wildfire Safety Systems website. His rural neighborhood was also hit by the 2017 Atlas Fire, though Wilson's house survived.
Mike Wilson and Linda Cantey look at a FORT wildfire emergency shelter on Monday, Aug. 18.
As might be expected, the FORT has no windows. The inside is spartan, with seats against the wall and a small shelf. Seven large yellow air tanks line the walls near the lone door.
Cantey said the FORT seats six people. Its compressed air tanks provide fresh air for eight people for four hours. Temperatures inside remain constant even when the landscape outside is burning.
She described a test that involved piling 600 pallets and brush around the FORT. Then, with diesel fuel added, this volatile mix was set ablaze.
"We torched it," she said.
A video of the test shows orange flames leaping high into the air. The FORT weathered the fire without burning.
Calling any structure "fireproof" is apparently problematic, given that any material can burn at some temperature. Wilson said the FORT's wall panels are "extremely fire-resistant, if not fireproof."
Cantey said the wall panels have been laboratory-tested to withstand temperatures of nearly 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit for three hours.
Wildfire Safety Systems could begin producing and delivering the FORT this fall. It plans to deliver up to 300 annually from its plant in southern Illinois. Cantey said the cost initially is in the $67,000 to $72,000 range.
Go to wildfiresafetysystems.com to learn more about the FORT.
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