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air;  atmosphere;  environment;   monitoring;  measurement;  pollution;  pollutants;  quality;  health;  sulfur dioxide;  standard;  queensland;  air pollution

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Sulfur dioxide | Environment, land and water | Queensland Government

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When sulfur dioxide combines with water, it forms sulfuric acid - the main component of acid rain. When acid rain falls, it can cause deforestation.

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Department of the Environment and Energy

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Air quality fact sheet
Department of the Environment and Heritage, 2005
Nitrogen dioxide is a nasty-smelling gas. Some nitrogen dioxide is formed naturally in the atmosphere by lightning and some is produced by plants, soil and water. However, only about 1% of the total amount of nitrogen dioxide found in our cities' air is formed this way.

Nitrogen dioxide is an important air pollutant because it contributes to the formation of photochemical smog, which can have significant impacts on human health.

The major source of nitrogen dioxide in Australia is the burning of fossil fuels: coal, oil and gas. Most of the nitrogen dioxide in cities comes from motor vehicle exhaust (about 80%). Other sources of nitrogen dioxide are petrol and metal refining, electricity generation from coal-fired power stations, other manufacturing industries and food processing.

Unflued gas heaters and cookers are the major sources of nitrogen dioxide in Australian homes.

The main effect of breathing in raised levels of nitrogen dioxide is the increased likelihood of respiratory problems. Nitrogen dioxide inflames the lining of the lungs, and it can reduce immunity to lung infections. This can cause problems such as wheezing, coughing, colds, flu and bronchitis.

Increased levels of nitrogen dioxide can have significant impacts on people with asthma because it can cause more frequent and more intense attacks. Children with asthma and older people with heart disease are most at risk.

Since the early 1990s, even the highest levels of nitrogen dioxide reached in most Australian towns and cities are thought to be acceptable for humans.

In some of Australia's larger cities, it is possible that the concentration of nitrogen dioxide sometimes increases for a short time to levels that have an adverse health effect on people who are most at risk. Air pollution authorities are monitoring the situation to see if this is the case.

Because high concentrations of nitrogen dioxide can have adverse effects on human health, the Australian Government has taken steps to manage and reduce the amount of nitrogen dioxide produced. These include:

implementing national fuel quality standards;

supporting the implementation of tighter vehicle emission standards;

developing a National Environment Protection Measure for diesel, to improve the in-service performance of diesel vehicles;

developing and promoting alternative fuels;

developing pollution forecasting systems for Australia's major cities;

promoting bicycle use for short journeys through CycleConnect; and

working with the States and Territories through programs such as TravelSmart to influence passengers transport choices.

Through the National Environment Protection Council, the Australian, State and Territory Governments have also agreed on a National Environment Protection Measure for Ambient Air Quality. The Measure contains national standards for six key air pollutants in Australia, including nitrogen dioxide. (See fact sheet on National Standards for Criteria Air Pollutants in Australia). One of the aims of the Measure is to keep nitrogen dioxide in outdoor air below the following levels by the year 2008:

0.12 ppm (parts per million) over a one hour period

0.03 ppm averaged over a one year period.

These levels, when averaged over one hour or one year, have not been exceeded in any Australian capital city since the early 1990s.

Related publications are available from the Community Information Unit of the Department of the Environment and Heritage, phone 1800 803 772. These include the State of the Air Report: Community Summary 1991-2001 and Air Quality fact sheets on: National Standards for Criteria Air Pollutants in Australia; carbon monoxide, lead, ozone, particles, sulfur dioxide, air toxics; woodheaters and woodsmoke; and smoke from biomass burning.

See also our Air quality website.

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Department of the Environment and Energy

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Air quality fact sheetDepartment of the Environment and Heritage, 2005 What is nitrogen dioxide? Nitrogen dioxide is a nasty-smelling gas. Some nitrogen dioxide is formed naturally in the atmosphere by lightning and some is produced by plants, soil and water. However, only about 1% of the total amount of nitrogen dioxide found in our cities' air is formed this way.

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What benzene is

Benzene is a chemical that is a colorless or light yellow liquid at room temperature. It has a sweet odor and is highly flammable.

Benzene evaporates into the air very quickly. Its vapor is heavier than air and may sink into low-lying areas.

Benzene dissolves only slightly in water and will float on top of water.

Where benzene is found and how it is used

Benzene is formed from both natural processes and human activities.

Natural sources of benzene include volcanoes and forest fires. Benzene is also a natural part of crude oil, gasoline, and cigarette smoke.

Benzene is widely used in the United States. It ranks in the top 20 chemicals for production volume.

Some industries use benzene to make other chemicals that are used to make plastics, resins, and nylon and synthetic fibers. Benzene is also used to make some types of lubricants, rubbers, dyes, detergents, drugs, and pesticides.

How you could be exposed to benzene

Outdoor air contains low levels of benzene from tobacco smoke, gas stations, motor vehicle exhaust, and industrial emissions.

Indoor air generally contains levels of benzene higher than those in outdoor air. The benzene in indoor air comes from products that contain benzene such as glues, paints, furniture wax, and detergents.

The air around hazardous waste sites or gas stations can contain higher levels of benzene than in other areas.

Benzene leaks from underground storage tanks or from hazardous waste sites containing benzene can contaminate well water.

People working in industries that make or use benzene may be exposed to the highest levels of it.

A major source of benzene exposure is tobacco smoke.

How benzene works

Benzene works by causing cells not to work correctly. For example, it can cause bone marrow not to produce enough red blood cells, which can lead to anemia. Also, it can damage the immune system by changing blood levels of antibodies and causing the loss of white blood cells.

The seriousness of poisoning caused by benzene depends on the amount, route, and length of time of exposure, as well as the age and preexisting medical condition of the exposed person.

Immediate signs and symptoms of exposure to benzene

People who breathe in high levels of benzene may develop the following signs and symptoms within minutes to several hours:

Drowsiness

Dizziness

Rapid or irregular heartbeat

Headaches

Tremors

Confusion

Unconsciousness

Death (at very high levels)

Eating foods or drinking beverages containing high levels of benzene can cause the following symptoms within minutes to several hours:

Vomiting

Irritation of the stomach

Dizziness

Sleepiness

Convulsions

Rapid or irregular heartbeat

Death (at very high levels)

If a person vomits because of swallowing foods or beverages containing benzene, the vomit could be sucked into the lungs and cause breathing problems and coughing.

Direct exposure of the eyes, skin, or lungs to benzene can cause tissue injury and irritation.

Showing these signs and symptoms does not necessarily mean that a person has been exposed to benzene.

Long-term health effects of exposure to benzene

The major effect of benzene from long-term exposure is on the blood. (Long-term exposure means exposure of a year or more.) Benzene causes harmful effects on the bone marrow and can cause a decrease in red blood cells, leading to anemia. It can also cause excessive bleeding and can affect the immune system, increasing the chance for infection.

Some women who breathed high levels of benzene for many months had irregular menstrual periods and a decrease in the size of their ovaries. It is not known whether benzene exposure affects the developing fetus in pregnant women or fertility in men.

Animal studies have shown low birth weights, delayed bone formation, and bone marrow damage when pregnant animals breathed benzene.

The Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) has determined that benzene causes cancer in humans. Long-term exposure to high levels of benzene in the air can cause leukemia, cancer of the blood-forming organs.

How you can protect yourself, and what to do if you are exposed to benzene

First, if the benzene was released into the air, get fresh air by leaving the area where the benzene was released. Moving to an area with fresh air is a good way to reduce the possibility of death from exposure to benzene in the air.

If the benzene release was outside, move away from the area where the benzene was released.

If the benzene release was indoors, get out of the building.

If you are near a release of benzene, emergency coordinators may tell you to either evacuate the area or to "shelter in place" inside a building to avoid being exposed to the chemical. For more information on evacuation during a chemical emergency, see "Facts About Evacuation." For more information on sheltering in place during a chemical emergency, see "Facts About Sheltering in Place."

If you think you may have been exposed to benzene, you should remove your clothing, rapidly wash your entire body with soap and water, and get medical care as quickly as possible.

Removing your clothing

Quickly take off clothing that may have benzene on it. Any clothing that has to be pulled over the head should be cut off the body instead of pulled over the head.

If you are helping other people remove their clothing, try to avoid touching any contaminated areas, and remove the clothing as quickly as possible.

Washing yourself

As quickly as possible, wash any benzene from your skin with large amounts of soap and water. Washing with soap and water will help protect people from any chemicals on their bodies.

If your eyes are burning or your vision is blurred, rinse your eyes with plain water for 10 to 15 minutes. If you wear contacts, remove them after washing your hands and put them with the contaminated clothing. Do not put the contacts back in your eyes (even if they are not disposable contacts). If you wear eyeglasses, wash them with soap and water. You can put your eyeglasses back on after you wash them.

Disposing of your clothes

After you have washed yourself, place your clothing inside a plastic bag. Avoid touching contaminated areas of the clothing. If you can't avoid touching contaminated areas, or you aren't sure where the contaminated areas are, wear rubber gloves or put the clothing in the bag using tongs, tool handles, sticks, or similar objects. Anything that touches the contaminated clothing should also be placed in the bag.

Seal the bag, and then seal that bag inside another plastic bag. Disposing of your clothing in this way will help protect you and other people from any chemicals that might be on your clothes.

When the local or state health department or emergency personnel arrive, tell them what you did with your clothes. The health department or emergency personnel will arrange for further disposal. Do not handle the plastic bags yourself.

For more information about cleaning your body and disposing of your clothes after a chemical release, see "Chemical Agents: Facts About Personal Cleaning and Disposal of Contaminated Clothing."

If you think your water supply may have benzene in it, drink bottled water until you are sure your water supply is safe.

If someone has swallowed benzene, do not try to make them vomit or give them fluids to drink. Also, if you are sure the person has swallowed benzene, do not attempt CPR. Performing CPR on someone who has swallowed benzene may cause them to vomit. The vomit could be sucked into their lungs and damage their lungs.

Seek medical attention right away. Dial 911 and explain what has happened.

How benzene poisoning is treated

Benzene poisoning is treated with supportive medical care in a hospital setting. No specific antidote exists for benzene poisoning. The most important thing is for victims to seek medical treatment as soon as possible.

How you can get more information about benzene

People can contact one of the following:

Regional poison control center: 1-800-222-1222

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

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centers for disease control and prevention

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Information on Benzene. Provided by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

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Hospital eTool: Healthcare Wide Hazards - Glutaraldehyde

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Hospital eTool: Healthcare Wide Hazards - Glutaraldehyde

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agency for toxic substances and disease registry

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ATSDR - Public Health Statement: Formaldehyde

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Formaldehyde is a colorless, flammable gas at room temperature.ï¿½ It has a pungent, distinct odor and may cause a burning sensation to the eyes, nose, and lungs at high concentrations.ï¿½ Formaldehyde is also known as methanal, methylene oxide, oxymethylene, methylaldehyde, and oxomethane.ï¿½ Formaldehyde can react with many other chemicals, and it will break down into methanol (wood alcohol) and carbon monoxide at very high temperatures.

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On This Page

What is formaldehyde?

Formaldehyde is a colorless, flammable, strong-smelling chemical that is used in building materials and to produce many household products. It is used in pressed-wood products, such as particleboard, plywood, and fiberboard; glues and adhesives; permanent-press fabrics; paper product coatings; and certain insulation materials. In addition, formaldehyde is commonly used as an industrial fungicide, germicide, and disinfectant, and as a preservative in mortuaries and medical laboratories. Formaldehyde also occurs naturally in the environment. It is produced in small amounts by most living organisms as part of normal metabolic processes.

How is the general population exposed to formaldehyde?

According to a 1997 report by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, formaldehyde is normally present in both indoor and outdoor air at low levels, usually less than 0.03 parts of formaldehyde per million parts of air (ppm). Materials containing formaldehyde can release formaldehyde gas or vapor into the air. One source of formaldehyde exposure in the air is automobile tailpipe emissions.

During the 1970s, urea-formaldehyde foam insulation (UFFI) was used in many homes. However, few homes are now insulated with UFFI. Homes in which UFFI was installed many years ago are not likely to have high formaldehyde levels now. Pressed-wood products containing formaldehyde resins are often a significant source of formaldehyde in homes. Other potential indoor sources of formaldehyde include cigarette smoke and the use of unvented fuel-burning appliances, such as gas stoves, wood-burning stoves, and kerosene heaters.

Industrial workers who produce formaldehyde or formaldehyde-containing products, laboratory technicians, certain health care professionals, and mortuary employees may be exposed to higher levels of formaldehyde than the general public. Exposure occurs primarily by inhaling formaldehyde gas or vapor from the air or by absorbing liquids containing formaldehyde through the skin.

What are the short-term health effects of formaldehyde exposure?

When formaldehyde is present in the air at levels exceeding 0.1 ppm, some individuals may experience adverse effects such as watery eyes; burning sensations in the eyes, nose, and throat; coughing; wheezing; nausea; and skin irritation. Some people are very sensitive to formaldehyde, whereas others have no reaction to the same level of exposure.

Can formaldehyde cause cancer?

Although the short-term health effects of formaldehyde exposure are well known, less is known about its potential long-term health effects. In 1980, laboratory studies showed that exposure to formaldehyde could cause nasal cancer in rats. This finding raised the question of whether formaldehyde exposure could also cause cancer in humans. In 1987, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) classified formaldehyde as a probable human carcinogen under conditions of unusually high or prolonged exposure ( 1). Since that time, some studies of humans have suggested that formaldehyde exposure is associated with certain types of cancer. The International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classifies formaldehyde as a human carcinogen ( 2). In 2011, the National Toxicology Program, an interagency program of the Department of Health and Human Services, named formaldehyde as a known human carcinogen in its 12th Report on Carcinogens ( 3).

What have scientists learned about the relationship between formaldehyde and cancer?

Since the 1980s, the National Cancer Institute (NCI), a component of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), has conducted studies to determine whether there is an association between occupational exposure to formaldehyde and an increase in the risk of cancer. The results of this research have provided EPA and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) with information to evaluate the potential health effects of workplace exposure to formaldehyde.

The long-term effects of formaldehyde exposure have been evaluated in epidemiologic studies (studies that attempt to uncover the patterns and causes of disease in groups of people). One type of epidemiologic study is called a cohort study. A cohort is a group of people who may vary in their exposure to a particular factor, such as formaldehyde, and are followed over time to see whether they develop a disease. Another kind of epidemiologic study is called a case-control study. Case-control studies begin with people who are diagnosed as having a disease (cases) and compare them to people without the disease (controls), trying to identify differences in factors, such as exposure to formaldehyde, that might explain why the cases developed the disease but the controls did not.

Several NCI surveys of professionals who are potentially exposed to formaldehyde in their work, such as anatomists and embalmers, have suggested that these individuals are at an increased risk of leukemia and brain cancer compared with the general population. However, specific work practices and exposures were not characterized in these studies. An NCI case-control study among funeral industry workers that characterized exposure to formaldehyde also found an association between increasing formaldehyde exposure and mortality from myeloid leukemia ( 4). For this study, carried out among funeral industry workers who had died between 1960 and 1986, researchers compared those who had died from hematopoietic and lymphatic cancers and brain tumors with those who died from other causes. (Hematopoietic or hematologic cancers such as leukemia develop in the blood or bone marrow. Lymphatic cancers develop in the tissues and organs that produce, store, and carry white blood cells that fight infections and other diseases.) This analysis showed that those who had performed the most embalming and those with the highest estimated formaldehyde exposure had the greatest risk of myeloid leukemia. There was no association with other cancers of the hematopoietic and lymphatic systems or with brain cancer.

A number of cohort studies involving workers exposed to formaldehyde have recently been completed. One study, conducted by NCI, looked at 25,619 workers in industries with the potential for occupational formaldehyde exposure and estimated each worker's exposure to the chemical while at work ( 5). The results showed an increased risk of death due to leukemia, particularly myeloid leukemia, among workers exposed to formaldehyde. This risk was associated with increasing peak and average levels of exposure, as well as with the duration of exposure, but it was not associated with cumulative exposure. An additional 10 years of data on the same workers were used in a follow-up study published in 2009 ( 6). This analysis continued to show a possible link between formaldehyde exposure and cancers of the hematopoietic and lymphatic systems, particularly myeloid leukemia. As in the initial study, the risk was highest earlier in the follow-up period. Risks declined steadily over time, such that the cumulative excess risk of myeloid leukemia was no longer statistically significant at the end of the follow-up period. The researchers noted that similar patterns of risks over time had been seen for other agents known to cause leukemia.

A cohort study of 11,039 textile workers performed by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) also found an association between the duration of exposure to formaldehyde and leukemia deaths ( 7). However, the evidence remains mixed because a cohort study of 14,014 British industry workers found no association between formaldehyde exposure and leukemia deaths ( 8).

Formaldehyde undergoes rapid chemical changes immediately after absorption. Therefore, some scientists think that formaldehyde is unlikely to have effects at sites other than the upper respiratory tract. However, some laboratory studies suggest that formaldehyde may affect the lymphatic and hematopoietic systems. Based on both the epidemiologic data from cohort and case-control studies and the experimental data from laboratory research, NCI investigators have concluded that exposure to formaldehyde may cause leukemia, particularly myeloid leukemia, in humans.

In addition, several case-control studies, as well as analysis of the large NCI industrial cohort ( 6), have found an association between formaldehyde exposure and nasopharyngeal cancer, although some other studies have not. Data from extended follow-up of the NCI cohort found that the excess of nasopharyngeal cancer observed in the earlier report persisted ( 9).

Earlier analysis of the NCI cohort found increased lung cancer deaths among industrial workers compared with the general U.S. population. However, the rate of lung cancer deaths did not increase with higher levels of formaldehyde exposure. This observation led the researchers to conclude that factors other than formaldehyde exposure might have caused the increased deaths. The most recent data on lung cancer from the cohort study did not find any relationship between formaldehyde exposure and lung cancer mortality.

What has been done to protect workers from formaldehyde?

In 1987, OSHA established a Federal standard that reduced the amount of formaldehyde to which workers can be exposed over an 8-hour workday from 3 ppm to 1 ppm. In May 1992, the standard was amended, and the formaldehyde exposure limit was further reduced to 0.75 ppm.

How can people limit formaldehyde exposure in their homes?

The EPA recommends the use of "exterior-grade" pressed-wood products to limit formaldehyde exposure in the home. These products emit less formaldehyde because they contain phenol resins, not urea resins. (Pressed-wood products include plywood, paneling, particleboard, and fiberboard and are not the same as pressure-treated wood products, which contain chemical preservatives and are intended for outdoor use.) Before purchasing pressed-wood products, including building materials, cabinetry, and furniture, buyers should ask about the formaldehyde content of these products. Formaldehyde levels in homes can also be reduced by ensuring adequate ventilation, moderate temperatures, and reduced humidity levels through the use of air conditioners and dehumidifiers.

Where can people find more information about formaldehyde?

The following organizations can provide additional resources that readers may find helpful:

The EPA offers information about the use of formaldehyde in building materials and household products. The EPA can be contacted at:

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Radiation and Indoor Air
Indoor Environments Division
Mail Code 6609J
1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW.
Washington, DC 20460
202-554-1404 (EPA Toxic Substance Control Act (TCSA) Assistance Line)
http://www.epa.gov/iaq/formalde.html

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has information about household products that contain formaldehyde. CPSC can be contacted at:

U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission
4330 East West Highway
Bethesda, MD 20814
1-800-638-2772 (1-800-638-CPSC)
301-595-7054 (TTY)
http://www.cpsc.gov

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) maintains information about cosmetics and drugs that contain formaldehyde. FDA can be contacted at:

U.S. Food and Drug Administration
10903 New Hampshire Avenue
Silver Spring, MD 20993-0002
1-888-463-6332 (1-888-INFO-FDA)
http://www.fda.gov

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has information about formaldehyde exposure levels in mobile homes and trailers supplied by FEMA after Hurricane Katrina. FEMA can be contacted at:

Federal Emergency Management Agency
Post Office Box 10055
Hyattsville, MD 20782-7055
1-800-621-3362 (1-800-621-FEMA)
http://www.fema.gov

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has information about occupational exposure limits for formaldehyde. OSHA can be contacted at:

U.S. Department of Labor
Occupational Safety and Health Administration
200 Constitution Avenue
Washington, DC 20210
1-800-321-6742 (1-800-321-OSHA)
http://www.osha.gov

The National Toxicology Program (NTP) is an interagency program of the Department of Health and Human Services that was created to coordinate toxicology testing programs within the federal government; to develop and validate improved testing methods; and to provide information about potentially toxic chemicals to health, regulatory, and research agencies, scientific and medical communities, and the public. NTP is headquartered at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, which is part of NIH. NTP can be contacted at:

National Toxicology Program
111 TW Alexander Drive
Building 101
Research Triangle Park, NC 27709
919-541-0530
http://ntp.niehs.nih.gov

Selected References

1. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Air and Radiation. Report to Congress on Indoor Air Quality, Volume II: Assessment and Control of Indoor Air Pollution, 1989.

2. National Toxicology Program (June 2011). Report on Carcinogens, Twelfth Edition. Department of Health and Human Services, Public Health Service, National Toxicology Program. Retrieved June 10, 2011, from: http://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/go/roc12.

If you would like to reproduce some or all of this content, see Reuse of NCI Information for guidance about copyright and permissions. In the case of permitted digital reproduction, please credit the National Cancer Institute as the source and link to the original NCI product using the original product's title; e.g., "Formaldehyde and Cancer Risk was originally published by the National Cancer Institute."

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On This Page What is formaldehyde? Formaldehyde is a colorless, flammable, strong-smelling chemical that is used in building materials and to produce many household products. It is used in pressed-wood products, such as particleboard, plywood, and fiberboard; glues and adhesives; permanent-press fabrics; paper product coatings; and certain insulation materials.

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(Philadelphia, PA) - Later this fall, emergency-medicine physicians enter into what they call the "CO season" - a time when faulty furnaces and other mechanical mishaps lead to a spike in cases of carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning. CO poisoning is the leading cause of injury and death by poisoning worldwide, with about 40,000 people treated in the U.S. annually. Brain damage occurs - days to weeks later - in half of the patients with a serious case of CO poisoning.

The physiological causes of this delayed decline were not well understood until now. A team led by Stephen R. Thom, MD, PhD, Professor of Emergency Medicine and Chief of Hyperbaric Medicine, at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, report this week online in the Proceedings of the National Academies of Sciences, that CO causes profound changes in myelin basic protein (MBP) - a major protein constituent of myelin, the protective sheath surrounding neurons. Using an animal model, they showed that the CO-induced changes in MBP set into motion an autoimmune response in which lymphocytes, triggered to eliminate altered MBP, continue to attack normal MBP.

Specifically, the researchers found that by-products of CO metabolism in the brain alter the charge and structure of MBP. "These changes in MBP have also been demonstrated in multiple sclerosis, which is why we paralleled the study along those lines," says Thom.

To link acute CO poisoning to long-term brain injury, the team conducted tests on normal versus CO-poisoned rats, comparing their abilities to navigate and memorize a maze. "CO poisoned rats don't learn," said Thom. "But if you render their immune systems tolerant to altered MBP, by feeding them normal MBP before CO poisoning and thereby short-circuiting the lymphocyte response, the rats learn normally."

Thom says that overall this work suggests that the 50 percent or more of patients who develop brain damage following severe CO poisoning may do so, in large part, due to an autoimmune reaction. The body simply does not know when to stop attacking what it now views as an invader. "This opens up a lot of possibilities, such as treatment with immunosuppressant agents, in conjunction with standard hyperbaric oxygen therapy," he says. "Until our study elucidated this immune response, we had no motivation to think along those lines."

Penn colleagues on the paper are: Veena M. Bhopale, Donald Fisher, Jie Zhang, and Phyllis Gimotty. This study was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

This release can also be found at: .

PENN Medicine is a $2.7 billion enterprise dedicated to the related missions of medical education, biomedical research, and high-quality patient care. PENN Medicine consists of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine (founded in 1765 as the nation's first medical school) and the University of Pennsylvania Health System (created in 1993 as the nation's first integrated academic health system).

Penn's School of Medicine is ranked #3 in the nation for receipt of NIH research funds; and ranked #4 in the nation in U.S. News & World Report's most recent ranking of top research-oriented medical schools. Supporting 1,400 fulltime faculty and 700 students, the School of Medicine is recognized worldwide for its superior education and training of the next generation of physician-scientists and leaders of academic medicine.

The University of Pennsylvania Health System includes three owned hospitals [Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, which is consistently ranked one of the nation's few "Honor Roll" hospitals by U.S. News & World Report; Pennsylvania Hospital, the nation's first hospital; and Presbyterian Medical Center]; a faculty practice plan; a primary-care provider network; two multispecialty satellite facilities; and home care and hospice.

Disclaimer: AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert system.

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Long-term effects of carbon monoxide poisoning are an autoimmune reaction

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Delayed brain damage occurs in half of patients with a serious case of CO poisoning. The physiological causes of this delayed decline were not well understood until now. A team from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine report in PNAS that CO causes profound changes in myelin basic protein, a major protein constituent of myelin, the protective sheath surrounding neurons.

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Firefighters around the world put faith in their personal protective equipment, particularly their structural firefighting ensemble. The collective costs of the individual items that make up the turnout gear ensemble are one of the costlier purchases for any department - whether for new recruits or replacement gear for current members.

A full protective ensemble, including helmet, hood, suspenders, coat, pants, boots and gloves, can cost about $2,000. Along with proper prescribed cleaning and drying, properly storing turnout gear can greatly extend the life of the structural firefighting ensemble.

Research, testing and evaluation of PPE tells us that there are several things that can have an adverse impact on the life-cycle of firefighting PPE, particularly the integrity of the PPE fabric. Here's a look at the five leading factors.

1. Exposure to sunlight and other sources of UV rays, like fluorescent lighting.

2. Moisture damage (mildew) from gear not being properly dried.

3. Retention of fire gases and toxic substances from soiled PPE that's not been cleaned and dried.

4. Surface contamination, especially soot, and other debris from firefighting operations.

5. Surface contamination from diesel exhaust particulates from fire apparatus.

This last hazard is exacerbated if the apparatus bay is not properly equipped with a diesel exhaust particulate removal system.

4 principles to prolong PPE life

1. Keep it clean

Regular cleaning and complete drying, per the manufacturer's recommendations, is critical for extending the life of the protective coat and trousers. Clean turnout gear also presents less exposure to the firefighter from surface contaminants and toxins trapped in the fabric.

Boots, gloves, hoods and helmets also require regular inspection and cleaning to prolong their useful lives.

2. Get it dry quickly

A firefighter's PPE may not become soiled to the point of needing a thorough cleaning, but it does routinely get wet and it gets exposed to smoke and soot particles that can penetrate the fabric's surface.

When PPE is not stored so that it can dry quickly and completely, this combination of moisture and contaminants can work its way deeper into the protective fabric. If not dried completely before the next exposure to water, the presence of existing moisture and contaminants will help the new moisture and contaminants pass into the fabric.

3. Let the PPE breathe

When firefighters are enveloped in smoke and fire gases, microscopic-sized soot particles - which can be as small as a hundredth of a micron, making the particles invisible except when concentrated in a smoke cloud - and fire gases permeate the fabric. They also get into the interior portions of the structural ensemble through areas such as the hood, pant legs and coat-to-pant overlap.

Hanging the protective coat, trousers and hood with adequate airflow in and around the gear allows absorbed gaseous toxic materials to release from the fabric, that is, off-gas.

4. Keep PPE in the dark

OK, maybe that's not practical. But it is important to minimize PPE's exposure to UV rays when being stored in the station. Direct sunlight is the main culprit, but prolonged exposure to the UV rays from high-intensity fluorescent lighting may also have a damaging effect on PPE fabrics.

For many fire departments it is normal to store firefighter PPE in the station's apparatus bay, particularly for volunteer-staffed departments, to facilitate rapid access when a call comes in.

While many fire departments have invested in steel mesh rack or locker systems and placed them in the apparatus bay, if not properly protected, PPE is still exposed to light and surface contamination. One way to protect against this is to use fitted synthetic fabric locker covers with quick-release Velcro fasteners.

If each firefighter is not provided with specially designed hangers for coats, gloves and pants to promote free circulation of air for faster drying, then moisture, gasses and surface contamination hazards become a larger issue.

How DoD fire stations store PPE

The optimal solution is a dedicated space within the fire station to store PPE. The U.S. Department of Defense provides guidance and direction for construction of all military fire stations through its Unified Facilities Criteria. Individual services can then take that guidance and make it their own through a document such as the Facilities Criteria: Navy and Marine Corps Fire Stations.

That criteria outlines the requirements for PPE gear storage in Navy and Marine Corps fire stations. The basic requirement is that a well-ventilated locker be assigned to each member of the firefighting crew, with sufficient floor space in front of each locker for easy access during emergencies. Specific requirements include:

Minimum ceiling height of 8 feet.

Low-maintenance, durable wall finishes such as industrial latex or epoxy paints.

Slip-resistant, sealed concrete floor finishes sloped to a floor drain.

Provide open 24-inch-wide by 24-inch-deep by 6-foot-high wire open-mesh locker that includes shelves and clothes hooks. Lockers located alongside walls.

Locker layout should permit free air circulation around and throughout clothing.

Room must be provided with negative ventilation that exhausts to the outside of the fire station.

Commercial options

Not every department can design a new station with a dedicated PPE storage room or retrofit an existing area in their station. Across the board, commercially available turnout gear storage systems provide for the free circulation of air, which helps dry turnout gear faster.

These systems also provide for the proper storage for gear once it's cleaned and dried. And they enable personnel to quickly access their gear when responding to emergencies.

So, where to start? First, do a good assessment of your station to determine where you need gear storage racks and how much space you have available.

Next, determine whether you want the storage racks mounted to a wall, freestanding within the station (no wheels) or mobile within the fire station (wheeled units). Each of the three types of storage racks has some very good points, but there is no one solution that will work for every department.

Individual compartments - regardless of type or manufacturer - for the various storage racks on the market come in widths of 18, 20 and 24 inches.

Several of the largest manufacturers have a useful wall calculator on their websites. You plug in how much wall space you have available, select the compartment width you want, and the calculator determines how many units can be installed in the available space.

Once you've identified the size and number of units, you'll have a choice of finishes. Most manufacturers offer their product with either a chrome finish or a flexible epoxy coating, available in a variety of colors depending upon the manufacturer.

Turnout gear storage system makers also offer a wide variety of add-on features that make their storage racks more versatile. Some of these features include:

Lockable security doors, which can be installed initially or retrofitted.

Electrical receptacles for individual compartments; this also can be installed initially or retrofitted.

Lockable storage drawers for individual compartments.

Fitted synthetic fabric covers with quick-release Velcro fasteners.

Specially designed hangers for coats, gloves and pants to promote circulation of air for faster drying.

Specially designed helmet stand to keep pressure off the helmet's suspension ratcheting system.

The purchase of turnout gear represents a substantial investment in the safety of your personnel. The turnout gear you've purchased will be fit for duty when needed and will have a longer life through a systematic approach to its care and maintenance, particularly how it's stored between uses.

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How fire station storage prolongs PPE life

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Firefighters around the world put faith in their personal protective equipment, particularly their structural firefighting ensemble. The collective costs of the individual items that make up the turnout gear ensemble are one of the costlier purchases for any department - whether for new recruits or replacement gear for current members.

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Studies have shown that firefighter turnout gear and PPE that gets coated with toxic agents from the fireground can continue to transfer and off-gas contaminants long after the incident has ended. This article follows firefighter gear from contamination, through doffing, transport and cleaning to identify potential areas for exposure in the gear contamination cycle.

The fire contamination hazard area

Today's typical structure fire involves the high temperature destruction of many types of plastics, foams, various species of wood, fabrics and other materials. Gases and particulates liberated from these burning materials often contain toxic, reactive and otherwise unhealthy chemicals that are both inhalation hazards and skin absorption hazards.

Several studies have shown that during interior firefighting operations there are many toxic substances and compounds present, particularly during the overhaul phase of those operations, that exceed ceiling values promulgated at the time by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists or the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. (Photo/USAF)

Several studies have shown that during interior firefighting operations there are many toxic substances and compounds present, particularly during the overhaul phase of those operations, that exceed ceiling values promulgated at the time by the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists or the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.

Among those substances and compounds that were most frequently present were:

Gross decontamination

Once a firefighter leaves the hazard area, the potential for secondary contamination begins. The first action to prevent that secondary contamination is for the firefighter to undergo a gross decontamination to remove as much of the external contaminants as possible from the outer surface is of their PPE.

Handling contaminated firefighter PPE

The second action that must occur is properly managing the PPE and SCBA that have been through the gross decon process. Such gear and protective clothing should be treated as hazardous until it's been cleaned and dried back at the station.

Let's be clear: The key word in gross decontamination is "gross." PPE and SCBA that have been through gross decon will still maintain surface contaminants, and impregnated substances and compounds that can only be removed during advanced cleaning back at the fire station.

The hazard in this case is the potentially contaminated water still contained in the PPE as well as any absorbed substances or compounds that can off gas. All PPE and SCBA should be bagged in heavy duty plastic bags for transport back to quarters.

Transporting contaminated PPE

The transportation of contaminated equipment back to the station presents another secondary contamination challenge that must be resolved. The compartment space on most fire apparatus is already "spoken for" with other stored equipment and appliances; firefighters and officers must reevaluate how the available storage space is allocated and make the necessary adjustments to accommodate transporting contaminated gear.

The one absolute is that the bagged contaminated gear, including SCBA, cannot be transported in the crew cab. Doing so could expose personnel to secondary contamination should there be leakage from a bag. It would also create another space - the crew cab - that needs to be decontaminated back at the fire station.

Most existing fire apparatus are not likely to have been designed for the transportation of contaminated equipment. Proper bagging of that gear, with great care to prevent rips, tears or punctures, is necessary to prevent the release of contaminated water into an apparatus compartment. Failure to do so will result in additional actions to decontaminate such a compartment upon return to the quarters.

Off-loading PPE and staging for washing

All contaminated gear should remain bagged and isolated within the fire station until it's time for advance cleaning. Equipment should move directly from its stored location to the cleaning process before being removed from bags.

All personnel handling bagged equipment back at the station should wear equipment to protect them from liquid splashes (e.g., eye protection, gloves, and a rubber apron or Tyvek coveralls.)

Does any of this sound familiar?

If much of this sounds familiar, it's likely because you and your fire department provide EMS to your community. As such, you've had to learn how to take proper care with hazardous waste and contaminated equipment as you cleaned up an emergency scene before returning to service. That's why I stated earlier in this article that you need to treat your contaminated PPE and SCBA just like you've always treated EMS waste and contaminated patient care equipment.

Why reinvent the wheel?

--
The views of the author contained in this article do not necessarily reflect those of the sponsor.

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The firefighter gear contamination cycle

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Studies have shown that firefighter turnout gear and PPE that gets coated with toxic agents from the fireground can continue to transfer and off-gas contaminants long after the incident has ended. This article follows firefighter gear from contamination, through doffing, transport and cleaning to identify potential areas for exposure in the gear contamination cycle.

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Freightgate - Container Dimensions / Weight

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Online portal for the freight and logistics industry all modes of transport, Internet solutions for the freight industry shipment tracking tracing pricing air freight express forwarders

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Page 231 in Engineering Text Book

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Analysis Tool Summary Deep Dive Ergonomics Analysis Tool Matrix (Excel) MMH Tables and Calculator MMH Scoring Sheet (pdf) MMH Scoring Sheet_Metric (pdf) MMH Tables English (pdf) LM ... Continued

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InSoFast is a one step solution to the complex multiple layers that wall assemblies require. The InSoFast panel provides continuous insulation, vapor barrier, framing, and electrical raceways in one step increasing labor production. Do the job once and do it right.

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InSoFast - Continuous Insulation Panels | For Residential, Commercial Walls & Shipping Containers

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InSoFast continuous insulation panels can be applied universally to any type of interior or exterior wall assembly in both new and retrofit construction projects. Whether you are a construction professional or a homeowner, if you have a wall, InSoFast panels can be attached to it!

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Fiberglass Insulation vs Foam Insulation

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Fiberglass Insulation vs Foam Insulation

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1. Removed the first layer of drywall from the wall to expose the stud framing. Set up a table saw to rip the 2×4 stud material down.

2. The red boards are 2×1 furring strips we cut down to run around the perimeter of the wall.

3. Cut 2×4 into 2×1 furring strips.

4. Apply Acoustical Sealant to the 2×1 furring strips. You want to make a good seal between the original wall and the newly added 2×1.

5. Position the furring strip into place.

6. Firmly press the furring strip against the bottom plate.You will continue these steps around the perimeter of the wall.

7. Closeup of the the newly added 2×1 furring strip.

8. Secure the furring strip with nails every 8-16 inches. Always follow local building codes.

9. Remove the existing wall insulation. If you are lucky you can keep this and reinstall it after the new set of studs are installed.

10. Install the new wall studs 16″ o.c. The new studs will fall in between the current wall studs (so the completed assembly will be 8″ o.c.).

11. Continue installing studs. Since this is a rebuild we are toe-nailing them in place. A nailing gun is always helpful if you have one available.

12. Cut insulation down to fit in between the studs. You want to make sure it fits into place. In this case, I cut the insulation into 6.5″ strips.

13. Gently place insulation into the wall cavity. You may wish to use paper faced insulation so you can staple into place.

14. Continue installing the insulation.

15. Top view of the wall framing. The top plate has been removed to show the staggered studs.

16. A diagram illustrates the staggered stud effect.

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Building a Staggered Stud Wall | The Soundproofing Company

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1. Removed the first layer of drywall from the wall to expose the stud framing. Set up a table saw to rip the 2×4 stud material down. 2. The red boards are 2×1 furring strips we cut down to run around the perimeter of the wall. 3. Cut 2×4 into 2×1 furring strips.

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Adding mass using  high destiny materials 

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Adding mass using  high destiny materials 

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Design Step 2 - Generation of Alternative Concepts

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Design Step 2 - Generation of Alternative Concepts

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Wildland Fire: Incident Command System Levels (U.S. National Park Service)

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The wildland fire Incident Command System (ICS) is flexible, scaling up or down as complexity changes and the needs of the incidents change. Type 5 is the least complex, while Type 1 is the most complex.

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MARIPOSA COUNTY - Back in the day, we called it Fire Camp. It is officially known as the Incident Command Post, or ICP. Whatever moniker you choose, it's the little town - constructed basically overnight - where everything done in support of the crews on the fireline happens.

Though the French Fire was much smaller in comparison - just 13,835 acres compared to the nearly 81,000 acres burned so far on the Ferguson Fire - the basic structure put in place to support the firefighters is the same.

There hasn't been an opportunity (okay, there just hasn't been time!) to do an extended tour of the ICP at Ahwahnee Hills Regional Park, but a back-stage look at any ICP is interesting and informative.

Just multiply the size by two or three, and you'll get the idea. The story below was posted on Aug. 6, 2014. Some of the players have changed, but the game remains the same. And the Incident Management Team in the initial stages of the Ferguson Fire was the same team involved in this story, with some personnel changes.

Please enjoy this tour of fire camp during the French Fire a few years back...

NORTH FORK - It takes a village to support hundreds of firefighters battling thousands of acres of scorching flames, and that's what has sprung up, literally overnight, at the Old Mill Site in North Fork.

Nearly 1,700 firefighters, support staff, overhead and contractors are staged on the 135-acre compound managed by the North Fork Community Development Council, effectively doubling the population of this mountain town.

In order to support the efforts of firefighters working this hard and for this length of time, major infrastructure is required.

It took exactly 24 hours for the mostly empty site to be built up into the little city that is being call "French Town." This Incident Command Post (ICP) is headquarters for all activity on the French Fire, from administrative offices to laundry service.

As was the case for last year's Aspen Fire, there is also a heliport on the upper portion of the site, where ships lift off every day to conduct operations on the fire, which is burning along Forest Road 4S81 on the Bass Lake District of the Sierra National Forest.

French Town is set up just as any city of any size would be, complete with a Main Street, says Allen Johnson, one of two Liaison Officers on the South Central Sierra Interagency Incident Management Team (SCSIIMT), the people in charge of this incident.

Johnson conducted a tour of the ICP last Friday, using the city management structure as an analogy to help everyone understand how the setup works.

"Everyone working on the fire ends up on Main Street at one time or another," says Johnson, who has obviously been doing this management thing for a while. All along Main Street are offices occupied by the Section Chiefs, which one can think of as the "Town Council."

Communications, security, finances, ordering and supply, safety, incident command, human resources, training, logistics and operations, planning, fire behavior analysis, equipment, check-in and demobilization, facilities management, information, transportation, weather, medical - all the components necessary for the management of such a large incident are located here.

The "mayor" of this community is David Cooper. He is the Incident Commander (IC), or as they were called back in the day, the Fire Boss. He is in charge of everything that takes place, both at the ICP and on the firelines. Cooper, who is the Fire Management Officer on the Bass Lake Ranger District, has served nearly 20 terms as "mayor" in his position on the SCSIIMT, and was also the IC of the Aspen Fire last year.

The large trailer at the head of Main Street is the Communications Center. This trailer is provided by a contractor, and set up with all the specialized equipment needed for communicating with all operations on the fire, from aircraft operations or medical emergencies, to delivery of supplies and equipment.

Agency personnel are brought in to serve as dispatchers, creating a mobile dispatch center for the incident.

Radio communication is crucial to all aspects of incident management, and with hundreds radios in the field and dozens of frequencies being utilized for different operations and sections of the fire, plus helicopter and air tanker operations, techs are kept busy preparing radios for the field.

They also provide "cloning" for radios when there are new or changed frequencies, rather than having to enter them by hand on each unit. Just plug it in, sync it up and you're good to go.

To assist in boosting radio signals, a series of repeaters has been put in place on mountain tops for relays.

Every city needs a police department, and this one has a security team that keeps an eye on camp and assists with road guard duties to keep the public out of the fire area. Some are true law enforcement rangers who carry guns, some are prevention people with ticket writing authority who are used to dealing with the public on a regular basis.

And as with any city, large or small, there may be an element of crime. People may sometimes "wander in" and things may go missing, so security is an important part of running the ICP.

There are about 30 computers, plus printers, making it easier for the Management Team to update their twice-daily Incident Action Plan (IAP), which is the local "newspaper." With conditions changing hour by hour on the fire, the maps change, along with the weather, the resources available, what section of the fire they are assigned to, and the jobs that need to be done. So an updated IAP is put together and ready for each shift at a mandatory briefing before crews head out to the line.

The IAP is printed out by the on-site "Kinko's," a big mobile copying service located just off Main Street. They also print the maps and displays used for briefings, meetings and planning sessions.

At the twice-daily briefing, each of the members of the "Town Council" addresses the troops with their objectives and concerns for the upcoming shift, weather and fire behavior observations, safety concerns, division assignments, housekeeping-type issues such as payroll, and an update on the progress and challenges of the shift coming in off the lines. This is where division and crew bosses get their assignments for the day, while firefighters are having breakfast, filling coolers and picking up lunches.

Safety is always the number one priority, and working in this rugged, unforgiving terrain, it is front and center on everyone's minds.

Of course the goal is to put out the fire, but there are objectives of very high priority that include protecting wilderness, wildlife, cultural and botanical values throughout the footprint of the fire and the surrounding area. Those objectives are clearly stated and updated, posted on the board at the briefing area.

There is also a finance office on Main Street where firefighters can turn in their time to their home units and get paid, and another office for dealing with such issues as rocks falling on vehicles and other types of damage.

Everything on the fire is assigned a number; every piece of equipment, every vehicle and every person. From the time someone leaves their unit until the time they return, they are tracked, and someone knows where they are at all times.

Of course every town needs accountants and financial advisors who track the amount of money being spent. Everything that's done requires paperwork, and it's filed in boxes that go to each unit. All the water tenders, dozers, contractor trailers, tents - everything is accounted for every day, and with resources being ordered up and demobilized all the time, and the ICP expanding as the fire grows, it's a constant job.

The local "Walmart" is a big supply tent, where everything from fire-retardant clothing and hardhats, to gloves and goggles, is received, inventoried, and distributed. Ground Support is the vehicle rental and repair shop, making sure everyone has a road-worthy ride. They also deliver equipment and supplies to the fireline, shuttle personnel, back-haul trash, and manage the supply of fuel and the weed washing stations.

All the people working at the ICP never forget that all these logistics are in support of the most important part of any fire camp - the firefighters. Working long shifts in heat, smoke and challenging terrain takes a toll both physically and mentally, and when crews come in off the line, filthy and exhausted, they need three things - food, shower and sleep.

Needing 4,000 - 5,000 calories a day to fuel their bodies, firefighters take full advantage of the chow provided to them by the contractors running the food service at camp.

"For Stars Catering" runs the local restaurant at French Town, as they have on all three fires managed by the SCSIIMT so far this year. With contracts to feed the crews on movie sets in addition to large fires, For Star has several different units of various sizes. Given the size of this job, they arrived at camp with the big guns - a giant restaurant on wheels, plus a large grill, a barbeque smoker and 26 employees.

"We do everything we can from scratch," says the manager of 27 years, Dave Pena. "We're doing prime rib tomorrow, and racks of ribs in the smoker, with fresh rosemary chicken after that. Then I'll have my guys roll about 3,200 meatballs and soak them in sauce for about 6 hours."

The caterer also prepares food to be delivered to the spike camp at Minarets Work Station, and the other at Minarets High School. Plus, there are lunches that go out to the fireline, and with well over 1,000 firefighters on the line, that's a truckload of lunches because a lot of guys want two.

Once crews have refueled at the mess tent, the next order of business is scrubbing off the day's soot, sweat and grime.

There are full-service shower trailers at camp, each with individual shower units and changing rooms. The gray water is collected underneath and hauled away, while fresh water is trucked in. No more hanging a bladder bag from a tree and hoping for the best temperature-wise.

Once they've scrubbed the day away at the showers, it's time to head for the laundromat. The camp has a full service laundry facility where firefighters can take their sweat-soaked, fire-blackened clothes.

Debbie Costello of AAA Emergency Services, along with her crew - Elaine, Brandon and Richard - do about 600 pounds of laundry a day. Debbie has been doing this since 2007, and was also part of the ICP on the Aspen Fire last year.

Everyone is given a plastic bag which is tagged with their name, the date and time and their personal identifying numbers. The bags are put into chronological order.

The clothes are then laundered and placed in a tent next door so that when firefighters come in off the line, or have had some sleep and are ready to gear up for their shift, they have clean clothes.

That is especially important when they're working around poison oak and bear clover, and any firefighter will tell you that having clean socks is a very big deal.

The biggest challenge for firefighters working the night shift "back in the day," was trying to get enough sleep to make it through the next night. Trying to sleep in the middle of the day was, well, difficult. It was hot, it was noisy, there were bugs and helicopters buzzing around overhead... things have definitely changed for the better.

In order to allow crews to get some good rest, there are mobile sleeper units set up at the North Fork Recreation Center, and the benefits of these trailers cannot be overstated. They are climate-controlled, have fresh air circulating constantly, and with no windows, they provide "blackout" conditions. They are practically sound-proof and the interior lighting is a soft blue.

Each of these units is self-contained and has 42 berths, stacked three high on each side. Each berth has a reading light, a plug-in for cell phones, tablets or alarm clocks, and a curtain for privacy.

Some firefighters have opted for the outdoor experience, pitching their tents on the green expanse of lawn at the North Fork School. After a startling incident when the sprinklers came on the first morning, adjustments have been made and the tent city allows for sleeping without interruption.

After all the engines and crew buggies have departed for the firelines in the morning, the parking lot at the ICP begins to fill up with other types of vehicles.

Everywhere in camp there are trucks. Trucks hauling in potable water, hauling out gray water, emptying portable toilets, delivering supplies, food and equipment, and watering to keep the dust down. Everyone is working to get everything ready for the return of the day shift when they come in off the line tired, hungry and grubby, and to feed and outfit the night shift as they gear up for work in the late afternoon.

Of course there are also rows and rows of porta-potties, plus hand-washing stations set up at strategic locations... like next to the porta-potties.

The young adults of the California Conservation Corps are a big part of camp support; organizing and cleaning the dining area, emptying trash cans, setting up display boards, monitoring the parking area, directing traffic, spreading wood chips, refilling whatever needs refilling, assisting in supply and ground support, and basically doing whatever is asked of them.

Not everyone at fire camp is a firefighter, and people may not realize how much support it takes to keep this machine running.

There is also a lot of money being pumped into the community through the use of contractors, the rental of the sites, and hundreds of visits to the local markets.

"When these guys want to get chew or soda, they need to head for town," says our tour guide. "And one thing we don't give them is energy drinks. Those are really bad. Closest you're gonna get here is a cup of coffee."

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What Happens At The Incident Command Post On A Wildfire?

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MARIPOSA COUNTY - Back in the day, we called it Fire Camp. It is officially known as the Incident Command Post, or ICP. Whatever moniker you choose, it's the little town - constructed basically overnight - where everything done in support of the crews on the fireline happens.

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Housing 749 firefighters. This ICP has a helibase (top right), and quick access to roads

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wildland firefighting incident command post

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Incident Command Post - Wildland Firefighting

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Incident Command Posts are set up to host, house and maintain firefighters and support the equipment and services assigned to a wildfire or other types of emergency incidents.

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During wildland/urban interface (WUI) fires, it's become an all-too-common occurrence for firefighters to take greater risks when defending civilians and assets. Although no fire agency suggests taking extraordinary risks, firefighters have a natural tendency to push the envelope when lives and structures are threatened.

Of course, a "can-do" attitude must be tempered with real-time fire behavior forecasting and the mindset that threatened assets should be defended with acceptable risk to firefighters. But as we all know, conditions that are safe one moment can change rapidly, posing a threat as fire behavior shifts. Firefighters must anticipate changes in fire behavior and respond accordingly, taking appropriate action to avoid injury.

It is the responsibility of all firefighters to constantly assess their own safety and the safety of those around them by maintaining a heightened level of situational awareness (SA) in the WUI. SA requires personnel to:

Understand their assignment;

Maintain a positive accountability of subordinates;

Remain aware of adjoining resources and their assignments;

Remain aware of current and forecasted weather and fire behavior;

Maintain radio communications with subordinates and supervisors; and

Establish identified temporary refuge areas and escape routes to safety zones.

Safety Zones & Escape Routes
When identifying escape routes, consider the distance between the tactical work area and the safety zone, and the amount of time it will take to travel between the two. Travel time should be commensurate with the rate of fire spread. As resources move within their tactical work area, escape routes must be reevaluated and reestablished as needed.

The size of a safety zone is determined by the observed maximum flame height. The Incident Response Pocket Guide (IRPG) states that distance between the firefighter and the flames should be a minimum of four times the maximum continuous flame height. Distance separation equals the radius from the center of the safety zone to the nearest fuels. Convective heat from wind or topographic influences will increase this distance requirement.

Safety zones that meet the IRPG criteria are rarely present in the WUI environment, where housing density and small parcel sizes preclude the existence of large, open areas. It's also difficult to construct adequate safety zones in the WUI without destroying residential improvements; however, there are WUI-specific areas that can function as safety zones:

Any area without flammable vegetation (rock slide, bodies of water, wet meadows, cleared open space, greenbelts)

Large parking lots

School/athletic fields

Parks with open, grassy areas

Previously burned areas with no flammable overstory (canopy)

Where the TRA Fits In
The temporary refuge area (TRA) concept is somewhat new to the WUI firefighting arena; however, it has been adopted by FIRESCOPE and is currently part of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE) WUI training curriculum.

In short, anything that protects firefighters from radiant or convective heat can be considered a TRA; therefore, if an escape route to a safety zone becomes compromised, firefighters should use a TRA until it's safe to move to the safety zone or safely return to work. Keep in mind, however, that a TRA is not a replacement for an identified safety zone; it is merely a temporary, short-term solution that firefighters can use when needed.

TRA Considerations
Unlike a safety zone that may be some distance away from the tactical work area, a TRA should always be identified on site so that firefighters can quickly secure short-term relief from unexpected flare-ups or adverse changes in fire behavior.

The major difference between a TRA and a safety zone: TRAs may not provide continuous, adequate safety and protection because of changing fire conditions or extreme fire behavior, therefore a TRA always requires another planned tactical action. Firefighters who take shelter in a TRA must have a contingency plan in place in the event they are forced to abandon their position. For example, firefighters taking temporary refuge inside a structure must plan their next move in case the structure begins to burn and they can't remain inside. This may mean moving to an apparatus, sheltering behind a wall or rock outcropping or finding another suitable heat barrier.

Potential WUI TRAs include:

Large turnouts, cul-de-sacs or parking lots

On-site greenbelts, meadows, pastures, large lawns

Lee side of structures

Inside apparatus

Inside structures

When using a TRA, keep all personnel together, and continuously account for all crewmembers. Provide fireline supervisors with situation details and an accurate description of the TRA location and how to access it, and request ground and/or air support and rescue resources, if needed.

When the threat subsides, evaluate personnel for injuries and provide treatment as necessary. Update fireline supervisors of the crew's status and any additional resource needs. When safe to do so, re-engage the fire or move to the safety zone.

What to Use: Apparatus or Structure?
As a TRA, an apparatus can provide tactical mobility as well as some protection from radiant heat, blowing embers, dust, smoke and other hot gasses. With the exception of tactical mobility, a structure can provide the same.

When determining whether to use an apparatus or structure as a TRA, consider:

Fire behavior, intensity and rate of spread

Vegetation clearance around the apparatus or structure

Fuel type (grass vs. heavy fuels) and loading

Duration of exposure to heat and direct flame impingement

Proximity to concentrated heat sources

Proximity to adverse topographic features (drainages, chimneys etc.)

When preparing an apparatus for use as a TRA, park facing the direction of the escape route, and run the engine at a high idle (1,000 rpm if available, so that thick smoke, soot and dust don't bog down the engine and possibly stall it out.). Close all windows, and deploy fire shelters over windows, if necessary. Turn on all lights, including headlights and emergency lights, so that the crew can find its way to the apparatus and others can see the apparatus,and be ready to disconnect deployed hoselays. Take structure fire PPE, SCBA and drinking water into the cab, and be prepared to move the vehicle to the safety zone as conditions permit. Lastly, notify your supervisor that the vehicle is being used as a TRA.

Preparing a structure for use as a TRA is very similar: First, close all windows and doors, and remove flammable materials from windows. If drapes are present, close or remove them if they're made of flammable material. Turn on all interior and exterior lights, even during the daytime. Apply a Class A foam or gel on the structure's exterior (time permitting), and fire out around the structure (if appropriate). Deploy charged hoselines from the apparatus and garden hoses through openings on the least involved side. Take structure fire PPE, SCBA and drinking water into the structure and move to a location furthest from the fire. Identify alternate exits and notify your supervisor that you're using the structure as a TRA.

Keep in mind that using an apparatus or structure as a TRA requires another planned tactical action in the event that conditions deteriorate. The apparatus operator must be prepared to move to another TRA or use an escape route to withdraw to a safety zone when safe to do so. If conditions inside the structure deteriorate, firefighters must be prepared to leave the structure and move to another TRA or use an escape route to withdraw to a safety zone when safe to do so.

Other considerations/precautions when using a vehicle/structure TRA: above-ground fuel storage, power lines, ditches and bridges.

Important: Do not use a structure or apparatus TRA as a substitute for identifying and utilizing viable escape routes and safety zones. Only use a structure or apparatus TRA if escape routes to safety zones have been compromised.

Your Exit Strategy
A review of near-miss reports and fatal fires reveals that many firefighters have abandoned or ignored suitable TRAs while engaged in structure defense or while en route to a safety zone, rather than waiting in a TRA until conditions allowed for safe access to a safety zone. Remember: Firefighting in the WUI is dangerous, and as such, it always requires a planned exit strategy. That strategy should always include the following:

1. Employ a tactical maneuver to avoid injury; move away from the fire.

2. Move to an identified TRA.

3. Withdraw along an escape route.

4. Move into an established safety zone.

Sidebar: Define Our Terms

Escape routes are identified routes used to withdraw from a tactical work area to a pre-determined safety zone or temporary refuge area.

A safety zone is a pre-planned area of sufficient size and suitable location that is expected to protect personnel and apparatus without deploying fire shelters.

A temporary refuge area (TRA) is a pre-identified area where firefighters can immediately take refuge for temporary shelter and short-term relief without deploying a fire shelter in the event that access to an established safety zone is compromised.

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Temporary Refuge Area Considerations and Options

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Escape routes and safety zones are among the most important safety elements firefighters have when fighting a wildland or wildland/urban interface fire. But as Jerry Burke and Kelley Gouette point out, when these elements become blocked or overrun with fire, a preplanned, temporary refuge area can provide firefighters with a short-term, life-saving alternative.

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As wildfires continue to rage in Idaho, a new fire has shut down parts of Yosemite National Park. The USDA Forest Service is reporting a total of 51 uncontained large fire and the national wildfire preparedness level has been raised to its highest level for the first time in years. Current resources are being stretched to their limits as fighting these forest fires requires a massive logistical undertaking, including coordinating tankers, flight crews, government agencies and firefighters aiding in the efforts. While the large number of volunteers is necessary, it creates a problem of trying to house so many in remote locations. Temporary housing for firefighters is an option that many departments beginning to take advantage of.

Short Term Lease Options

Short-term leases of temporary housing for firefighters are allowing departments to get quality living conditions rapidly placed throughout the US as wildfires spread. Plus, at pricing usually lower than a hotel, they are a perfect solution to provide firefighters a place to relax after a grueling day without breaking the bank.

IHS Bunkhouse Trailers

At Industrial Housing Solutions, our Bunkhouse Trailers were built specifically for these occasions. The 8'x49' trailers can be pulled through nearly all terrain and allows a small enough footprint to be placed almost anywhere. However, don't let the size fool you. These trailers are built with extra tall ceilings, can easily sleep 8 people in 4 bunkbeds, and include two bathrooms, a living area and a kitchen. Built with high-grade insulation and durable materials, the trailer can withstand any climate or crew.

Reach out to a member of the Industrial Housing Team today at 866.704.1192. Whether you need a Bunkhouse Trailer or a custom design, we can create a temporary housing rental solution for you.

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Temporary Housing for Firefighters Battling Wildfires - Industrial Housing Solutions

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As wildfires continue to rage in Idaho, a new fire has shut down parts of Yosemite National Park. The USDA Forest Service is reporting a total of 51 uncontained large fire and the national wildfire preparedness level has been raised to its highest level for the first time in years.

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Firefighting Clothes | San Marino, CA - Official Website

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Learn why the firefighters wear the clothes they do.

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A user on Quora recently asked, "What should all firefighters carry with them, and why?" A few answers stood out to us, especially one by firefighter-EMT Dave Lang. You can read his reply below:
In my opinion, there are a couple of things that every firefighter should have.

There are a couple of things that every firefighter should have. (Photo/Joe Thomas of Greenbox Photography)

You should have examination gloves - at least two pairs of different colors and extra for your buddies is always wise. You should also have a back up, intrinsically safe LED flashlight, a lock back knife, heavy duty webbing, a wax pencil and least two door chocks.

Every firefighter will put those to use regularly.

Two other essential pieces are earplugs and dust masks. I always carry spares, too.

The fireground can be loud and some good earplugs will help protect your ears over a long career. Particularly when working near pumps, power tools or simply when you can't get the alarm to shut off.

For dust masks, a smart firefighter should still be wary of respiratory protection.

We are regularly exposed to some nasty stuff. And there is nothing macho about eating smoke and dust when you don't need to.

Keep some dust masks on you and use them.

As for my gear?

1. Streamlight flashlight, chocks and medical gloves.

2. DSU key, gas keys, a five drop key, biting gauge, shove knife and a shopping trolley token.

3. Dust masks, radio, flash hood, beanie hat (for winter).

4. Tubular webbing, crosslayed behind my kneepad.

5. A tactical bag.

This has a set of extrication gloves, a hammer drill, a set of spanners, more chocks, nitrile gloves and dust masks. A K-tool, non marring wedge, inflatable wedge, teabags, coffee sachets and an emergency chocolate bar.

Loads of stuff. Primarily for forcing and securing locks in non-emergency scenarios, but also some other handy things. I don't carry this everywhere, and has little use at a fire but it's great for special service calls.

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What should all firefighters carry with them?

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A user on Quora recently asked, "What should all firefighters carry with them, and why?" A few answers stood out to us, especially one by firefighter-EMT Dave Lang. You can read his reply below: In my opinion, there are a couple of things that every firefighter should have.

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What do the humans need who will be using this product.

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Human-centered design is a practical, repeatable approach to arriving at innovative solutions. Think of these Methods as a step-by-step guide to unleashing your creativity, putting the people you serve at the center of your design process to come up with new answers to difficult problems.

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JavaScript is disabled on your browser. Please enable JavaScript to use all the features on this page.

Abstract

Disaster relief (DR) shelters play a vital role in large-scale disasters and are an important part of disaster response and recovery. DR shelters are used to provide private and secure places for people to live who have left or lost their usual accommodations as a result of some form of disaster. DR shelters not only provide immediate and short-term shelter for the victims of a disaster, but they also help them to recover from the trauma of a disaster as well as provide a base to start the process of rehabilitation. A review of the literature, case studies, guidance, and reports relating to the design of DR shelters indicates that their provision and performance are not currently as effective as they could be. A lack of adequate consideration with regard to climatic conditions, locally available materials and skills, cultural and social issues, delays, cost constraints, and poor location selection for DR shelters have each been identified as sources of poor performance contributing to an unacceptable standard of living. Moreover, there seems to be a lack of sufficient consideration with regard to the design of DR shelters for future storage and re-use. The principal aim of this research is to examine the extent to which environmental, economic, technical, and sociocultural criteria affect the provision and performance of DR shelters, and how such factors might be taken into account in the decision-making and design processes of such shelters.

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An Overview of the Design of Disaster Relief Shelters

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JavaScript is disabled on your browser. Please enable JavaScript to use all the features on this page. Disaster relief (DR) shelters play a vital role in large-scale disasters and are an important part of disaster response and recovery.

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CLOSE

Woodburn firefighter Jon Koenig was supposed to leave for New Mexico this month to celebrate his 20th wedding anniversary.

Instead, Koenig and 21 fellow Marion County firefighters sifted through ash and rubble where Paradise, California once stood, recovering bodies and trying to save what few buildings remained.

"We had plans," said his wife, Lynne Koenig, but "it was a no-brainer ... they needed him more than I did."

Woodburn Fire District was one of five agencies in the Marion County Taskforce - one of 15 Oregon strike teams - that deployed to California to battle the more than 150,000-acre Camp Fire near Chico. Most started returning this past week.

After igniting Nov. 8 in the Sierra Nevada foothills, the blaze exploded into a roaring inferno, whipped by wind gusts down Camp Fire Road in Butte County and into Paradise, a town of 27,000.

CAMP FIRE UPDATE: Death toll grows to 84 as California's most destructive wildfire is nearly contained

At its peak, the fire swallowed the equivalent of 60 football fields per minute.

By Friday, the Camp Fire had claimed at least 84 lives with more than 500 people unaccounted for.

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Camp Fire: Oregon firefighters search for victims, help protect remaining homes

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CLOSE Woodburn firefighter Jon Koenig was supposed to leave for New Mexico this month to celebrate his 20th wedding anniversary. Instead, Koenig and 21 fellow Marion County firefighters sifted through ash and rubble where Paradise, California once stood, recovering bodies and trying to save what few buildings remained.

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24h Site Plans for Building Permits: Site Plan Drawing & Drafting Service

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There is a hot new trend: shipping container homes. Basically, you modify and re-purpose used shipping containers and stick them together to build a house. Architects, designers and builders have actually found a way to transform big boxes of steel into beautiful and fully-functional homes. With proper planning, you can endeavor to design and build a luxurious house for half the price of a "normal" house. 🙂 Let's talk a bit about the costs of building a shipping container house.
Base cost to build per container:
There are two standard sizes for shipping containers: 20 x 8 x 8 ft. covering a surface of 160 sq. ft. and 40 x 8 x 8 with a surface of 320 sq. ft. A used 20-footer costs anywhere between $1,400 and $2,800, whereas a 40-footer costs $3,500 - $4,500. You will also have to pay for labor (about $50-$150 per hour) and for the modifications needed to make the container livable. Expect to pay at least $10,000 for labor, more likely $15,000.
If you are planning to design and build your very own shipping container home, then it's important to note that in many cases it may be necessary to provide a site plan to obtain various home building permits from your city hall or township. You can turn to to get a custom site plan drawing prepared for your dream home in less than 24 hours by our team of experienced architects and drafters. Use the promotion code: 24hplans-20off to get a 20% discount off any package. - Please note this is a limited time offer, exclusive to the readers of our blog. This offer is not being advertised anywhere else.
There are prefabricated shipping container houses sold for as little as $15,000. A big and luxurious house made of shipping containers can cost more than $200,000, but this is one half of the price of a regular construction that has the same size.
Green Home
Via Digital Trends

With a surface of 2,000 sq. ft., this house combines the industrial design on the outside with a walnut finish on the inside. The floors are made of concrete and the dual-pane aluminum windows provide natural light all year round. The house has 5 separate decks to enjoy the sun while eating outside, tanning or simply standing still to enjoy the view. You would probably have to pay about $150,000-$200,000 (estimated) for a metal container house this big. Compared to the $300K required to build a normal house with the same dimension. We think metal containers sound quite attractive at this point. 😉
Container Guesthouse
Via Digital Trends

The costs to build this 1,000 sq. ft. house rise up to $40,000 - $80,000 (estimated). They used 2 x 40 ft. containers and added large windows to make the house look very spacious. This will get your mind off the fact that it's made of metal containers. Although you can't tell from this picture, the house is located near a 2-million people city: San Jose, Costa Rica. This is a great way to build the house of your dreams without burying yourself in debt. Any young married couple who bought a house agrees their life became a lot more difficult after getting a loan of $150K+, so why would you do the same when there is a more affordable way? You have to be open minded though about the whole shipping containers idea.
Green and black containers house
Via Digital Trends

Located in France, this house measures 1,119 sq. ft. and is made of two metal containers positioned on top of each other. Maybe you don't like the green color, but this is not a reason to dislike this design. Remember that you are free to paint it in whatever color you want. Besides, you have to appreciate the desire of architects to make the construction look as if it defies the laws of physics.

Inside, you will see the house looks like any other one: wooden floor, white walls, and a comfortable sofa in the living room. If you go upstairs you will find the bedroom that has a door (or window, you can't tell for sure from the picture) that leads to the top of the first container. You can put grass there or add a chaise lounge to get a tan during hot summer days.
PV14 house
Via PV14 house

Here's what a guy from Dallas, Texas, managed to build; an impressive house comprised of 14 steel shipping containers designed and built for around $300,000 - $450,000 (estimated total cost to build). It has an impressive surface of 3,700 sq. ft., featuring 3 bedrooms, each with its own bathroom, a garage large enough to fit 2 cars, and a roof deck. There is also a study that the owner (who is an architect) probably uses for late night work. You must admit that the design is innovative. You can barely tell the walls are made of metal. On the other hand, your bank account would definitely tell if you were to build a regular 3,700 sq. ft. house with pool.

PV14 House interior by Wade Griffith Photography
Container house on water
The house below seems to be made of 6 metal containers put side by side near a river. You can't see it in this picture but the construction has a greenfield on the top, which is another trend that becomes more and more popular. Located in Scotland, this container house hosted tourists from all over the world: Australia, America, Africa, Asia and Europe (even Eastern Europeans like Russians and Romanians afforded to stay a few nights - just kidding, people are not that poor in these areas as the West world tends to think). 😉

Via Digital Trends

If you want to build one of these for yourself, you have to take into account the location. Some shores are not suitable for constructions and you will have to apply for a permit to find out if you can go ahead with the project. Don't forget about a site plan: contact http://24hplans.com for more details.
Container house made of 2 pieces
Via Digital Trends

This house is basically made of 2 pieces separated by a small yard where you can install a patio and furniture. If you have pets and/or children this space is very useful. You will always be able to keep an eye on your kids just by glancing out the window. This design basically features two separate house, a situation perfect for a recently married couple who want to stay close to their parents.

The floors are made of concrete and fir while the large panels made of glass are found on every side of the constructions. The entire property measures 1,920 sq. ft., the main building being made of 6 shipping containers. The owners wanted to direct attention away from the fact that the walls are made of metal and hid them behind drywalls so that the construction looks like any other house. If you don't see the exterior, you can never tell that the house is made of shipping containers.
Small container house
Via Digital Trends

Made of two shipping containers and other materials, this house covers 1,517 sq. ft. of Nederland, Colorado. The main living space is inside the containers where you will find 2 bedrooms, a kitchen and a bathroom, an office and a laundry room. The house looks and actually is very spacious. The ground floor combines the living room with the kitchen in a beautiful open space design.

You can install solar panels on the roof to make your own electricity. As you see, the house is located on a rocky hill where it can be hard to get electricity and running water but you will find a solution if you don't want to live off grid as some of use would love to. The above house was custom-designed and built for $265,475, which includes the cost of architecture and design, permitting and planning, site work, and the cost of materials and construction.
House made of 8 shipping containers
Via Digital Trends

This is a big house of 2,200 sq. ft. located in Lille, France. The designer opted to not remove the containers' doors as they can be closed manually whenever you need some privacy. The inside is spacious and the link between the 2 floors is made of a slim metal staircase. Downstairs you have the living room and kitchen while upstairs there are the bedrooms. The rooms are connected through floors and bars of metal to maintain an industrial look but you can ditch those and choose the elegant option: wood. 8 containers are needed for this construction, which means that you will pay at least $50,000. Include the labor costs coupled with the materials needed to unite the containers, and you easily get to $100,000. Permitting, planning, architectural designs, and interior finishes, will put you well over $150,000 (estimated).
White container house
The façade is asymmetric having a parking space big enough to accommodate 2 SUVs. You will see this house in France tucked between a bunch of regular houses. One thing we can all agree to is that the house definitely stands out with all its angles. At a first glance, it doesn't look to be made of shipping containers but if you look closer you will see it's a metal modular home that fits a limited budget.

You have to contact a specialized company to turn the containers into living spaces by adding insulation, electrical wires and to make other necessary changes. Adjusting the containers off site and simply having them delivered to the location highly reduces the building time. For example, this particular design was built in only 3 months.
Low cost container house
Here's a futuristic design that requires some extra investments. It's not that easy to find workers who know how to implement the design, nor to find an architect to put it on paper. You need about 10 shipping containers, which means that the raw materials price starts at about $20,000 (at an average price of $2,000 per container). Obviously, the actual cost to design and build, with all the permitting, design, and interior finishes will likely put the total cost at well over $100K mark. The construction is actually a studio in Germany built in 2010 and represents the concept of a photographer named James Whitaker. The downside is there is no garage, but if you own enough land, you can park it nearby. The design allows plenty of natural light to get inside and its radial composition is definitely unique.
Stacked containers house
This design is quite similar to the one featuring a green and a black container. The bars you see to the left of the construction actually make a balcony. The outer wall of the balcony is made of a short rectangle of glass. On top of the brown container, there is a deck surrounded by glass walls and a staircase that leads back to the ground meaning that you can reach the top floor directly from outside the house. The containers were assembled around a steel framework. When you go inside you will see a living space downstairs with a sofa in front of a metal fireplace. The indoor staircase is also made of metal and leads to the top floor where you find the master bedroom.
Cross shaped microhome
Given its cross shape, this design can create a bit of controversy especially if you live in an area where the majority of population isn't Christian. To me and many other people out there, this is just a house made of shipping containers positioned perpendicular to each other. It makes good use of vertical space and it definitely stands out. The concept revolves around self-sufficiency, so this would be an off grid house. It was actually designed as a skit for a single person. Using waste materials significantly reduces the costs.

There actually are 4 levels in this house. From the ground up: the first is the lobby, the second is the bathroom, the third is represented by the horizontal container and holds the rooms and the kitchen while the fourth can be turned into a study with a door toward a deck on top of the horizontal container.
Two-story shipping container house
Via Container Home Plans

This design masks the metal with pallets giving the house an appearance suitable for a Jamaican beach. The house is Eco-friendly, meaning it's built with 85% recycled materials. Proper insulation eliminates the problem of condensation and maintains the right temperature during both summer and winter.
Tiny shipping container house
Via Container Home Plans

Here's a single container house with solar panels. If you do some smart planning, you can probably keep the costs under $50,000. You might think that buying a shipping container for a couple thousands dollars is all you have to do in order to obtain this house, but it's a bit more complicated than this. The building is meant to accommodate a family of four and to supply it own energy. The deck allows you to eat breakfast outside if you buy some patio furniture.
Sloped roof shipping container house
Via Container Home Plans

This house has a big sloped roof that you can cover with grass. The brown material you see in the picture is actually a bamboo lining that insulates that containers making them appropriate for human beings. Remember that it's not just a container, it's a construction that's supposed to abide to certain regulations. That's why you will need a permit and to make sure the house is not a fire hazard. The design seems a bit closed but you can open it up a bit by adding larger windows.
Big metal containers house
Via Container Home Plans

This container house is a big one built with 40-footers. If you were to build a regular house that's the same size, you'd do it in twice the time. This home is located in Costa Rica and is adjusted to withhold tropical weather. For example, you can apply a special type of paint that protects the container against frequent rain showers.
White container house with 2 levels
Via Container Home Plans

This design is perfect for areas where floods occur often because the ground floor containers are flood proof. They also resist wind speeds up to 175 mph. The weight capability of these containers is quite amazing. You can stack as much as 7 containers on top of one another, meaning that the base container holds close to 200 tons (each container holds up to 30 tons of weight). This house covers at least 2000 sq. ft. and has a big garage that can fit 2 cars.
Single shipping container house
Via Design Milk

If you want to keep the costs to a minimum, this is the design you want. You need to buy only 1 container and then make the necessary changes. For example, the one in the image is coated with treated lumber to give it a more natural appearance. However, this is not a good idea for houses in rainy areas because wood rapidly deteriorates in contact with water.
Huge modern shipping container house
Via Shipping Container House Design

Here's a gorgeous house with 2 stories off the ground house with a big garage. Whoever designed it did a pretty great job concealing the fact that it's made of shipping containers. Note how the black combines with the white creating a modern look. The bars of the balconies are designed to allow you to see the view without standing up. For example, you sit on a comfortable chair to drink your coffee in the morning and you see everything as if you were standing because the bars are thin enough to provide a clear view.
Container home with roof terrace
Via Off Grid World

And last, here's is a computer generated design of a house that offers plenty of outdoor space. Notice how you can get to the roof directly from the ground. The house measures 1280 sq. ft. and about 9660 sq. ft. are made of patio or deck space. Notice that on the side of the roof there are solar panels to make the house self sufficient. With proper sourcing and planning, you should pay no more than $75,000 - $125,000 (estimated) for the entire construction including PV solar panels. Not bad for a house this big, isn't it?

Conclusion

You may not have liked every single design we presented here, but you must have understood two things:

1. Shipping container houses are significantly cheaper to build than regular homes. They are very resource efficient and can be made to look like regular houses.

2. You will need a building permit to build or install a container house, and you'll likely need a site plan in order to obtain the building permit.

Note: Here's how we can help: 24hplans has a team of highly-trained, professional architects and drafters who can prepare any kind of site plan in the shortest amount of time possible, so that you can easily obtain that building permit and get on with your project. Use the promotion code: 24hplans-20off to get a 20% discount off any package. - Please note this is a limited time offer, exclusive to the readers of our blog. This offer is not being advertised anywhere else.

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Top 20 Shipping Container Home Designs and their Costs 2017

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There is a hot new trend: shipping container homes. Basically, you modify and re-purpose used shipping containers and stick them together to build a house. Architects, designers and builders have actually found a way to transform big boxes of steel into beautiful and fully-functional homes.

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Earth Day arrived last week, ushering in the usual flood of planet-friendly events--from rain barrel contests to the animated doodle featuring the puffer fish and Japanese macaque. Among the most fascinating of the stories, by my count, is the tiny house.

Fueled by backlash from the financial and housing crisis, these homes--typically sized 500 square feet or smaller--are having a moment. Earlier this month the first ever Tiny House Conference in Charlotte sold out, attracting some 170 attendees. Tiny house pioneer Dee Williams, who has spent the last decade in an 84-square-foot home in a friend's backyard, is currently touring the nation to promote her memoir "The Big Tiny." Even students at the Savannah College of Art and Design are getting into the game, building an entire floor of 135-square-foot homes inside an old school parking lot.

These home may be environmentally friendly--they force owners to reduce their possessions and, often, to use less power--but they're not exactly cheap. Tiny houses typically cost between $200 to $400 per square foot. On a square foot basis, that's far pricier than the average American home--and tiny homes don't include land.

Take the Tumbleweed Tiny House Company, considered the Cadillac of the tiny house world. Tumbleweed prices its 161-square-foot "Elm" model at $66,000, or about $410-per-square-foot. Canoe Bay makes an even costlier model: its 400-square-foot "Escape" ranges from $79,000 to $124,900 (about $200 to $310 per square foot) depending on features. Even midrange tiny homes cost between $20,000 and $40,000--as in the 204-square-foot bungalow by Wind River Custom Homes for $40,000. One builder, Greg Parham of Rocky Mountain Tiny Houses, proudly priced his 136-square-foot "Boulder" at $27,350. As Parham declares on his web site, the total cost is well below the final price tag of competing models.

Still, even the relatively inexpensive Boulder amounts to about $200 per square foot--a price point higher than the median home price in 48 states, according to . Only California, where the median price of a home for sale in March 2014 was $268 per square foot, Hawaii (at $420 per square foot) and Washington, D.C. ($428) suffer from higher per-square-foot home costs, data provided by Zillow shows.

But perhaps a focus on per-square-foot misses the point, when (most of) the tiny houses cost so much less than regular ones. The national median price of a home for sale March 2014 was $169,800, according to Zillow, $290,000 for new homes, according to the Commerce department. Those figures are still well above the total cost of even the most expensive tiny house.

Builders say the high per-square-foot price tag for tiny homes is due to packing a bunch of expensive, shrunk-down features--water heater, refrigerator, stove, toilet, air conditioner--in a teeny space. "If we added another 100 square feet our costs would go down," points out Steve Weissman, president of Tumbleweed Tiny House Company. "We still have to have a bathroom, a kitchen, and all of the mechanicals."

Anyway, the goal of living in one, advocates claim, is a simpler life. "To be out of debt, living within your means, and enjoying your job," says Kent Griswold, who runs Tiny House Blog. The first blogger to cover the tiny house movement, Griswold now works full-time on his blog, which earns him a six-figure income. The majority of his readers, he notes, are women in their 50s, followed by people of both genders between age 20 and 30.

A diligent tiny home builder, of course, can keep costs down. Williams, the author now promoting her memoir, built her tiny home for $10,000 in 2003. According to Ryan Mitchell of the tinylife.com and the Tiny House Conference, the average cost to do it yourself is $23,000.

Four years ago, Andrew and Gabriella Morrison were living in a four-bedroom dream house, stressed out by the costs and work of maintaining it. Today they live with their two dogs and their 14-year-old daughter on five acres in the hills outside , Oregon. They built--and furnished--their 207-square-foot tiny house for $33,000. "The only thing it doesn't cover was the mattreses and the toothbrushes," Gabriella Morrison says.

The Morrisons didn't scrimp on details they cared about, including a full-sized kitchen with full-size appliances, a regular bathroom and sink, stairs to their sleeping loft, and room enough for their home offices, where they both work on their blog, tinyhousebuild.com. (It's worth noting that their 17-year-old son is usually away at boarding school in Colorado, and that each of the kids have a teeny house of their own for when they need privacy. Nonetheless, the Morrisons say most of the time their kids' teenage hangouts take place in the main house rather than the extra tiny houses.)

"Because we're in a small space, there is no disappearing to the back guest room or the second family room behind closed doors," says Andrew Morrison. "Our level of communication and family relationships are so much closer and deeper than they've ever been. I can't think of anything more important than that."

Williams, of the 84-square-foot house, doesn't live with anyone but seems to find small living equally rewarding. "The best part of living in a little house is discovering that I can now work part time," Williams told FORBES. "There's no hefty mortgage or utility bills, no credit card debt tied to fixing the furnace or purchasing a new couch to fill the void in the living room...there is no void in the living room. Now I've got time to hang out with my friends, and to go for a long walk in the middle of the day. I have time to hang out with my neighbor's four year old, and show him how to plant sunflower seeds in the garden. It's the gift of time; that's the best part of the deal."
Zillow and Trulia helped FORBES find some fun tiny houses currently on the market. Check them out in the slideshow at the beginning of this post.

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12 Tricked-Out Tiny Houses, And Why They Cost So Much

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see photosPhoto by Kristin ReneeClick for full photo gallery: 12 Tricked-Out Tiny Houses Earth Day arrived last week, ushering in the usual flood of planet-friendly events--from rain barrel contests to the animated Google doodle featuring the puffer fish and Japanese macaque. Among the most fascinating of the stories, by my count, [...]

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Recent Fires Are Significantly Larger Than Past Fires

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Recent Fires Are Significantly Larger Than Past Fires

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The era of megafires: the crisis facing California and what will happen next

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Three scientists explain the unprecedented danger facing the western US and call for new solutions to a growing threat

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Wildfire has been an integral part of California ecosystems for centuries. Now, however, nearly a third of homes in California are in wildland urban interface areas where houses intermingling with wildlands and fire is a natural phenomenon. Just as Californians must live with earthquake risk, they must live with wildfires.

Shaped by ignitions, climate and fuels, wildfires are likely to become more frequent and severe with climate change. The 2017 experience of the largest and most damaging wildfires in California history, and ongoing destructive fires in 2018, provide a window of opportunity for learning to better coexist with wildfire.

But both governments and people tend to adopt only short-term responses that don't necessarily reduce risk effectively. For example this summer, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, after visiting fires in California, said the solution to wildfire prevention is more active management to remove fuel from forests. In his tweets, President Trump criticized California's handling of the wildfires, blaming its environmental policies and saying that tree clearing is needed to contain fires.

However, focusing on traditional approaches like fighting fires and fuels management alone can't solve the wildfire problem. Instead, California must become better prepared for inevitable fires and change how it develops future communities.
Climate change will make fires worse
For many decades, reducing ignitions was the focus of much public and government attention. Smokey Bear chided, "Only you can prevent forest fires." Indeed, ignitions play a role in determining when and where fires occur. However, whether ignitions translate into fires that spread to larger areas with substantial risks to human infrastructure depends strongly on weather and fuel conditions at the time.

State-of-the-art climate projections estimate that annual average daily temperatures are expected to increase by 3-5 degrees Celsius in the next few decades, increasing how fast fuels will dry out. In mountainous parts of California, increasing temperatures also cause snow to melt earlier, lengthening the summer fire season. The number of days with extreme temperatures, when fire risks are especially high, is also expected to double by 2050.

Higher temperatures and drought combine to create fuels that are dry and highly flammable. Extreme rainfall events, which contribute to post-fire flooding, erosion and even debris flows, are also expected to increase in frequency and intensity. Taken together, these changes in climate are likely to increase the length of the fire season, fire size and fire severity, and the impacts of fire for much of the state.

Fuel management such as controlled burns, vegetation clearing, forest thinning and fire breaks can sometimes reduce fire severity and limit the size of fires. However, like taking vitamin C and exercising, which cannot completely prevent colds, fuel management cannot eliminate fires. Dry enough fuels and high enough temperatures and winds will spread fires. And fuel management need to be maintained over time, or vegetation regrows and reduces the effectiveness of such actions - often within five to 10 years.

The expense of fuel management can certainly be worthwhile if it uses best-available science to inform active management practices. Fuel management plans must also take advantage of advances in fire science to strategically inform where and how often to perform fuels management on different landscapes. But even well-designed fuel management will not eliminate fires, nor even severe fires and the substantial losses associated with them.
Right after fires is the time to make changes
Many of the largest and most destructive fire have occurred in the last decade. As of July 2018, the Mendocino Complex Fire is the largest fire in recorded California history. In 2017, the Tubbs Fire, the most damaging California fire at that time, burned more than 5,000 structures. In response, the California state legislature is considering at least 57 bills related to wildfire. Our research shows that this is typical; governments often respond to wildfire quickly and decisively.

But people and governments don't always respond in ways that reduce the risk most effectively. For example, our research shows that they place fuels management projects close to places that have had recent wildfires. These are often places at reduced risk of wildfire relative to places that haven't just had a wildfire.

And our research shows that responses to wildfire and other natural hazards tend to reduce risks in the short rather than long term. Moreover, most responses to fire are focused on suppression and fuels management, rather than also emphasizing other policy responses.
Strategies for living with wildfire
Addressing the wildfire problem will require policy solutions that reflect a shift in perspective from fighting to coexisting with wildfire. Here are some specific ways to achieve that goal:

Reducing incentives to locate in the wildland-urban interface: Local decision-makers need incentives to support safer and more sustainable development, recognizing that fire is inevitable in their communities. The relative lack of disincentives to develop in risky areas - for example, expecting state and federal payments for suppression and losses - ensures that local decisions will continue to promote disasters for which we all pay. And people must begin to pay the costs for living in fire-prone landscapes. Rather than encouraging development by guaranteed fire insurance and publicly funded fire suppression, we need to ensure that prospective homeowners can make informed decisions about the risks they face in the WUI.

Retrofitting existing housing stock: Homes often ignite and burn due to flying embers from a burning landscape far from the structure itself. There is a crucial need for retrofits of existing structures, such as replacing wood roofing and screening attic vents, which are cost-effective ways to reduce home losses.

Creating more sustainable future development: Building new homes on fire-prone landscapes increases our exposure and the risk of losses. Future development needs to concentrate structures in the lower hazard portions of the landscape and avoid the highest hazard areas, as with other natural hazards. We can achieve safer spatial layouts for neighborhoods by, for example, including buffering with non-flammable features such as orchards, and ease the work of fire fighters by, for example, clustering homes.

Improving evacuation planning, education and warning systems: Regardless of where people end up living, we will eventually be faced with evacuation due to inevitable wildfires. Evacuation planning can begin with spatial land use planning that accounts for multiple exit routes and ease of access. But it must extend to early education about evacuation. People must know in advance how to respond to wildfire, and evacuation-warning systems must be robust by having, for example, redundant technologies. Warning and education must also address the many consequences of fire beyond home and infrastructure loss, including health impacts of exposure to smoke, post-fire flooding and landslide risk.

California has a great deal to learn from other inevitable natural hazards. Following the roadmap for earthquakes, from seismic planning to earthquake retrofitting to education campaigns, the state can move the response to wildfire from reactive fighting to comprehensive preparedness. Increasing wildfires - in number, size and severity - may be inevitable. However, increasing home losses, fatalities and costs are not.

Max Moritz, Cooperative Extension Wildfire Specialist at the University of California Forest Research and Outreach; Adjunct Professor Bren School of Environmental Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara; Naomi Tague, Professor of Hydrology , University of California, Santa Barbara, and Sarah Anderson, Associate Professor of Environmental Politics, University of California, Santa Barbara

***

Copyright © 2018 Salon Media Group, Inc. Reproduction of material from any Salon pages without written permission is strictly prohibited. SALON ® is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as a trademark of Salon Media Group Inc. Associated Press articles: Copyright © 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Wildfires may be inevitable - but increasing home losses, fatalities and costs are not

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Wildfire has been an integral part of California ecosystems for centuries. Now, however, nearly a third of homes in California are in wildland urban interface areas where houses intermingling with wildlands and fire is a natural phenomenon. Just as Californians must live with earthquake risk, they must live with wildfires.

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Between trips upstairs to gather treasured photographs and important documents, Diane Francis stood at her living-room window and stared over the hillside at giant black plumes of smoke.

The view was eerily familiar. Seventeen years earlier, she and her husband stood on the road leading to their property and watched as their house burned down, devouring everything they owned.

"It's stunning to have the fire in front of you again," Francis said.

This time, she was lucky. In the triple-digit July heat, gusty winds drove the blaze away from her home. Other Alpine residents just miles away were not: 53 homes were damaged or destroyed in this summer's West fire.

A governor should expect that his agenda is going to be interrupted at some point by natural or manmade disaster. It's just going to happen. - Former Gov. Gray Davis

Whether fire or earthquake, mudslide or drought, natural disaster is an inextricable part of the California experience. And just as it upended Francis's life, disaster threatens to snarl the next governor's plans. Emergency response is rarely discussed as a campaign issue, but once in office, a governor's on-the-ground handling of unexpected catastrophe and its immediate aftermath can define his legacy, for good or bad.

"A governor should expect that his agenda is going to be interrupted at some point by natural or manmade disaster. It's just going to happen," said former Gov. Gray Davis, whose faced an unexpected power crisis while in office. "Nobody wants to think about it, but you need to prepare for it."

How a state's chief executive responds when calamity strikes often makes it into the history books. The choices a governor makes ahead of disaster are no less consequential - and often present high political risk with little payoff.

"The first principle is that [governors] get rewarded for how they react to crises to a greater degree than whether they act to prevent them," said Bruce Cain, professor of political science at Stanford University.

The disaster currently occupying headlines - wildfires that have ravaged the state in historic proportions these last two years - has pushed the policy debate over fire prevention to the forefront.

But experts say the next stage of the discussions must confront how we build communities to better withstand fire, a topic that has long been politically fraught. Disaster preparedness is expensive - whether it's retrofitting buildings and highways to withstand quakes, improving water infrastructure to prevent deadly floods or deciding if development should be allowed in fire-prone areas.

When governors challenge the status quo, "the resistance is enormous" said Cain.

"How do you make the case to voters to do this really, really difficult thing?"

Keeping the lights on

Within his first year as governor, Pete Wilson was flying in a helicopter over the Oakland hills, watching as a firestorm raged against the darkening sky.

"I was looking down on about 3,000 little orange squares - each of them representing a home," Wilson said in an interview. "It struck me what I was seeing. I was near tears. I just thought, 'My God, what a tragedy this is.'"

In his two terms as governor, Wilson encountered every strain of California disaster: The 1991 Oakland fires and the 1994 Northridge earthquake were among the most destructive.

He won plaudits after the quake for repairing the I-10 freeway's collapsed overpasses in less than three months, using his emergency powers to cut red tape and give hefty bonuses to motivate contractors to finish their work early. With earthquake fears fresh in the minds of voters, he followed up with a $2-billion bond to seismically retrofit highways statewide, work that experts said has made state roadways significantly safer.

"Disasters are crisis situations that can make or break political figures," said Mark Ghilarducci, director of the governor's Office of Emergency Services. "If you come on too much, you're tending to get in the way.... But if you're slow to lead, slow to respond, then it's problematic. It's a fine line."

In his earlier turn as governor, Jerry Brown flubbed the response to the Mediterranean fruit fly infestation that threatened to decimate the state's crops. Brown found himself caught in a battle between farmers clamoring to spray pesticide to stop the infestation and environmentalists who were fiercely opposed.

During the 13-month saga with one zany episode after another - 1.3 billion sterile flies were released in hopes of zapping the Medfly population by infertility, a state official drank a glass of watered-down pesticide to prove it was safe - Brown came off as indecisive and ultimately decided in July 1981 to spray.

"It was just a PR disaster - and it went on and on," said Miriam Pawel, author of the new biography "The Browns of California."

Brown's handling of crises during his current tenure has showed a more assured leadership style. Not one to show up at the scene of an unfolding emergency, his signature has been frank talks on the danger posed by natural disasters and how climate change will only exacerbate those threats in the future.

He used those crises as opportunities for more sweeping policy changes. The four-year drought gave cause for the state to regulate its groundwater for the first time in California history. The dry spell, along with wildfires, has been cited by Brown to bolster ambitious plans to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

It's not just Mother Nature that poses a threat. Unexpected manmade catastrophes can similarly hobble state government.

When Gov. Pat Brown ordered police to remove protesters from Sproul Hall at the UC Berkeley campus during the Free Speech Movement of 1964, the resulting images of students being dragged out of the building prompted a swift backlash.

Ronald Reagan seized on the incident in his successful 1966 campaign against Brown. His pledge to "clean up the mess" at Berkeley was especially resonant, Pawel said.

"It became symbolic that the state is out of control and Pat Brown does not have control," said Pawel, a sense that had been reinforced by the Watts Riots in 1965.

Davis said he did not get a single question about the state's energy deregulation during his 1998 run for governor. But when California found itself with electricity shortages in 2000 and 2001, it consumed his administration and ultimately led to his recall in 2003.

"It envelops you. That's all you're focusing on - keeping the lights on," Davis said. "But those are the cards you're dealt."

The immediate aftermath of a disaster is a punishing test of one's ability to lead. But there can also be a silver lining: crisis-sparked momentum that can break through political logjams. Spending money to prevent disaster from occurring, however, gets no such boost.

"Money always seems to be available to clean up a disaster, but much less is available to prepare for it," Davis said.

California's largest cities have not endured a major earthquake in the last 20 years. Because of that, the next governor might not find sufficient popular desire to spend more state money on safety retrofits. A physical or cyber attack on the power grid could plunge the state into blackouts, but with scant public focus on that possibility, it's unclear whether the next governor will make it a priority.

Fire, however, weighs heavily on the minds of most Californians. Over the last year, California has contended with the largest, most destructive wildfires in its history. And the state projects that wildfires, along with other disasters, will be more extreme than previously thought due to climate change.

Several of the deadliest, most destructive fires in the state's history have happened in the past decade.

Most destructive wildfires

Deadliest wildfires

Largest wildfires

If the next governor hopes to make progress in protecting the state against wildfire risk, he'll have to spend political capital on the WUI.

Pronounced woo-ee, like an elongated exclamation, WUI stands for "wildland-urban interface." Picture a Venn diagram with the state's nature spaces on one side, and where people live on the other. The area where they overlap - that's the WUI.

About one-third of California homes are considered to be in the wildland-urban interface. While many have focused on how hotter, drier weather has led to a longer fire season, less has been said about how fires have become more catastrophic because there are more homes in their path.

WUI fires fall under the same disaster category as forest fires, the type of blazes that Smokey the Bear wanted us to prevent. But they raise very different policy questions.

Most of the recent action in Sacramento has focused on the latter, aiming to tackle California's overgrown, parched forests so they are less of a tinderbox when fire rolls in.

Brown convened a task force to address the crisis of millions of dead and dying trees and signed an executive order in May promising to improve forest management. On Sept. 21, he signed a law approving $1 billion to be spent over five years on tree and brush thinning, prescribed burns and other forest health programs.

That spending package, along with a boisterous debate over how utility companies could pass along certain wildfire-related costs to customers, commanded much of the attention in the closing weeks of the legislative year.

But lawmakers also put together a hodgepodge of proposals to address fires in the WUI. Among them was legislation to improve landscaping around homes to reduce fire risk, known as "defensible space," and to improve emergency alert systems across the state.

It's those types of efforts that must be at the center of the next governor's agenda, experts said.

"What the administration is doing now is focusing strongly on the forest-fire component," said Dan Turner, a former Cal Fire unit chief for San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties. "There is no equivalent for the wildland-urban interface fires. There's very little effort going forward in California today on what do we do for solutions for the WUI fire problem."

On the campaign trail, the gubernatorial candidates have laid out different approaches to wildfire. Republican John Cox has backed more logging to help manage overcrowded forests. Democrat Gavin Newsom has emphasized the links between fire and climate change, and has talked about deploying new technology to detect blazes early.

But there are a number of other policies the next governor will have to weigh. Will it be continued emphasis on vegetation management - thinning out brush and other plants on public land that fuel conflagrations? What about defensible space? The state requires homes in high fire-risk areas to have 100-foot buffers around them, and some counties have stricter requirements, but enforcement can be spotty.

Should the state require buildings to be more fire resilient, with interior sprinklers, double-paned windows and protected vents to guard against flying embers? California law has set stringent requirements for new construction and significant home remodeling in areas with high fire risk. But those rules do not apply to older construction, and making those upgrades can be a costly prospect for homeowners.

What about more money for state and local firefighters? The California Fire Chiefs Assn., for example, sought $100 million in the state budget to shore up the state's overstretched Mutual Aid System - used by fire agencies to send manpower and equipment to fires outside their jurisdiction - and to enable agencies to pre-position their crews where fire is likely. The final budget included just a quarter of their request: $25 million.

The answer from experts: All of the above.

"Let's help prepare the battlefield for the firefighters that are in this monumental fight," said Chris Dicus, a wildland fire expert at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. "From scientists and utility companies to landscape architects and engineers, we have to break out of our silos and come to the table and discuss the fire problem in a multi-faceted and interdisciplinary view - which can be uncomfortable."

'It's not enough'

It usually takes a tragedy to force government to get serious about disaster preparedness. That's what happened in San Diego.

Fifteen years ago, epic firestorms raged from L.A. County to San Diego. The worst of the blazes was the Cedar Fire, which destroyed more than 2,200 homes and claimed 14 lives. It was followed four years later by a 27-day siege of fire that killed 10 people and destroyed more than 1,700 homes.

The two disasters marked a watershed moment in how the San Diego region grappled with fire.

The county created a consolidated fire agency to oversee about 1.5 million acres. It partnered with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to create a real-time incident monitoring and communication system that is now being used by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, and established a reverse 911 system to call residents with emergency alerts. County and local fire codes were updated with stricter requirements, and local planning departments increased their scrutiny of proposed development. Local nonprofits help residents chip flammable brush.

"It's day and night. It's markedly improved," said County Supervisor Ron Roberts, whose district includes most of the city of San Diego. "Are there more things I'd like to see done? I don't want to say it's perfect. But every part of this has improved."

But airtight regulations mean little without enforcement.

Dianne Jacob, a county supervisor who represents much of San Diego County's eastern backcountry, acknowledged follow-through could be spotty.

"We've got great people out there - the [local nonprofit] fire-safe councils and the county does a lot of these inspections," Jacob said. But "it's not enough," she said, adding that the state could spend more money to help local governments with enforcement.

That hit-or-miss quality of inspection is evident in San Diego's North County. In affluent Rancho Santa Fe, urban foresters are on staff at the Fire Department. They approve residential landscaping plans, making sure popular but flammable Italian cypress trees and pygmy palms are a safe distance away. The department has nine staff members dedicated to prevention who drive the rustic hills each day and keep an eye on properties to make sure they're in compliance.

Ten miles away, in Escondido, Ron Woychak, a former firefighter who is now a fire-prevention consultant for developers and homeowners, drove through a new fire-conscious development with wide roads and buildings built to the new code. Directly adjacent were older homes that screamed out risk, with firewood stacked nearby or front porches laden with various flammable tchotchkes.

"We've got a lot of homes out here that don't follow fire code," Woychak said. "It's not at the top of their priority list. They're working, trying to make money, trying to live a life, trying to enjoy their weekends. You think fire prevention is a big thing in their mind? No."

A political third rail

Are there certain places where it's simply too dangerous to build?

It's a simple question, but politically charged. Land use - deciding where to build - has long been the domain of cities and counties. It's a responsibility local governments doggedly guard.

"The argument is that local control is sacrosanct and we can't let go of that," Max Moritz, a wildfire specialist at UC Santa Barbara, said. "It's almost religious."

Cara Martinson, a lobbyist with the California State Assn. of Counties, described land use as "inherently local."

"There is room for the state in these conversations," she said. "But the approval process really lies squarely with local government."

If you're really talking major change... I'm not sure you're going to see that. It's a heavy lift. - Kim Zagaris, fire and rescue chief, California Office of Emergency Services

Because local governments have a muscular lobbying presence at the Capitol, the prospect of giving the state more authority over land use decisions has for years been seen as a political third rail.

"If you're really talking major change...we'd be dictating down to locals on fire prevention and mitigation," said Kim Zagaris, CalOES's fire and rescue chief. "I'm not sure you're going to see that. It's a heavy lift."

But others in the field say it's time for the state to take a more active role.

"I'm sure what the local government would say is ...we zone and plan accordingly for our local issues," said Lou Paulson, past president of the California Professional Firefighters. "But when we've got to send a massive amount of resources - state-funded and federally-funded - to put wildland-urban interface fires out, it is actually a statewide problem."

There are signs the state could soon flex more muscle in local land use decisions. Gov. Jerry Brown signed a pair of bills to enhance the state's role in advising local governments in high fire risk zones.

"There's an acknowledgement on everybody's part - the locals in particular - that we need additional technical input and advice," Martinson said. "Everybody at this point is willing to acknowledge we all need to do better."

"There is a strong desire on behalf of some people that want to live in these areas and I don't think we should deny that," Jacob said. Instead, she said, the government should focus on making sure that homes are built with safety in mind and residents are prepared to accept the risk they're taking.

Back in Alpine County, Francis, whose life has repeatedly been singed by fire, said she knows and accepts those risks. Even in the emotional days following her close call, she said that if her home burned down, she would remain.

"I suppose people would scratch their heads and say, 'Why would she build again?'" she acknowledged.

Her answer lies in the living-room view of the ocean and city lights, and quail and rabbits darting across the hill. And in the memories of her now deceased husband.

"Because," she said, "I love it here."
melanie.mason@latimes.com

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Natural disaster is inevitable in California. And it can define a governor's legacy

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Between trips upstairs to gather treasured photographs and important documents, Diane Francis stood at her living-room window and stared over the hillside at giant black plumes of smoke. The view was eerily familiar. Seventeen years earlier, she and her husband stood on the road leading to their property and watched as their house burned down, devouring everything they owned.

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(Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Wildfire has been an integral part of California ecosystems for centuries. Now, however, nearly a third of homes in California are in wildland urban interface areas where houses intermingling with wildlands and fire is a natural phenomenon. Just as Californians must live with earthquake risk, they must live with wildfires.

Shaped by ignitions, climate, and fuels, wildfires are likely to become more frequent and severe with climate change. The 2017 experience of the largest and most damaging wildfires in California history, and ongoing destructive fires in 2018, provide a window of opportunity for learning to better co-exist with wildfire.

But both governments and people tend to adopt only short-term responses that don't necessarily reduce risk effectively. For example this summer, Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke, after visiting fires in California, said the solution to wildfire prevention is more active management to remove fuel from forests. In his tweets, President Donald Trump criticized California's handling of the wildfires, blaming its environmental policies and saying that tree clearing is needed to contain fires.

However, focusing on traditional approaches like fighting fires and fuels management alone can't solve the wildfire problem. Instead, California must become better prepared for inevitable fires and change how it develops future communities.

Climate Change Will Make Fires Worse

For many decades, reducing ignitions was the focus of much public and government attention. Smokey the Bear chided, "Only you can prevent forest fires." Indeed, ignitions play a role in determining when and where fires occur. However, whether ignitions translate into fires that spread to larger areas with substantial risks to human infrastructure depends strongly on weather and fuel conditions at the time.

State-of-the-art climate projections estimate that annual average daily temperatures are expected to increase by three to five degrees Celsius in the next few decades, increasing how fast fuels will dry out. In mountainous parts of California, increasing temperatures also cause snow to melt earlier, lengthening the summer fire season. The number of days with extreme temperatures, when fire risks are especially high, is also expected to double by 2050.

Higher temperatures and drought combine to create fuels that are dry and highly flammable. Extreme rainfall events, which contribute to post-fire flooding, erosion, and even debris flows, are also expected to increase in frequency and intensity. Taken together, these changes in climate are likely to increase the length of the fire season, fire size, and fire severity, and the impacts of fire for much of the state.

Fuel management such as controlled burns, vegetation clearing, forest thinning, and fire breaks can sometimes reduce fire severity and limit the size of fires. However, like taking vitamin C and exercising, which cannot completely prevent colds, fuel management cannot eliminate fires. Dry enough fuels and high enough temperatures and winds will spread fires. And fuel management need to be maintained over time, or vegetation regrows and reduces the effectiveness of such actions-often within five to 10 years.

The expense of fuel management can certainly be worthwhile if it uses best-available science to inform active management practices. Fuel management plans must also take advantage of advances in fire science to strategically inform where and how often to perform fuels management on different landscapes. But even well-designed fuel management will not eliminate fires, nor even severe fires and the substantial losses associated with them.

Right After Fires Is the Time to Make Changes

Many of the largest and most destructive fire have occurred in the last decade. As of July of 2018, the Mendocino Complex Fire is the largest fire in recorded California history. In 2017, the Tubbs Fire, the most damaging California fire at that time, burned more than 5,000 structures. In response, the California state legislature is considering at least 57 bills related to wildfire. Our research shows that this is typical; governments often respond to wildfire quickly and decisively.

But people and governments don't always respond in ways that reduce the risk most effectively. For example, our research shows that they place fuels management projects close to places that have had recent wildfires. These are often places at reduced risk of wildfire relative to places that haven't just had a wildfire.

And our research shows that responses to wildfire and other natural hazards tend to reduce risks in the short rather than long term. Moreover, most responses to fire are focused on suppression and fuels management, rather than also emphasizing other policy responses.

Strategies for Living With Wildfire

Addressing the wildfire problem will require policy solutions that reflect a shift in perspective from fighting to co-existing with wildfire. Here are some specific ways to achieve that goal:

Reducing incentives to locate in the wildland-urban interface: Local decision-makers need incentives to support safer and more sustainable development, recognizing that fire is inevitable in their communities. The relative lack of disincentives to develop in risky areas-for example, expecting state and federal payments for suppression and losses-ensures that local decisions will continue to promote disasters for which we all pay. And people must begin to pay the costs for living in fire-prone landscapes. Rather than encouraging development by guaranteed fire insurance and publicly funded fire suppression, we need to ensure that prospective homeowners can make informed decisions about the risks they face in the WUI.

Retrofitting existing housing stock: Homes often ignite and burn due to flying embers from a burning landscape far from the structure itself. There is a crucial need for retrofits of existing structures, such as replacing wood roofing and screening attic vents, which are cost-effective ways to reduce home losses.

Creating more sustainable future development: Building new homes on fire-prone landscapes increases our exposure and the risk of losses. Future development needs to concentrate structures in the lower hazard portions of the landscape and avoid the highest hazard areas, as with other natural hazards. We can achieve safer spatial layouts for neighborhoods by, for example, including buffering with non-flammable features such as orchards, and ease the work of fire fighters by, for example, clustering homes.

Improving evacuation planning, education, and warning systems: Regardless of where people end up living, we will eventually be faced with evacuation due to inevitable wildfires. Evacuation planning can begin with spatial land use planning that accounts for multiple exit routes and ease of access. But it must extend to early education about evacuation. People must know in advance how to respond to wildfire, and evacuation-warning systems must be robust by having, for example, redundant technologies. Warning and education must also address the many consequences of fire beyond home and infrastructure loss, including health impacts of exposure to smoke, post-fire flooding, and landslide risk.

California has a great deal to learn from other inevitable natural hazards. Following the roadmap for earthquakes, from seismic planning to earthquake retrofitting to education campaigns, the state can move the response to wildfire from reactive fighting to comprehensive preparedness. Increasing wildfires-in number, size, and severity-may be inevitable. However, increasing home losses, fatalities, and costs are not.
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article. Max Moritz is an adjunct professor at the University of California-Santa Barbara. Naomi Tague is a professor of hydrology at the University of California-Santa Barbara. Sarah Anderson is an associate professor of environmental politics at the University of California-Santa Barbara.

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Max Mortiz, Naomi Tague & Sarah Anderson

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California Must Better Prepare for the Inevitability of Future Fires

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Wildfire has been an integral part of California ecosystems for centuries. Now, however, nearly a third of homes in California are in wildland urban interface areas where houses intermingling with wildlands and fire is a natural phenomenon. Just as Californians must live with earthquake risk, they must live with wildfires.

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Continuous Fires Create a Detriment to Already Scarce Housing

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Continuous Fires Create a Detriment to Already Scarce Housing

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People who lost homes in the California wildfires lined up on Sunday outside an emergency assistance center set up at the Press Democrat building in Santa Rosa, Calif. Credit Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

SANTA ROSA, Calif. - Nathalie and Michael Internicola had about 15 minutes to grab what they could as the flames roared toward their house, and it wasn't much: Some clothes, passports, their phones. They are grateful to be alive, they said, but as for what comes next and how and where they might rebuild their lives, they don't have a clue.

"We're staying with friends as long as they will have us; then we don't know," said Ms. Internicola, 51, whose home in Santa Rosa burned to the ground, along with about 60 others in their neighborhood. "We are desperately looking for a house we can rent, but there's just nothing available, because there are so many people displaced."

Though some of the fires in Northern California, the deadliest on record in the state, had been partly contained by Sunday afternoon, others were still raging. At least 41 people have died, and the count is likely to rise as the search for victims continues.

But for people like the Internicolas who escaped in time but lost their homes, the journey is just beginning. And the daunting implications of starting over, multiplied by thousands, are rippling through the state. About 100,000 people have been evacuated from fire zones, and some 5,700 houses and buildings have been destroyed.

Some displaced people likened their path to a gauntlet of fresh blows: real estate prices and rents that were already sky-high before the fires, the complexities of California's housing, zoning and building regulations, and the environmental problems involved in cleaning up home sites made toxic by the ash from the fire.

Improvisation is the order of the day. Ron Gove called his accountant after his house in Santa Rosa burned down, hoping she would have documents and backup paperwork for his home-based business. She immediately insisted that he move into her guest bedroom, where he has now been staying for a week.

Some people are staying in motels or bunking with friends. Evelyn Gibson, 73, has moved in with her boyfriend. Some people have gone as far as Oakland or San Francisco, upward of 70 miles from Santa Rosa, in search of a place to sleep and a refuge from the fire's new reality.

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Matt Park, a child psychologist at Hidden Valley Elementary School, which was affected by a wildfire, consoled his son Henry, 5, on Sunday at a donation center in Santa Rosa, Calif. Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

"It reaches to every aspect of this community's life," said Matt Park, a school psychologist who lost his house in Santa Rosa. He said about half the children in his daughter's kindergarten class were now homeless as well.

For almost everyone, the retelling starts with the frantic minutes, often with flames visible from the front door, as they piled a few possessions, randomly or not, into a vehicle and fled. Some now shake their heads at the things they thought to grab in the chaos and trauma: a basketful of clean folded clothes just out of the dryer, a book taken from a shelf on the way to the door.

John Page pulled two drawers of family mementos from a bureau and made a cache in his backyard as the wildfire closed in. The trove, he said, was the stuff of deep meaning but little financial value: some old watches and neckties, his children's baby teeth, his brother's military burial flag. He covered the box of mementos with water-drenched bedding and blankets, made a kind of tepee over it out of three wheelbarrows, and then fled for his life.

John Page, 65, tried to safely stash two bureau drawers full of family mementos before he fled his house in the Fountain Grove neighborhood of Santa Rosa. The house was destroyed by fire, but the mementos survived and were returned to him by a police officer. Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

The house was completely destroyed, and Mr. Page, 65, is staying in his deceased parents' home for the time being. A few days ago, a deputy sheriff who'd heard his story rang the doorbell with a box in his arms.

"It was all there," Mr. Page said, choking up. "I couldn't believe it."

California already had a housing crisis long before the fires started. With strict environmental rules and local politics that can discourage new housing development, the state's pace of new construction has fallen far short of the state's population growth.

In the five-year period ending in 2014, California added 544,000 households, but only 467,000 housing units, according to the McKinsey Global Institute, and the deficit is only expected to grow over the next decade. Napa and Sonoma Counties, where the fires did some of the most extensive damage, are among the furthest behind, building less than half the number of units in recent years that the state reckons were needed to keep up with the population.

Napa and Sonoma present a kind of worst-of-both-worlds scenario, according to Issi Romem, chief economist at BuildZoom, a San Francisco company that helps homeowners find contractors.

Those two counties are close enough to San Francisco and Silicon Valley that they have been affected by the heavy demand and soaring prices that have made housing unaffordable for many people in the Bay Area's dense urban job centers, Mr. Romem said. At the same time, they are far enough away from cities that residents are still fiercely protective of their rural atmosphere and ethos, and they often resist development.

"Rebuilding is going to be tough unless some kind of streamlining is made," he said.

The ruins of Amanda Welch's burned house were shown in a photo displayed on her phone. Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

The question of how to speed up housing construction figured prominently in the state legislature's most recent session. Gov. Jerry Brown signed 15 bills meant to ease the effects of local regulations and raise money for subsidized lower-income housing.

"It needs to be as easy as possible for people to rebuild," said Scott Wiener, a state senator from San Francisco. "We have a severe housing shortage as it is, and we don't want to make it worse."

Outside a multiagency assistance center that opened in Santa Rosa this weekend, Tom Gerstel, a disaster support worker, addressed a line of people who had been assembling for more than an hour before the doors opened on Sunday morning. In the center's first day of operation on Saturday, 387 people came through its doors, all of whom had lost their homes and most of whom had also lost the paper trail of their lives: deeds and marriage licenses, tax files and social security cards.

"Some folks have lost everything, others partial," Mr. Gerstel said to the line of people, some of them wearing masks over their noses and mouths as ash fluttered down from a sunny sky. He told them that they could expect a kind of triage inside, with help in applying for federal aid, and getting a new driver's license, but that the priority was housing: "A safe, secure place to sleep tonight, and food - that's going to be tended to as a priority," he said.

Some who lost their homes said that the fires had shifted the priorities of their lives, and that possessions and nice houses no longer seemed so important.

Dennis and Kathy Shanklin, who lost all their belongings, at a friend's house in Santa Rosa on Sunday. Credit Jason Henry for The New York Times

Kathy and Dennis Shanklin lost everything but their dogs and the clothes they were wearing, after they stripped off their pajamas and fled in the middle of the night. They sneaked back through the still-closed roads a few days ago to look at the ashes of their old lives.

"I started to cry, and then it just felt like, 'It's not worth crying about,'" said Ms. Shanklin, 67, a schoolteacher, describing her feelings as she stood there looking at what had been. "You've just got to put one foot in front of the other," she said.

Susan Gibson saved her cats and some cat food, a purse and couple of changes of clothes, but lost everything else when her house burned to ash. The psychological shock waves hit when she looked at a rental she hoped to live in for two years or more, the time she thinks it could take to rebuild. The place was lovely, she said, down a winding road in the woods, But she walked away, the caustic memories of fire and flight too fresh and raw. She knew she wouldn't be comfortable there.

"The escape route was a concern," she said. "On the night of the fire, I sat in stopped traffic - we all did. It took about half an hour to go a quarter-mile, and the fire was bearing down on us. So now I'm conscious of it."

Many people who lost homes said the outpouring of donations and outreach from friends had changed them, too, in positive ways - in seeing new connections and reasons for hope.

"Gratitude," said Ms. Shanklin, the schoolteacher, "is a big word in my vocabulary now."

Kirk Johnson reported from Santa Rosa, Calif., and Conor Dougherty from Oakland, Calif.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A11 of the New York edition with the headline: Fires Leave Many Homeless Where Housing Was Scarce. Order Reprints | Today's Paper | Subscribe

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California Fires Leave Many Homeless Where Housing Was Already Scarce

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SANTA ROSA, Calif. - Nathalie and Michael Internicola had about 15 minutes to grab what they could as the flames roared toward their house, and it wasn't much: Some clothes, passports, their phones. They are grateful to be alive, they said, but as for what comes next and how and where they might rebuild their lives, they don't have a clue.

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How the Fires Affect Those Who Are Already Homeless

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How the Fires Affect Those Who Are Already Homeless

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Photos: The Camp Fire ravages Paradise, California.
Lisa Cooper got three of the masks that were being handed out by the city, because she was having trouble breathing. But then she fell asleep on the street after being awake for nearly four days, she said, and all three masks had been stolen. On Monday evening, she was on her way to a shelter, but said her spot was only guaranteed for one night-she has addiction issues and some of the shelters are strict about drug use. She is worried for her health if she stays on the streets. "Right now, it's hard to exhale and inhale fully," she said.

Smoke from wildfires is dense with tiny, toxic irritants that scientists call particulate matter. It's a catchall term that refers to any microscopic bit of material released by a fire: a mote of dust, a flake of ash, an unburned shred of wood, or a droplet of sulfuric acid. A messy, incomplete, uncontrollable wildfire can spew any of these things-each many times thinner than a human hair -into the atmosphere.

And when there's more particulate matter in the air, more people die. It seeps into the tissue of the lungs and heart, triggering heart attacks and aggravating asthma. The closer scientists look, the more harm particulate matter seems to cause: A study published this summer found that particulate matter so inflames the body that it can cause diabetes. More than 150,000 cases of diabetes in the United States are directly attributable to particulate matter, scientists now argue.

"I think everyone would agree that the particulate matter is by far the largest public-health threat [from wildfires] from an air-quality perspective," said Greg Huey, a professor of atmospheric chemistry at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

There's reason to believe there are going to be more wildfires in coming years, and cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco that are experiencing high levels of homelessness also happen to be in regions more vulnerable to wildfires. There are currently more than 50,000 homeless people in Los Angeles County, a 36 percent increase from 2010. There are 7,500 homeless people in San Francisco, a 16 percent increase from 2011.

Fires can contribute to homelessness, too. As thousands of homes are destroyed in their path, more people have to look for somewhere to live, battling one another in the Bay Area's vicious real-estate market. Real-estate agents last year told renters after the fires in Sonoma and Santa Rosa that they were going to have to pay higher rents because of the additional renters on the market.

It's possible that the terrible air quality will spur cities in California to more effectively address their homelessness problems. Cities on the East Coast, after all, have had to figure out how to house people during blizzards, snowstorms, and periods of extreme cold. California cities, with their year-round balmy weather, have not had to worry that failing to house all of their residents could lead to people dying on the streets. That was then, but this new normal of uncontrollable wildfires in California is raising the already high risks of living on the streets.

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

Alana Semuels is a staff writer at The Atlantic. She was previously a national correspondent for the Los Angeles Times.

Robinson Meyer is a staff writer at The Atlantic, where he covers climate change and technology.

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The Homeless Can't Escape San Francisco's Smoke-Ridden Air

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Photos: The Camp Fire ravages Paradise, California. Lisa Cooper got three of the masks that were being handed out by the city, because she was having trouble breathing. But then she fell asleep on the street after being awake for nearly four days, she said, and all three masks had been stolen.

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Jeff Hill lost his home and all he owned in the Camp Fire, which officials believe destroyed up to 90 percent of the housing stock in the town of Paradise, California.

His employer, the Paradise Irrigation District, told him and his coworkers that they would be out of work for the foreseeable future because it would take weeks, even months, to get the utility up and running again after most of the town's infrastructure was destroyed.

Hill and thousands of other evacuees without a paycheck or a permanent place to stay are facing the possibility that the 138,000-acre Camp Fire has left them homeless.

"At this point, I'm taking it day-to-day," said Hill, 29, who has been staying with relatives in nearby Chico. "There are no stores left, no restaurants, nothing. If people did want to live there, there is nowhere to eat, no water or power. It's not even habitable. It's like we went back a hundred years. It's just crazy."

Brock Long, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, told reporters Wednesday that losses in Paradise, population 26,682, were "total."

The disaster in Butte County, which has killed at least 56 people, comes as California is experiencing a monumental housing crisis and where nearly half of the nation's unsheltered live in cars, parks and on the streets.

Even if destitute survivors receive federal and state aid to help pay for rent, there's no guarantee they'll be able to find a place in the Golden State.

"The housing crisis hit us hard like everywhere else," said Sarah Thomas, program manager of the nonprofit Chico Housing Action Team. "The vacancy rate in Chico is around 1 percent. Now that we've lost all these homes in Paradise, there are going to be more people struggling to find a place to live."

Despite the reality that about one in five Californians live in poverty, the median home value in the state is $544,900, and the median two-bedroom rent is $2,750, according to real estate listings site Zillow.

Before the fire started Nov. 8, thousands of lower-income workers and retirees took refuge in Paradise, where the median home price is $200,900, according to the U.S. Census Bureau data.

"Paradise is not the richest of towns," said evacuee Danie Schwartz, whose home was spared. "I am from Southern California, which is also ablaze, but it's like people who are worried about their beach homes burning, the circumstances are a bit different for those people compared to the ones in Paradise.

"People in Paradise don't have the means to get out of town," she continued. "People are stuck at evacuation shelters."

Evacuees have been setting up tents in parking lots, including at a Chico Walmart, while others are sleeping in cars or staying with family. Hill said as many as 20 of his family members have been staying in one house because they also lost their homes in Paradise.

"What's stunning is to hear family after family say, 'We have multiple members who lost homes,'" said Laura Cootsona, executive director of the Jesus Center, a homeless services nonprofit in Chico.

Karman Beller, 33, who is six months pregnant, and her husband Ryan Beller, 30, lost their home and didn't have renters insurance. They plan to stay with a brother-in-law who has taken in four other relatives displaced by the fire.

"I'm due in three-and-a-half months," Beller said. "Trying to find a home with [no] funding is really impossible. Everybody's homeless."

Chico is the largest city in Butte County, but its shelters are usually full, even without 10,321 structures destroyed in Paradise.

Richard A. Narad, operations manager of Chico's Safe Space Winter Shelter Program, which adds 60 beds to the city's shelter inventory for 12 weeks starting in mid-December, said that last year the program was "turning people away every night."

"We already had a housing shortage in the county," he said. "We expect some people will end up on the street. It's going to be a big problem until they figure it out. I'm guessing RV trailers will be necessary. I don't think there's enough hotel rooms."

Joy Amaro, executive director of the Torres Community Shelter, said there are usually fewer than 250 beds in Chico, although the American Red Cross opened four temporary shelters in response to the Camp Fire.

Two of those were at capacity immediately, a Red Cross spokesman said. Butte County officials said 1,385 Camp Fire evacuees were living in temporary shelters.

FEMA has promised help for qualified, displaced residents - up to three months assistance for homeowners and at least one month for renters.

"We do have the funds, and we will help out in every way we can," Gov. Jerry Brown said Wednesday.

FEMA administrator Long said he had spoken to President Donald Trump on Wednesday and "his message is to take care of people - and that's exactly what we're here to do."

In Oroville, a city south of Paradise, at least 200 evacuees set up camp in a parking lot last week. Tracy Grant went there to hand out hamburgers she made for them. She met Lee Brundige, a 93-year-old World War II veteran and widower who had lived alone in Paradise.

"I had an instant connection with him, being a grandpa's girl myself," she said.

So she and her husband took him in. "He's all by himself with just his clothing," Grant said.

She's not sure how Brundige will carry on without becoming homeless. She thinks he needs to be in an assisted living facility, but she's not sure he has the resources.

The veteran fled with his cane and his vehicle on Nov. 8, driving in a conga line of cars to the parking lot in Oroville. Nearly a week later, he still wasn't aware that his house had been lost.

"We got confirmation this morning that it is gone," Grant said Wednesday. "I haven't told him yet."

Jareen Imam and Stephan Kozub contributed.

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Deadly California fire could worsen state's homeless crisis

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Jeff Hill lost his home and all he owned in the Camp Fire, which officials believe destroyed up to 90 percent of the housing stock in the town of Paradise, California.

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On Tuesday night, David Cuen was wishing for some peace, but none was to be found in the Walmart parking lot where he's currently living.

Cuen had run from the Camp Fire five days earlier, barely escaping the inferno with his fiancee Jessamy Carthwright and their pitbull Meeka. Since then, they'd been sleeping in their hatchback sedan or a donated tent at the shopping center - along with hundreds of other evacuees from the blaze that largely destroyed the Northern California town of Paradise and forced more than 52,000 people to evacuate.

"People go right next to you, not respecting that we're sleeping in our vehicles - not respecting that we don't have nothing no more," Cuen said of this haphazard community of survivors that has taken shape in recent days.

The lot has become a de facto refugee camp as those who have lost everything seek the most basic of necessities: a place to be. Exactly how long people will stay there is an unsettling and unanswered question in Butte County. In a region already plagued by a severe shortage of homes and apartments, the Camp Fire may usher a massive housing shortage, potentially leaving thousands of fire victims homeless for months or even years.

The more than 50 tents, and the dozen or more RVs and occupied cars such as Cuen's in the parking lot represent just a small fraction of the staggering number of families that have been left temporarily or permanently homeless since the Camp Fire raged through the area Thursday morning, torching an estimated 7,600 homes in and around Paradise and killing at least 48 people, the most from a wildfire in California's history.

"We're on the edge," said Ed Mayer, the executive director of the county's housing agency, when asked if the county was facing a humanitarian crisis.

Local officials warned the destruction from the Camp Fire could set off a wave of refugee migration akin to a smaller version of the Dust Bowl of the 1930s.

"Big picture, we have 6,000, possibly 7,000 households who have been displaced and who realistically don't stand a chance of finding housing again in Butte County," Mayer said. "I don't even know if these households can be absorbed in California."

The county has the capacity to place 800 to 1,000 households in permanent housing, Mayer said, but its short-term options are overwhelmed. Officials have offered no timetable for when residents will be allowed back to their homes, if they're lucky enough to have a home still standing.

Housing was already scarce in Butte County before the Camp Fire. The housing vacancy rate was less than 2 percent, which "is considered a crisis state," Mayer said. And unlike wealthier Sonoma County, where fires destroyed thousands of homes last year, many residents of Paradise don't have the financial means to rebuild their homes quickly.

With few options in the short term, Mayer said local leaders may consider establishing camps for those displaced by the fires.

"We could make the choice to put them in temporary (shelters) to try to absorb those households for three to five years, meaning refugee camps and trying to keep our community together. That's one choice," he said. "The other choice is we say, 'We can't do it, we don't have the ability (to find shelters) and go fend for yourselves.'"

Thomas Tenorio, chief executive officer of the Community Action Agency of Butte County, which operates shelters, housing and other services for low-income residents, said "there's going to be a lot of folks in shelter for a very long time."

"These are folks who aren't ready to call themselves victims," he said. "They're survivors and they're trying to figure it out one day at a time."

The federal government still cannot say exactly what type of emergency housing may be made available to victims of the Camp Fire, or when that determination will be made, but the major emergency declaration signed by President Donald Trump on Monday allows for federal aid to begin pouring into the state.

"We don't have a housing plan right this second," Federal Emergency Management Agency spokeswoman Brandi Richard said Tuesday. "That's something the state and local officials and FEMA teams are working on."

The type of assistance offered will be different for various victims, she said.

"There are going to be some people who've found housing with family members, there's going to be some who have housing through insurance companies," she said.

Richard could not say whether assistance to Butte County would include FEMA trailers, hotel vouchers or other aid, but said 1,000 fire victims from throughout California already have registered for aid online at www.disasterassistance.gov or by calling 1-800-621-3362.

FEMA administrator Brock Long toured the scene of fires in Butte County Wednesday.

When he got to Paradise, Long was confronted with a level of destruction never before seen in California. Most of the homes in Paradise, a town of about 27,000 people, are gone. So are most of the businesses, and the surrounding communities. Paradise Mayor Jody Jones said she is living in a mobile home in a vacant lot owned by a friend; the other members of the town council also lost their homes. Dozens of police and fire personnel are also homeless.

"Everybody's story is going to be different," she said. "Some people will leave and some will stick it out and rebuild."

Paradise officials insisted their small town will come back. "We are committed to rebuilding," said Jim Broshears, emergency operations coordinator, at a media briefing Monday night. "We consider ourselves survivors and we will come back from the ashes. We are fully committed to building a new Paradise."

The demographics inside the fire zone may make the rebuilding effort more complicated. Its residents tend to be older: The median age in the town was about 50, much higher than the statewide median age of 36, according to census estimates covering 2012 through 2016.

The median household income in Paradise was about $48,000, roughly $16,000 lower than the statewide median. Still, it had a high homeownership rate. About 71 percent of its households lived in homes that they own, compared to 54 percent of households statewide.

The demographics are similar in Magalia and Concow, small neighboring communities that were also hit hard.

Officials warn that the process to rebuild the region could take years.

Thirteen months ago, fires in Sonoma County destroyed about 5,300 homes, including about 2,000 in unincorporated Santa Rosa. Since then, the county's permit and resource management department has issued 598 permits to rebuild single family homes. Yet a year later, only around 30 homes have been rebuilt in the unincorporated areas, officials said.

Tennis Wick, the agency's director, said clearing debris from damaged neighborhoods was the first task and all but a handful of lots have since been cleared. The county then shifted its attention to trying to persuade residents to stay in Sonoma County by allowing them to set up trailers on their property and permitted homeowners to tap into septic systems.

"If we could get them back onto their property as soon as possible, that's what would keep them in Sonoma County," Wick said.

Sonoma has already sent staff to Butte County to provide advice on a number of tasks, including how many building inspectors will need to be added to approve permits for rebuilt homes.

U.S. Rep. Doug LaMalfa, R-Richvale, acknowledged the enormous challenge the area faces as residents try to rebuild, but said he already has spoken with FEMA representatives and is confident the agency will move quickly to bring in trailers and other resources to help.

"I don't want to gloss over what a challenge this is, but things are coming together," he said. "Obviously, this is a scale that's very unprecedented."

LaMalfa said the reality is that some people will move away from the area, at least for a time, "because how many people will be patient to stay in temporary housing before moving to another community 40, 50 or 100 miles away where they can live somewhere more normal. I don't think anybody wants to live in a FEMA trailer for a year."

As dark fell Tuesday night and temperatures dropped below 40 degrees, families in the Walmart lot sat in cars, turning on their engines to run the heater when it got too cold. Bundled in heavy coats and blankets, others sat on lawn chairs outside their tents, cigarettes between their gloved fingers. People in dust masks wandered through, shambolic and exhausted. Coughs, barking dogs and snores filtered through the portable generators rumbling under the fluorescent lights.

Immediate shelter and staying warm were the primary concerns on the minds of Joseph and Karin Ritsch, who said they only 15 minutes to leave their Paradise home Thursday with their dogs and little more than the clothes they were wearing.

They were setting up a donated tent amid dozens of others in a grassy area across from where Cuen had been sleeping in his car. Not far away, a section of the parking lot was cordoned off to distribute heaps of donated goods, and volunteers were providing food and medical care.

The Ritsches said they had been staying at a motel in a neighboring county since their Paradise home burned on Thursday. They ran out of money and a payment from their home insurance company hadn't yet come through, so they said they had no choice but to set up for the night in this tent city.

They planned to fend off the wintery cold under a pile of donated blankets and body heat from two of their dogs that would sleep on the air mattress with them.

The couple said in the coming days they planned to stay at the house of a friend of friend who was going on vacation for a few days, and maybe they'd find an apartment in the longer term.

Joseph Ritsch works in construction, but the prospect of hundreds of potential jobs rebuilding his hometown over the coming years did little to boost his spirits in the smoky, chilly air Tuesday night.

"I did not really want that," he said.

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Camp Fire evacuees face housing and humanitarian crisis | The Sacramento Bee

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On Tuesday night, David Cuen was wishing for some peace, but none was to be found in the Walmart parking lot where he's currently living. Cuen had run from the Camp Fire five days earlier, barely escaping the inferno with his fiancee Jessamy Carthwright and their pitbull Meeka.

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DRF - $7.4 bill

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As vast swaths of the country reel from the one-two punch of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, the focus now is on efforts to help affected states and communities recover from the devastation.

Natural disasters often leave in their wake a years-long process of rebuilding homes, repairing buildings and restoring infrastructure.

As this arduous task opens on several new fronts, we decided to take a closer look at how money flows into and out of federal disaster relief coffers.

Eric Ward, the bartender at Key Largo's Snappers inspects the damage from Hurricane Irma at the popular restaurant Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2017, in Key Largo, Fla. Florida is cleaning up and embarking on rebuilding from Hurricane Irma, one of the most destructive hurricanes in its history. (Al Diaz/Miami Herald via AP)

What triggers federal disaster relief?

Multiple agencies play a part in the nation's disaster recovery. But with FEMA's role in the Hurricane Katrina response still fresh in public memory, the funding source Americans are most familiar with is likely FEMA's disaster relief fund.

A sequence of steps, defined by law, typically takes place before the federal government turns on FEMA's disaster relief spigot.

If local officials believe the scale of a disaster is beyond their capacity, a governor can ask the president for help. FEMA then makes a recommendation to the president, who chooses whether to officially declare a major disaster or emergency. Both declaration types trigger federal disaster assistance, but the aid varies in amount and scope

A wide spectrum of events, from highly destructive incidents to more routine occurrences, can qualify for federal aid, and the president can declare a disaster even before its full brunt has been borne. A Congressional Research Service flowchart depicts the typical chain of events that triggers federal relief for a major disaster. (Note that some disaster relief activities don't require a presidential declaration.)

Trump's disaster and emergency declarations for Harvey and Irma

President Donald Trump's Twitter feed showed this process play out in real time as Hurricane Harvey barreled toward the Gulf Coast on Aug. 25.

Trump tweeted around noon Eastern time that he had been in touch with Govs. Greg Abbott of Texas and John Bel Edwards of Louisiana, and that the federal government was keeping a close eye on developments.

"I have spoken w/ @GovAbbott of Texas and @LouisianaGov Edwards. Closely monitoring #HurricaneHarvey developments & here to assist as needed," Trump tweeted at 11:46 a.m.

I have spoken w/ @GovAbbott of Texas and @LouisianaGov Edwards. Closely monitoring #HurricaneHarvey developments & here to assist as needed.
- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 25, 2017

A short period later, Trump tweeted that he had been briefed on Hurricane Harvey by FEMA Administrator Brock Long and other advisers that morning.

"Received a #HurricaneHarvey briefing this morning from Acting @DHSgov Secretary Elaine Duke, @FEMA_Brock, @TomBossert45 and COS John Kelly," Trump tweeted at 12:02 p.m.

Received a #HurricaneHarvey briefing this morning from Acting @DHSgov Secretary Elaine Duke, @FEMA_Brock, @TomBossert45 and COS John Kelly. pic.twitter.com/cnkRZd6D6Z
- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 25, 2017

At 7 p.m. that evening, the National Hurricane Center upgraded Harvey to a Category 4 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph, and "sustained hurricane-force winds spreading onto the middle Texas coast." Landfall looked imminent.

Before Harvey touched down outside Corpus Christi, Trump announced over Twitter that he had signed a disaster proclamation at Abbott's request.

"At the request of the Governor of Texas, I have signed the Disaster Proclamation, which unleashes the full force of government help!" Trump tweeted at 9:46 p.m.

At the request of the Governor of Texas, I have signed the Disaster Proclamation, which unleashes the full force of government help!
- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 26, 2017

Technically speaking, Trump declared a major disaster in Texas, and declared an emergency three days later in Louisiana, also due to Harvey.

In September, Trump made major disaster and emergency declarations in response to Hurricane Irma.

In this Monday, Aug. 28, 2017 file photo, Alexendre Jorge evacuates Ethan Colman, 4, from a neighborhood inundated by floodwaters from Tropical Storm Harvey in Houston, Texas. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

Where does FEMA funding go?

Once the president declares a major disaster, FEMA disburses funds to the state for eligible projects under the following categories, according to the Congressional Research Service:

Public Assistance. This is FEMA's largest funded program. It helps communities pay for things like debris removal and repairs to infrastructure, including public buildings, roads, bridges and utilities. Robert B. Olshansky, a professor of urban and regional planning at the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign), likened this to a federal insurance policy where taxpayers foot the premium.​

Individual Assistance. This includes things like housing for displaced people, grants to provide for needs that are outside the scope of insurance payments, crisis counseling and unemployment assistance for those who can't work as a result of the disaster.

Hazard Mitigation. A FEMA grant program funds measures to prevent or lessen the effects of a future disaster, like elevating one's home to avoid potential floodwaters. Mitigation funding is a fraction of the amount spent on the other two categories, Olshansky said.

Where does FEMA get its money?

In its regular course of business, Congress each year sends two pots of money to FEMA's disaster relief fund, the nation's main disaster relief bank account.

The first pot, known as base funding, is the smaller of the two. It's based on a formula pegged to ordinary FEMA operations and more routine events. In fiscal 2017, base funding was $615 million.

The second pot of money Congress gives FEMA is much bigger. Called Major Declarations, it's based on how much was spent on disaster relief in the past decade. In fiscal 2017, that appropriation was $6.7 billion.

Together, base and major declaration funding totaled $7.3 billion in fiscal 2017. (FEMA can also carry over any unspent funds from the previous year.)

That may sound like a lot of money. But compared with an estimate by Moody's Analytics, which places the combined damage from hurricanes Harvey and Irma at $150 billion to $200 billion, it's a drop in the bucket.

Additional money from Congress

So what happens when disaster recovery outstrips FEMA funding?

The task then falls to Congress to release more money, in the form of supplemental appropriations.

Lawmakers did just that on Sept. 8 when they approved more than $15 billion for additional Harvey relief. That includes the following:

$7.4 billion for FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund

$7.4 billion in Community Development Block Grant funding, which is administered through the Department of Housing and Urban Development

$450 million for the Small Business Administration's Disaster Loan Program

In a Sept. 11 press briefing, White House homeland security adviser Tom Bossert said a second appropriation would come at the end of September, and that federal officials would later seek a third and "perhaps a fourth" appropriation.

If history is any guide, Bossert has reason to be confident Congress will approve more funding, given its solid track record of replenishing FEMA's depleted disaster relief fund.

According to the Congressional Research Service, Congress made 14 supplemental appropriations from 2004 and 2013, totaling $89.6 billion. That includes $43 billion in 2005 alone, the year Hurricanes Katrina, Wilma and Rita hit the United States.

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As vast swaths of the country reel from the one-two punch of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, the focus now is on efforts to help affected states and communities recover from the devastation. Natural disasters often leave in their wake a years-long process of rebuilding homes, repairing buildings and restoring infrastructure.

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If you're a smoker or someone in your household smokes, your most burning question when it comes to indoor air is probably: how do I get this smoke out of my house? And it isn't just about the smell - cigarette smoke, even secondhand smoke, contains a cocktail of toxic chemicals. Study after study has found that exposure to tobacco smoke leads to higher rates of cancer, emphysema, asthma and other health problems. We're going to look at the best ways to reduce the amount of tobacco smoke in a home, the role of an air purifier in reducing secondhand smoke exposure, and what type of air purifier is the best at removing tobacco smoke from the air.

How Bad is Tobacco Smoke?

Let's establish one thing right from the start - secondhand smoke is dangerous and causes a wide range of health problems, especially for children who are exposed to it. If you live with a child, you should quit smoking, or at least limit your smoking to outside the house. Secondhand smoke does real harm to your children. Studies have consistently shown the harmful effects of secondhand smoke. A 2010 CDC study found higher levels of tobacco smoke by-products in people who lived with smokers, especially children, and that, "Secondhand exposure to tobacco smoke causes heart disease and lung cancer in nonsmoking adults and sudden infant death syndrome, acute respiratory infections, middle ear disease, exacerbated asthma, respiratory symptoms, and decreased lung function in children."

A study in the Journal of Epidemiology and Public Health found that, "When compared with never exposed children, children exposed to continuous secondhand smoke scored higher on self-reported aggressive behaviour and teacher-rated antisocial behaviour in fourth grade...similarly, children exposed to transient levels of secondhand smoke scored higher on aggressive and antisocial behaviour."

As you can see from these studies, tobacco smoke is made up of gaseous toxic compounds like acetaldehyde, hydrogen cyanide, and many others. These compounds are usually grouped under the umbrella term volatile organic compounds, or VOCs. The VOCs in tobacco smoke are very problematic because most air purifiers don't remove them. Particulates do make up part of tobacco smoke (that's why we can see the smoke in the air), but to really deal with the problems of tobacco smoke, you need to address both the particulates and the gaseous toxins.

So it's very clear - tobacco smoke in your home is bad, and you need to remove it in the most effective way possible.

Getting Rid of the Smoke

The two best ways to deal with most air quality problems are the same no matter what the source of the pollution is: get rid of the source, and open the windows. Removing the source of the pollution is far more important than just about any other solution for dealing with poor indoor air quality. Everything else is basically treating the symptoms without dealing with the underlying problem. So quit smoking, or smoke only outside. Smoking presents a difficult problem, however, if you're dealing with someone's else's secondhand smoke and they refuse to change their smoking habits. In this case, opening the windows is an excellent way to cut down on the problem. This will help flush the smoke out of the house and replace it with cleaner outdoor air. Unless you live next to a coal plant or major highway, the outside air is almost certainly less polluted than the indoor air if there's a smoker in the house. We should remember, however, that this form of passive ventilation will likely not completely remedy the problem, and residual gases, odors, and particulates may persist in the air even after leaving a window open for a long time.

How important is it to remove smoke from a room? It's often useful to see how a technical or scientific field treats a problem, since they usually have to be far more rigorous than you might be in your own home. In this case, we can turn to the problem of smoke emitted from laser and electrical surgery. Studies found that the smoke emitted from some forms of surgery was toxic and in a few cases contained infectious materials like bacteria or viruses. After extensive research, it was determined that using a powerful ventilation system to draw the smoke out of the room, preventing it from being inhaled by any doctors or nurses, was the correct solution. We can apply this to your home as well - if you can, at least restrict your in-house smoker to a single room, and place a window fan directed outward in the window. This will flush most of the smoke outside instead of letting it linger or float into the rest of the house.

But, of course, sometimes it's raining, or winter, and you simply can't open a window no matter how noxious the smoke. That's when you turn to an air purifier. Which type of air purifier is best at removing cigarette and tobacco smoke (and even other things that will produce smoke such as medical cannabis)?

The Best Air Purifier for Removing Tobacco Smoke

There are quite a few types of air purifiers on the market these days. Each one has different capabilities and drawbacks and are particularly good at removing one kind of pollution from the air, at the cost of being not quite as good at removing others. The difficulty with removing tobacco smoke from the air is that it's made from two different types of pollution: particulate matter (mostly ash and combustion byproducts around .07 microns in size) and VOCs.

Ozone generators and ionizers

First, we can eliminate ozone generators and ionizing filters. Both add ozone to the air in a room - ozone generators do it on purpose, ionizing filters do it as a byproduct of the ionization effect. Ozone is itself a toxic pollutant in high concentrations, and the EPA has found that these types of filters do create enough ozone to be harmful. So even if they were great at removing smoke from a room (they're not), they would be a bad choice for improving your indoor air quality.

UV-based air purifiers

Air purifiers that treat the air with UV radiation, typically to kill viruses and bacteria, are not effective against any of the harmful compounds in tobacco smoke, and in fact most models available for home use aren't really powerful enough to do what they claim to do in the first place. So we can skip those as well.

HEPA filter air purifiers

Mechanical filters that use a HEPA filter (one that has been tested and proven to remove 99.97 percent of all particles that are 0.3 microns in diameter) can be very effective against particulate pollutants. They will remove the visible "smoke" elements of cigarette smoke and may slightly reduce the smell. However, they are not effective against VOCs, and the toxic gases in cigarette smoke are potentially the worst part of it. So a HEPA filter alone is not going to do enough to clear the tobacco smoke from the air.

Gas-phase filter air purifiers

Gas phase filters use a material like activated carbon to trap molecules of gaseous substances. They may be able to get rid of some VOCs. However, they can be quickly "used up," or saturated, as the gas molecules take up all the possible attachment points in the filter, requiring replacement. They also must be tailored to specific types of molecules, so a single gas phase filter is unlikely to fully remove all the VOCs found in tobacco smoke from the air.

PCO air purifiers

PCO purifiers, an earlier form of PECO air purification systems, uses a catalyst to not just remove pollutants from the air, but actually destroy them. However, PCO purifiers work too slowly to effectively clean the air in a room.

PECO air purifier

The Molekule air purifier, which uses PECO technology, overcomes many of the shortcomings of PCO - a PECO air purifier can eliminate the particulate pollutants and the VOC elements of cigarette smoke, cutting down on the unpleasant smell and the harmful side effects of secondhand smoke.

No air purifier will remove the residue of cigarette smoke from a house that has been smoked in for months and years, however. Once you've made the choice to use the best air purifier possible (or even to quit smoking in the house), you have to clean and sanitize the house to get rid of the smell. Open the windows, take down all the curtains, steam clean all the upholstery and carpets, and repaint the walls. Yes, the walls themselves can hold that cigarette smoke smell for years - a coat of paint will "seal it in" and get rid of the smell.

But the bottom line really is that you need to stop smoking inside the house if you want to improve the air quality.

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If you're a smoker or someone in your household smokes, your most burning question when it comes to indoor air is probably: how do I get this smoke out of my house? And it isn't just about the smell - cigarette smoke, even secondhand smoke, contains a cocktail of toxic chemicals.

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Understanding Air Purifier Technology | AirPurifiers.com

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HEPA filters are the best method for air purifier filtration. But, the best air purifiers use multiple types of filtration technology, like pre-filters or activated carbon.

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Who and how would the homes be deployed or distributed?

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Who and how would the homes be deployed or distributed?

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Air Cleaners and Air Filters in the Home | US EPA

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Air cleaning can be used as an adjunct to source control and ventilation. However, air cleaning alone cannot adequately remove all of the pollutants typically found in indoor air.

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I've heard of people who buy RVs and get a complete walk through.

A dealer tells them how everything works and then, believe it or not, for years on down the road everything just does work.

I don't know if these lucky bastards are just, well, lucky, or what, but in my experience, the easiest way to get traveling in an RV or van is to buy used, and that means things will be broken. You'll need to fix them at some point. At the very least, you'll need to know how they work in order to operate or maintain them.

Thus, may I be as kind as to present to you this: your one stop shop for how everything in an RV works.

We'll cover the basics, we'll talk about everything from motorhomes to trailers to campervans, and we'll keep it fun but informative. No technical diagrams, no high level mathematical conversions, just what you need to know, quickly, to familiarize yourself with everything from the sewage pipe to the hitch.

RV Water Systems

Ah, water. Perhaps the most essential ingredient to this thing we call life here on Planet Earth. Washington is known for it. Californians steal it. Arizona is running out of it.

What was once a plentiful source, available freely across nearly the entire planet, is now sold for $2 / bottle and regulated highly. Whether you plan to boondock or stay in fancy RV resorts, you will find yourself included amongst the rest of humanity in needing this vital source of existence.

Freshwater Tanks vs. City Water Hookups

How Freshwater Tanks Work

There are two ways to get water into your RV's water system. One is to add it to your freshwater tank, literally a big jug somewhere on your rig where you can store some amount of water (typically 10 - 30 gallons or so). Most of the time, RV manufacturers will have the place where you fill up your freshwater tank very clearly marked. If you've got an older ride, though, just start opening up your outside compartments until you find a hole that looks like a hose could fit into it (not screw into it, mind you).

You can fill it with a hose if that's an option. Big freeway gas stations like Pilot, Flying J and TA Travel Centers often have RV areas where you can fill up your water for free, presumably with the purchase of some gas or diesel. RV parks, state and national park campgrounds and even some random spots in cities offer a place to fill up. Or just use the hose at your house if you're the type of traveler who has a sticks & bricks to return home to.

Otherwise, you can just buy a couple of 5-6 gallon portable water jugs and fill up your water tank that way. Walmarts and other larger grocery stores sometimes have a place where you can fill up your own jugs, as do almost all campgrounds, the exception being dispersed camping in BLM lands or the rare but usually well indicated park without any water sources.

Water Pumps

After dumping water into your freshwater tank, you'll turn on the faucet and, very possibly, nothing will happen. Just having water in a tank doesn't mean there's any pressure, and so RVs have a water pump. There may be some fancy newer RVs that don't require you to turn on your water pump every time you want to use it, but if you're like most of us, you'll need to find a switch labeled "water pump", and-you got it!-switch it on.

You should hear something, the sound of the pump doing its thing as it moves water from the tank to fill all of the pipes in your rig until they're all full enough that, upon turning a knob on a sink, water will instantly come out.

Sometimes it'll squirt and sputter a bit. That's just the air that was in the lines being forced out. After a short time that should stop and you should be all set. Once the water pump has forced water through all of the pipes, the water pump should stop running / quiet down.

Note that water pumps run off of your battery-aka, the 12v system, covered later-and are more or less specifically designed for boondocking. They exist so that you don't need to be hooked up to city water, and the built in water pressure that goes along with such a hookup.

They also almost always, and always should, have a filter installed between the freshwater tank and the pump itself. This makes sure little pieces of dust and debris don't get into the pump itself, possibly ruining it. If you fill up your freshwater tank, flip the water pump switch, and nothing happens, the pump is probably the reason for it.

Troubleshooting Water Pumps

If you hear nothing, the pump isn't working. Check the wiring if you're able. Call someone if you're not. It may be as simple as a blown fuse (more about fuses below) or a chewed up wire. Or your pump might be worked out.

SHURflo Water Pump
If for whatever reason your rig doesn't have a water pump, the good news is that they're very affordable (under $75) and easy to install. We use the SHURflo model and it's worked wonderfully for us.
Another no brainer that some of us who haven't fully learned to use our brains yet don't consider is, well, is there any water making it to the pump? If the pump is making noise but you still get nothing, look inside of the filter (if it's clear) and see if any water is getting in there. Or you can pull the hose off of the intake side of the pump and see if there's any moisture there. If not, you may have a leak between the tank and the pump itself.

If it is wet, then water is getting to the pump. This probably means you've got a leak somewhere after the pump. You can try and isolate the problem by checking all of the sinks, the shower, and the toilet. Do any of them have water pressure (ie, water coming out of the faucet)? If some do and others don't, it's probably a leak somewhere near the faucet itself, as often times they'll share common lines from the water pump throughout the rest of your RV.

Actual Freshwater Storage

The amount of freshwater you can store is completely up to how large your freshwater tank is, but a few other factors come into play as well. Some amount of water can be stored in the plumbing itself. I don't know the exact numbers on this, but I'd say a gallon or two is a very safe estimate, particularly for larger RVs, and then there's you hot water tank.

By turning on a hot water valve somewhere (the shower, a sink, anywhere with a dedicated hot water knob vs. one that rotates to share between the hot and cold lines), you'll help force water from the freshwater tank into the hot water tank. If you don't do this, I'm not sure how you can be completely positive that water actually is in the hot water tank. And a hot water tank, lit, with no water in it is a very dangerous thing. I mention that for your own safety, but the original point I was making was that your total fresh water storage is your freshwater tank + what can be stores in the pipes + your hot water tank.

Conserving Freshwater

Finally, there's conservation of water to consider. In a normal house, the average American family of four uses 400 gallons a day. I don't think there's ever been an RV made, Big Willy Style or otherwise, that can hold anywhere close to that, so you change your habit. Save the world, if you like.

Especially when you've got to lug your own jugs from a place you can fill them up, back to your RV, up in the air and hold it there while you dump the water into your tank, you naturally begin to want to conserve.

Additionally, as you use water you'll begin to fill up your grey and blackwater tanks. Once they're full, you've got to dump them, an activity even more involved and annoying to do repeatedly than filling up your freshwater. So the less you use, the less often you've got to do all of this stuff. (More on grey and blackwater tanks below.)

Navy showers. Don't let the water run while you brush your teeth. Drink bottled water. And figure out a whole new world of dish washing.

Forget a dishwasher, or a washing machine (if you've got something like that on board). Get low flow faucets and showerheads and your life will be a lot easier.

Luckily, most RVs are meant to use less water anyway. Specially made toilets that allow you to use next to no water (compared to 2 - 5 gallons most normal, household toilets use per flush) each time you flush, but still allow you to fill up the bowl for those of you who appreciate the input of a good batch of hot sauce, beer and Mexican food, and are regularly subjected to the inevitable exhaust of such endeavors.

How City Water Connections Work

Not limited to "cities", this refers to any time you're hooking up directly to a faucet that's plumbed to some source of water, typically water hookups at an RV park. Think the spigot you hook up a hose up to in your back yard.

It's pretty self-explanatory, but to be painfully clear, you'll need a hose. You find a place where you can screw one end of the hose onto your rig, and the other end gets screwed onto the spigot itself. Once both ends of the hose are securely fashioned, turn on the water at the spigot, and bam, you've got running water.

There are some additional considerations to keep in mind, not the least of which is water pressure. Particularly in older RVs, the plumbing wasn't build to withstand the powerful water pressure that will come blasting out of many water sources. Too much pressure could break your pipes, cause joints to leak, or dripping faucets. So, you buy a small metal cylinder known as a water pressure regulator.

I've found that they need replaced about every year or so, particularly if you're regularly hooking up to high pressure water systems. I place ours between the hose and the intake on our Airstream travel trailer.

Water Filters

Just as a water pump should be outfitted with a filter, city connections can be as well. This is less about keeping out damaging debris, though, and more about trying to filter impurities out of your water system so that you can feel good about not drinking too much mercury (or whatever they filter, I don't know as I don't use one, being a man and all).

Water filters are typically attached to the end of your hose furthest away from your RV, at the city water source.

Freezing Temperatures

Unlike a house, which has insulation and the protection of the Greek God of Housing Developments, RV water systems can quickly crack or break, or the fittings can get warped and result in leaks down the road, if subjected to freezing temperatures. If you're using your RV and find yourself in a situation below 34 degrees Fahrenheit, your absolute safest bet is to simply empty your tanks and unhook from any water source.

That advice should particularly be followed if you find yourself in a situation where freezing temps are happening during the day, because by the middle of the night it's going to be damn cold, and the chances that things will straight break increases exponentially.

If the night time temps are just going to drop slightly below 34 though, you can probably just leave a faucet dripping. That keeps water flowing and reduces any chance of freezing. You can also add some anti-freeze to your blackwater tank (by pouring it down the toilet) and your greywater tank (pour it down the shower drain), which can help keep those tanks from freezing.

If you're using your freshwater tank, well then you're probably boondocking in the frigid winter chill, so firstly, let me just congratulate you on being a badass. However, you can't add anti-freeze to your freshwater tank (you know, because you don't want to drink poison), so if you're not going to run the water out of your tank before it gets too cold, I'd recommend at least keeping it very, very low, turning off the water pump, and making sure there's no water in the line from the freshwater tank to the pump itself. I can't imagine a frozen pump feels very good.

All of this in mind, we've had our pipes freeze a few times. Though our Airstream was made in 1976, our plumbing is all PEX as a previous owner was wise enough to replace it all. Nothing has ever broken, and we've dipped down to the high 20s. This has only ever happened when I've simply forgotten though, and I always try to remember not to forget. A good motto for anyone, I'd say.

Winterizing your RV

If you're not full-timing, or if you're going to store your RV in cold temperatures where it could possibly freeze, winterizing is pretty simple. They'll charge you $50 to do it at a service center, but it's painfully simple.

1. Dump your grey and blackwater tanks. Let out the waste, watch it flow away like so many bad memories of flat tires and beautiful mountainscapes ruined by mosquitos. When they're empty, plug them both back up by closing whatever handles your motorhome provides for opening and closing the wastewater tanks. More info on that below in the Sewage System section if you need it.

2. Find your low point drain. This is typically a somewhat circular handle, often painted red, that you can turn (it looks like the water handle behind a washing machine or on your garden spigot, for example) and it will allow water to drain from the lowest point in your RV. Sometimes there are multiples of these. Instead of the water coming out of your sewer pipe, it'll often drain through a different hose underneath your rig.

3. Make sure there's no freshwater left in the system. Turn on your water pump, and open up your lowest faucet. This is typically the one in the bathroom, as the kitchen sink tends to be higher. When there's no more water, head back to the sink (or any other faucets) and double check those. Leave them all open.

4. Anti-freeze up. Dump a jug of anti-freeze down the toilet, and another down the shower, for good measure. This'll help ensure no amount of water you swear you didn't leave behind will freeze up.

You're all set!

Leaks in your RV

So you're leaking. It's embarrassing, particularly the darker the color. Luckily, it's not as daunting an issue as it seems if you're feeling at all handy, have a flashlight, and are willing to buy a bunch of plumbing gear.

First Steps

The first thing to do is figure out where the leak is coming from. This isn't as easy as it seems, though, because where it's dripping out of your RV isn't necessarily where the leak is. Still, that drip outside is the place to start.

Given the enclosed nature of many RVs, you'll likely see the leak at its outside source: a rusted through hole, or some purposely created hole in the bottom of your RV designed to let water out in case of a leak.

The next step is to try and find the closest access spot to that area. Sometimes this will be an outside compartment. You may need to dismantle some amount of the interior of that compartment-taking out a panel or two, loosening a few screws-to find the source of the leak. Other times you can find it by visualizing the leaking area inside and then lifting up couches, beds, or digging through drawers and closets. RVs aren't always designed with extreme elegance in mind, but they often are constructed to make accessing much of the plumbing accessible at critical points.

You may also want to note that plumbing tends to break at the weakest points: joints in particular, but especially where weaker materials have been used. For example, our Airstream was refitted with PEX before we got it, but some of the original copper plumbing was left in the shower and rubber tubes were used near where the city water comes in. Those spots have proven our biggest enemy, and I always check there first.

It'll take you some time to learn your own rig's shaky spots, but once you do life gets easier.

Once you find the leaking spot, you can typically follow it. If you're lucky, that compartment you took apart will have the source of the leak right there. If not, look for where the water's coming from, typically wherever the pipe tends to lean upward.

Once you find it, it's typically as easy as a replacement part. Sometime this is a busted pipe. Shut all of the water off, dismantle the pipe, taking note of how it was put together in the first place, and head on over to your local Ace Hardware. Bring pictures of what you've got, they're almost always happy to help you get everything you'll need to finish the job off once you get home.

Common, Easy to Fix Issues

Sometimes you'll find a leak but won't necessarily need to fix it...just understand it.

All RVs come with "low point drains", typically controlled by a handle similar to that you'd find behind a washing machine in a normal house. If this is loose, you may simply be "winterizing" your RV without knowing it. That is, you've opened a handle designed specifically to let water out of the RV.

Make sure those are tight. Consult the manual. Or your favorite vintage trailer forum if you don't have the manual.

Next up is checking the water pressure. This only applies if you're hooked up to city water, but what comes out of a local ordinances massive pipes can crush an RV's much more delicate system. While theoretically a leak could happen at any point from this, I've found it typically happens quite close to where the water initially comes into your motorhome. Or at one of those weak points I mentioned earlier.

The first solution is to just get a water pressure regulator. It's a relatively small device that you can hook onto the intake area where the city water goes into the RV, or permanently attach to your hose so that you never have to bother with remembering to use it. All it does is lessens the amount of water pressure coming into your little home.

If you've already got one and are still experiencing this, I find that they only last about a year and a half. They cost $5 - $20 depending on how much the local KOA wants to rip you off, so drop the cash and be leak free again.

Broken Tanks

Remember that bit about how dark colored water is not cool. Yeah, that sucks way more than the above scenarios.

You may have a broken grey or black tank. Or maybe just a sewer pipe. If the leaking goo is coming from somewhere near where your sewer pipe empties, or anywhere along an area that would be where the pipe goes from the tank(s) to this point, take apart whatever you need to in order to find the entire pipe.

While this can be a big job, it's easier to replace a thick chunk of PVC than it is to replace or even repair a tank.

If the tank is busted, while you may be able to repair it, I won't be able to guide you through that. It's just never happened to me.

No Water Coming out of the Faucet when Dry Camping

So you're boondocking and the water pump is running (because you can hear it), and you know for sure you've got water in the tank. But nothing is coming out of a faucet.

If it's a high faucet, like in the kitchen, check if the typically lower down sink faucet works. If it doesn't, see if your toilet will flush. Sometimes the higher a faucet, the worse the problem gets.

If other faucets or the toilet work, it's probably an issue with the plumbing just below that particular faucet. Look for leaks. See if there might be a shut off valve that got turned off somehow. Look in the opening of the faucet itself (where the water comes out), you can often unscrew the end of it and take the screen out. Though it's rare they get clogged enough to completely cancel out a water supply, they can get pretty grungy and severely limit the amount of water that comes out.

If none of that solves it, think about where your water pump is relative to the problem. Do sinks between the pump and the trouble faucet work? If so, it's probably a leak somewhere between those two areas.

Finally, if all else fails, run a hose from the nearest river through your window and attach a spigot to it. While this won't solve the longterm problem, you'll complete the trailer park look you were going for at the very least.

Greywater vs. Blackwater

You may have been wondering what the difference between "greywater" and "blackwater" is. It's fairly simple, though grows more complicated depending on why you're asking.

Blackwater is your human waste, specifically what you put down the toilet. Greywater is less gross, what goes down your shower drain, kitchen and bathroom sink.

Some states or areas allow you to drop greywater right onto the ground. This is typically found in Southwestern States, and more specifically in BLM (Bureau of Land Management) areas. Basically, if you're in a place far from civilization, that place has little water in the first place, and there are no signs specifically saying "don't dump your greywater", you may be in luck.

Always check with the municipality's official "where do I dump stuff at?" manager before doing anything you don't want to get fined for.

It's not a great idea to dump greywater near a freshwater source, such as a creek or a lake, particularly one that is part of a watershed that serves many people. It's never cool to dump blackwater on the ground. That literal shit belongs in a sewage system. Early London was plagued by people defecating into the public water source.

Your own personal knowledge of the local natural resources and opinions on saving the world may affect how comfortable you are dumping greywater on the ground. Oh, and loads of it dumped at once can stink really, really bad. Best to let it just trickle out.

Finally, many places actually encourage dumping of greywater. They want this relatively clean water back into their desperately draught-inflicted land. However, most of them will say that this water can't come from a kitchen sink-only a shower or bathroom sink. Nowhere that food is prepared or washed.

Why cleaning the grunge out of my butt crack is considered cleaner than a few stray peas making it down the drain is up to you to figure out, but in these places it would still be considered illegal to dispose of an RV system's greywater as in nearly every case that tank is the same for the kitchen and bathroom sink / shower.

How RV Sewage Systems Work

The sewage system is really just a component of the water system in general. See above for a ridiculous amount of information on that.

There are a few things that specifically relate to sewage disposal (in addition to the "Greywater vs. Blackwater" outline above) though.

The Brown Pyramid

RV sewage systems can get clogged up. And it's not even hard to do. The biggest recommendation I hear to avoid this is to use special RV toilet paper. Most of the best places to go aren't exactly near a Camping World, though, or even a Mom & Pop's RV Supply, so I have found that the absolute best way to keep your poop tank clean (that's the blackwater one) is to use it as a shitter as rarely as possible, and when you do, keep tons of water in there.

We have simply grown used to not pooping in our Airstream. Not that we don't. We potty trained a 3 year old in her, and there was no way he was going to hold it until we could run over to the campground bathroom or find the next gas station. And when boondocking, no one can plan when we'll make a run into town. If we all based our bowel movements around this idea we'd be driving to town for two hours a pop three times a day (we apparently eat a lot of fiber).

Still, even if you do take some mondo dumps in your roadhouse, know that you're not at a total loss.

Keeping a ton of liquid in there will help break the solid stuff up, be it toilet paper or worse. Even better, fill the black tank up sufficiently before you take that next 120 mile drive. All of that sloshing around will help crush the soil and the next time you let it flow, clean a good chunk of it out.

There are also these little packets of bacteria you can flush down the toilet. The theory is that they head on down the drain and create a little world of there own, digesting and destroying. It's the same basic principle as how a septic system works with a country home. Except I don't believe they work, because there just isn't that kind of time involved from one fill up to the next dump station. Have a go if you'd like to drop a few extra pounds from your bank account though!

Finally, if your sewage tank is just full...and you'll know this because the entire RV will wreak like a high school gym room where the entire football team dropped a hail mary deuce on the last day of school and the janitor didn't get to until September...well you can look up a guy who specializes in pumping shit out of RV blackwater tanks. I did it once in Las Vegas and it was around $80. I honestly can't say it changed things very much, though. The tanks were emptier than they'd ever registered, so it did clean things out, but I think once you get to the point of clogging your blackwater with so much grime and debris that your RV really starts stinking, you've kind of shanked yourself.

Oh, and if you're flushing baby wipes, tampons or pads down the toilet, enjoy! You'll be one of those lucky women who gets to tell some frustrated dude (your husband or a man you called to fix it who loves to charge stupid people a lot of money) that you definitely did clog the hell out of your system and will now need him to dig around it and free everything up.

Of course, woman aren't the only offenders, any man who's dropping tampons down the toilet is just as idiotic.

How to Empty an RV Sewage System

So here's how to properly dump your black and greywater tanks.

Firstly, even if you're hooked up to a sewer connection, always keep the blackwater closed. That is, don't open the valve and just let it drain all day. That's how you get too much solid and not enough water, resulting in the previously mentioned cirumstance.

If you are hooked up to a sewer connection, the night before you're going to leave, before you do the dishes and/or take a shower, close the greywater connection, too. This will give you time to fill it up substantially before you unhook and head out of your campsite.

If you're boondocking, or otherwise don't have hookups, you may have the greywater closed anyway for the duration of your stay. Regardless, the goal is to have a bunch of greywater in the tank before you go to dump the blackwater.

Why RhinoFLEX?
We've had at least six sewer pipes and only the Rhino has lasted for years, not months or weeks... Get it for around $30 on Amazon and save a ton over buying one at some KOA store.
That said, you're now rolling up to an RV dump station. Whip out your hose-we recommend the RhinoFLEX line of sewer pipes-and hook the end that fits onto your RV and the other end that screws into the dump station. You don't usually actually have to screw the dump station end in, depending on how the hose is sitting or if you've got something to lean against it, that'll do just fine, but definitely make sure you snug up the side that hooks onto your rig.

Don't even bother with the cheap sewer pipes that come with a clasps (like a large version of what radiator hose would use) that you screw tight. Or anything that isn't RhinoFLEX. Seriously. Do you want a pinhole to rot in your sewer pipe and then human feces to immediately spray from that pinhole directly into your nose?

It can happen. It has happened. To me. Like, five times. Just buy the Rhino.

Thetford Adapter
They're surprisingly harder to find than you'd imagine, but if you've got the old Thetford sized pipes, you'll need one. Or lots and lots of duct tape.
Note that if the sewer pipe you bought in a store doesn't fit, you've probably got a Thetford sewage connection. In which case you need an adapter, which hooks onto your RV, and then your sewer pipe hooks onto it.

Now that you've got your pipe all hooked up, always let the blackwater go first.

That way your toilet waste will flow on down the line, filling the nooks and crannies of this pipe you're going to have to dismantle and then stow away somewhere within the confines of your roaming home.

Then you let the greywater zoom and pow! You've now got all of that relatively more clean water (especially if you just did the dishes to fill it up, soapy water!) washing away as much debris as possible from the hose.

You can then run a blast of water down the hose to clean it out even further, though I rarely do this thoroughly. Then again, I don't wear rubber gloves during this entire experience either because I am not a lillylivered pansy from Crestwood. Feel free to wash your hands when it's all over.

Put the hose away and call it a day!

Electrical Stuff

There are two basic electrical systems in most RVs, the 120v and the 12v.

120 volt is similar to what you've got in a typical house. Think the normal electrical outlets, the ones Homer Simpson paints into cute bunny faces that one time he started a daycare. What you'd use to plug in a vacuum, lamp or microwave.

12 volt is more like what you've got in your car. Cigarette adapters, running off of a 12v car (or in this case, an RV/Marine battery).

The 120v system is generally used when you're plugged into RV hookups. You can use everything you'd use in a normal house-your RV's air conditioner or a fan, a microwave, plug in and charge your computer or phone, hairdryers, the whole shebang-though not necessarily all at once. When you're plugged into an RV park, the 120v system will also charge your 12v battery.

When you're boondocking, i.e. not plugged in to some external power source, then you'll need to rely on your 12v system. Typically an RV will have a fridge that can run off of 12v (often in conjunction with your propane system), and your lights will work. Older rigs won't be equipped to allow you to suck juice out of your wall outlets, but many will have cigarette lighter type outputs you can use. Just drop into a gas station and grab the same little adapter you'd use to charge your phone in the car.

Newer RVs will often have a converter which will allow you to plug your computer or other low intensity devices in and charge them, but don't count on that juice lasting very long without a renewable energy source (such as a generator or solar panels). You'll also find it nearly impossible to run an air conditioner, microwave or hair dryer...12v just doesn't have enough power for those high intensity devices.

When you are plugged into an RV park's power source, there are typically three types of amperage available: 20 amp, 30 amp and 50. Twenty amp outlets look just like a normal wall outlet. Older VW Buses and campervans will sometimes use this. Thirty amp outlets have one circular hole at the bottom, and instead of two parallel slots they're angled inward to one another near the top.

Fifty amp has a slightly different plug structure. You can buy adapters to allow a 30 amp plug to fit into a 20 amp outlet, or a 50 to suck from a 30, and even vice versa, though it's not particularly recommended that you go up (though we've often used an adapter to suck 30 amp into our old 20 amp VW bus with no repercussions...note that is no guarantee for your own situation).

Related Information
And loads more in our Complete Guide to Buying an RV for Full-time Travel.
Most RVs are designed to use either 30 amp or 50 amp, and it's generally best to stick with what was issued. Many RV parks will offer both, sometimes at every spot, or sometimes they'll have different loops or sections for 30 and 50 users. 50 amp rigs are typically the big guys: massive rock star Class A rides and the larger fifth wheels.

Solar Power in an RV

One way to recharge your 12v battery when you don't plan on plugging into dedicated power sources often is to set your rig up to use solar.

These days you can get a complete kit for under $400 on Amazon. That includes the panels (two 100 watt), cables, charge controller and brackets: everything you need except a battery to get yourself living off of the sun's energy.

Watts vs. Amps vs. Volts

Like most people who haven't done much in the way of electrical work, I used to find all of the terminology that comes along with getting solar setup complicated. Watts vs. amps vs. volts, what does it all mean? Then someone explained it to me more or less like this.

Amps are how much energy you use, an actual amount of electricity used. Volts are how powerful the energy is. Watts can then be thought of in terms of how much can be accomplished with the amount and power you've got.

It was explained to me further by comparing it to a garden hose. Amps are the thickness of the hose, the thicker the hose, the more water that can go through it.

Volts then play the role of water pressure, how much force is being used to send the water through.

When you multiply the volts by the amps, you get the wattage. So if the more amps x volts you've got, the stronger, faster the spray is coming through your hose, and therefor the more wattage.

However, with solar we're not interested in maximizing how much we can use, but rather getting ourselves setup so that we're generating adequate supply for what we need. No reason to buy a 2000 watt setup if you only use around 50 watts per day, you'll just be wasting money on a more expensive solar system than you need.

To figure out exactly what you need, find out how many amps your devices require. Here are some common appliances found in an RV.

Air Conditioner, Microwaves, Electric Water Heaters

14 Amps

Blenders, Coffee Makers, Televisions

5 Amps

Laptops, Drills, Range Hoods, Fans, Water Pumps, Radios

4 Amps

Lights, CO & LP Detectors,

1 Amp

Gas Refrigerator

2 Amps

Generators for Powering an RV

We have a Yamaha 2000 generator. It's a beautiful thing, not too loud, a little stinky, and fuel efficient. Five gallons of gas will keep it humming for us all week long (though we only run it for a few hours a day). Without solar, a setup like this will essentially provide you the ability to keep your 12v batter charged if you run it a little in the morning and a little in the evening. We tend to run it longer in the morning while I'm working on my laptop and our oldest son is doing his schoolwork on his own computer.

Aside from creating pollution and requiring you to store gas, the only real problem with a generator is that it can annoy the tail off a squirrel. Many folks who come out to campgrounds that require boondocking are doing so to get away from it all, the bustle of civilization, the stench of the highway. It's relatively easy to piss off a tenter by running a generator nearby.

Still, they come in handy and even if you do have solar, it's not always sunny. A generator makes life a little easier in that you can just fire it up and have basically 20amp service anywhere you'd like. Note that you won't be able to run a ton off of it, probably not even an air conditioner and certainly not multiple space heaters. We've found that things like curling irons don't get enough power to actually get hot. And you need to remember to change the oil frequently, especially if you notice your gennie is having a hard time starting up or keeping up with your power usage, just changing the oil can make a big difference.

Batteries

Most of us just go out and buy the 12v RV/marine batteries you can snag from nearly any auto parts store. Just like charging your phone, batteries allow you to put juice into them and then provide you with said juice for as long as it'll last. The more energy you use-ie, the more things you plugin, the longer you leave the lights on-the more quickly they'll run out.

Some RVers have multiple batteries and relish filling them up so they can disappear for days without needing any additional power input, including a generator. Others swear by using multiple 6v "golf cart" batteries instead of the marine batteries that are the RV industry standard.

There are cheap, $50 batteries to be found and those that can run thousands of dollars. While I've only tried the standard 12v marine batteries which run about $70 - $150 depending on where you are in the country, the general consensus I've heard from others is that the expensive ones aren't worth the money-yet-and that having two or three is typically more than sufficient for most people's usage.

Charging

There are essentially four ways to charge your battery, most of which we've already covered. Solar comes with a few hundred dollars in up front costs and then essentially unlimited free energy to put back into those batteries for years, as long as you can get the panels into the sunshine.

Generators allow you to trade the cost of gasoline and smell of exhaust for battery juice.

Typically, you'll also charge your RV's battery while you're hooked up and plugged into a tow vehicle (in the case of trailers) or have your engine running (for motorhomes), so the day's where you drive you'll be refilling your coffers as well, though this is far from an efficient way to try and keep your battery topped off.

Finally, anytime you plugin to RV park service (ie, 30 or 50 amp when staying at a place with hookups), you'll be charging the battery then as well.

Breaker Box vs. 12v Fuse Box

You know in a house, probably somewhere down in the basement, there's that silver metal door. You open it up when the power goes out and see if there are any switches you can flip to...voila!...get stuff in your house working again?

RVs have those too. They work just like the ones in your house, switching to prevent overloads when a private RV park's hookups send too much power your way or you draw too much from any given fuse. Knowing where yours is will save you a lot of trouble in the long run.

Our 1976 Airstream also has a 12v fuse box, as did our 1978 VW Bus. Even newer rides will likely have some 12v fuses as so many things are dependent on 12v alone it just makes sense. These may be glass fuses that can easily come loose and just need slipped back in, or more modern fuses that you can check to see if they've gone bad and find replacements for at your local RV or auto parts store.

Fuses are responsible for probably 90% of the "why aren't my [insert appliances] working?" situations that'll come up, so just go and give them a check first no matter what it is. Understanding where they are, how they work, and how much easier it is to switch one out than digging through wires will make your life closer to a rainbow in the misty spray and less like falling over a waterfall in a bucket.

Air conditioners, toasters, hair dryers and microwaves

Not all appliances are created equally. Many use very little power, and require very few Amps to work. LED lights are probably the least devastating to your battery supply, and things like charging a phone or powering a jack don't cost you all too much either.

Other appliances, more modern conveniences, suck a ton of juice out as they're used, and need a big draw to get going. Anything that produces a lot of heat-microwaves, toasters and hair dryers-are killers. Air conditioners are maybe the worst.

Just get used to frizzy hair and being hot, I say. Oh and cook your food, don't nucleate it into a mutant poison slowly transforming you into some sort of six winged mothperson. Why would you want that? Mothpeople are gross.

Propane

Propane is derived from natural gas. So it's good for nature, right?

No clue there, but it's an essential part of nearly every RVer. At least those of us who wear shoes and don't chain ourselves to flowers.

From keeping your fridge cold to your heater (and hot water tank) hot, propane plays several important roles and helps us eliminate our need for electricity. There are three ways to go about getting propane onboard.

Exchangeable Cylinders

Most trailers will have a spot near the hitch where you can stash and hookup these propane tanks. Even if you've never RVed, you'll know what these are: just think of the cage full of grey tanks at nearly every gas station.

They cost more than getting your own tanks filled, because the world is a vicious cycle of scams and every long time RVer knows they're never getting the full 20lbs. Blue Rhino, for example, straight up admits this on their website's FAQ page:

Blue Rhino followed the example of other consumer products companies with a product content change. We reduced the amount of propane in our tanks from 17 pounds to 15 pounds.

Note that the tanks are meant to hold 20lbs in the first place. They never filled them the full amount because "we need to give them a little room to expand". I'm no scientist, but if I played on on TV I'd say 3lbs out of 20 seems a little excessive, but 5lbs out of 20 seems downright conniving.

They also claim that they replace outdated tanks, but I've run into situations where I've purchased or exchanged one that was the 10 or 12 years out of date (they need to be inspected every so often, depending on where you're at), and propane filling stations wouldn't fill them. This is rare, but it happens.

Aside from being wrapped up in the whole world of disguised thievery, other disadvantages to exchangeable cylinders include the requirement to completely empty the existing tank before exchanging it. Which means you either need two tanks (which is the most common setup anyway) and only exchange one at a time, or running your tank(s) completely empty and then immediately going to get a new one. Otherwise, you're giving some amount of propane back to the company. They keep the excess, and still charge the next guy the same price. Bastardly, if I do adjectify the concept.

You also have to pay more for the tank initially, and you can't sell the tank back. So say you buy two exchangeable propane tanks for $27 / each, about average as of this writing, you can then exchange them for closer to $20 / piece each time. But when you're finally done with the tanks, they're yours forever. No getting your $14 deposit back. $14 for two tanks is quite cheap, actually (they run closer to $37 / piece if you want to buy that size tank outright), but it still feels seedy.

Buy Your Own Portable, Removable, Refillable Tanks

This is the way to go. Yes, the tanks are expensive, but you can buy 30-40lb tanks. This means that, even if they do need "room to expand", you're only paying for the actual amount of propane that goes in, and with bigger tanks can refill less often. Trust me, getting your propane refilled is the least entertaining of business that can go down on the road.

You've got to wait around for a certified type person to come out, hook it all up, fill it up, and never mind the time it takes to unhook them yourself and get it all back into place. The more you can store at one time, the better.

On the downside, apart from the initial cost (our two 30lb tanks cost us $70 each, and that was a great deal), it's harder to find a place to refill propane than it is to find those exchange places. They're about 1 to 10-every gas station seems to have the exchange program, but only a few RV parks and propane dealers actually have refill stations. It takes a little longer. And you have to get there during usually normal 9-5 business hours.

Still, the savings are so worth it. Consider this. Propane, when purchased by the gallon, costs about $2.30 (at the time of writing, like gas, this stuff fluctuates all the time). Now we're getting complicated, because tanks are measured in lbs not gallons, but here's the conversion:

So if we're strictly talking refilling, and at $2.30 / gallon:

20lb / 4.7 gallons of propane

$10.81

30lbs / 7.1 gallons of propane

$16.33

40lb / 9.4 gallons of propane

$21.62

So right off the bat, exchangeable propane tanks are a ripoff. Where it should only be about $11 to get a refill, it's more typically $19 - $24. So at a minimum you're paying $8 / more per fill. Except you only get 15lbs (or 1.175 gallons less than you should be). So you're paying at least $19 for $8.11 worth of propane. To get that number, take the initial 4.7 gallons of propane in a 20lb tank, subtract 1/4 (for the 5lbs you're losing when exchanging) and you're left with 4.7 gallons - 1.175 gallons = 3.525 gallons x $2.30 = $8.11 (rounded slightly up).

You also spent $7 or more for that propane tank, which is-though exchangeable-eventually yours.

Let's say we use 100 gallons of propane in two months. You've just spent:

$7 for the tank + ($19 / refill * 28.4 refills) = $546

Now say you bought yourself that 40lber. Camping World's got them on sale right now for $85, but lets go with the normal price of around $155.

$155 for the tank + ($21.62 / refill [9.4 gallons * $2.30 = $21.62] * 10.6) = $384

I'm so bored of math at this point, but even the simple realization that $21.62 to get 9.4 gallons (in a 40lb refillable tank) vs. $19 to get 3.525 gallons (in a "20lb" exchangeable) is a big difference. The excess cost for the $155 40lb tank is made up in a matter of weeks, and you're saving nearly 50%. As the years go on, and you eliminate the cost of the tank, you're practically Scrooge McDucking it.

Permanent Tanks

Permanent tanks are more or less as good as refillable tanks when it comes to money. The bigger issue is that they are harder to get re-certified, and even worse, you can't take them anywhere without taking your RV, too.

So you have to pack it all up, drive on down to some propane place, and then wait around for them to fill you up. That can be kind of annoying on a Wednesday afternoon when you were planning on hiking the Tetons but can't just run out and get it done, do your walkabout, and bring them home with you.

So You Smell Propane, Do You?

The first thing is, well, don't panic! Check your tanks. If they're nearly empty, and especially if your system is a decade or ten old, you may simply need to fill them back up. Low tanks, I'm told, mean you've got little or no propane, but you've still got that smell they put in there to help you detect when there's a leak.

Still, the safest bet is to turn off any flames and get yourself a great ventilation system going. Building a ventilation system in a pinch is fairly easy: just open all of the doors and windows. Go fill your tanks, and see if the problem persists.

Oh it does? Damn, then you'll need to check everything. A wise old RV mechanic once told me that there's nothing better for detecting propane than some bubble solution (you know, like kids blow bubbles with) in an empty Windex bottle. Add the bubbles, add some water, and you've got yourself a perfect gun to start spraying every single propane line you can find. Start with the seams, where two lines meet at some type of joint, as these are the most likely culprits. If you spray on the solution and you see actual bubbles forming, that's where you've got a leak. You may have multiple leaks. And since propane can be a deadly serious issue, I would be remiss if I told you not to call an experienced pro. So I'm not telling you that. Call them, right now.

There are mobile RV technicians who will drive out to you. That's nice. You pay for the convenience, but it's nice.

If you do find a leak at a seam, you can try and tighten it yourself of course. And then call a pro to double check your work. $75 for a house call is better than the cost of exploding your house, family and that little rat dog thing you carry around. Sorry, rat dog. It's not your fault. And at least you can fit in a purse!

While propane leaks can be very serious, I've been told by numerous professionals that in most cases you're not going to blow up. One even smoked while working on our hot water heater, stating that there is no way the right combustion of air and propane can happen in an open environment like that. I don't know, I'm not saying he's right, but I believed him.

When to worry? He told me that if the leak was inside of something, say your oven, that's when you've got an issue. Because no air is getting in, and propane is building up, so you light the oven and...kaboom.

So yeah, call the closest guy. If he smokes while working on your rig, you're probably all right. Check with your insurance company first, of course.

Finally, some likely spots to check for leaks are at the regulator (the thing that's between the propane lines and the actual tanks), the tank valves themselves, and near any appliances where the propane lines are going in, such as your fridge, stove or hot water heater. The stove's burners are another likely candidate. Oh, and make sure your oven isn't set to pilot but the pilot light isn't lit. If it isn't, but the pilot light is on (same with the hot water heater and fridge), shut everything down and wait a good long while, until you don't smell anything at all, before sticking your head in there and trying to light the pilot again.

Lighting pilot lights can be scary stuff. Especially when you've got an old rig and it takes a few tries to get it to light, or when you need to use an actual match because that electric switch isn't working. All I can say is, try and cover your face and hope you don't get exploded. Because yes, it's scary.

I haven't blow up yet though. #fingerscrossed

Fire Extinguishers

Though not technically a part of your propane system, every RV should have a fire extinguisher immediately on hand. Make sure it works. You may never need it, but I'll tell you that back in August of 2008, only two days into this life on the road, our RVs transmission caught on fire and were it not for me having immediate access to a fire extinguisher...well, I may not be here seven years later to discuss all of this.

Kitchen Appliances

Refrigerators

When we first got our 1976 Airstream Sovereign of the Road (man, I love the audacity of that name), someone had thrown a regular old fridge in it. The kind you can plug into a normal wall outlet. It worked, but only if we were plugged into 30amp power. So no boondocking. No freedom. You don't want that.

There are generally two kinds of RV-specific refrigerators: Two-way and Three-way.

A Two-way fridge can run off of just propane, and often requires a connection to your 12v battery (typically just to provide spark for the pilot and run any displays the fridge might have), but can also run off of 30amp power (or 20 or 50) when you're actually plugged in somewhere with hookups.

A Three-way fridge does all of the above, but can run off of just your RVs battery, too. Like the Ménage à trois they're named for, Three-ways can often hold more stuff, too.

There are other definitions of Two- and Three-way, though. We had a One-way fridge in our 1978 VW Bus campervan...it only ran off of 12v power. And some Two-ways definitions equate to just 12v and propane, excluding the typical 30amp plugin as a source. Though if you're plugged into shore power, like a 30amp connection at an RV park or your friends outdoor outlet, you're essentially charging your 12v battery and therefore in both of the situations described in this paragraph you can run those refrigerators off of shore power, too.

What Size Fridge?

This will depend completely on you. We had a 2 cubic foot fridge in our VW Bus. It could hold exactly enough cheese and smoked salmon to last us a day, plus a small tub of yogurt, a half gallon of milk and a six pack of beer. You can think of your needs and replace the beer if necessary. But then, what is the point of living?

We run a 4 cubic foot fridge in the Airstream. This is more than enough to keep groceries for six on hand for about three days, including about two gallons of milk on top of cheese, lunch meat, yogurt, blah blah blah. Stuff families with little kids who like to drink wine and beer every night might have.

The smaller your fridge, the easier it'll be to keep cool on hot summer days, and the less power / propane you'll use doing so.

Also note that most RV refrigerators that are warm take several hours to cool down when you're not plugged into a dedicated source of power like 110v / 30amps. This is because of science, and while I get it, I won't explain it because my explanation will sound more like magic. There it is, because of magic, or the lack thereof, an RV fridge that's warm takes forever to heat up.

So bring a cooler for backup.

Stove & Oven

There isn't much difference between most stoves you'll find in an RV than what you'd expect from a gas stove at your house. Except they'll be smaller. We've used a run of the mill Coleman 2-burner when in the VW Bus, and have the original Magic Chef oven in our Airstream.

Oh and we don't use the stove...because I'm afraid to stick my head all the way back in there and light the pilot. Have fun!

Sinks

Again, sinks are sinks. The biggest difference between the one in your RV and the one at home is that the pipes (and holding tanks) of your RV will be much less forgiving than the pipes running to city sewer at home.

If you start putting food waste down there-coffee grinds or bits of corn left over from your succotash-you could quickly clog your pipes. Or worse, a rotting stench will start seeping up through your bathtub as all of that organic matter begins to decompose in your grey water tank.

If your sink isn't running, nothing will come out of the tap, check the troubleshooting steps above in the water section of this article. It's likely that your water pump isn't working (if you're not plugged into city water), or you've got a leak in a pipe leading up to the faucet.

You may also just have a really clogged screen in the faucet, pop it out and clean that up, maybe even put in a new screen. Or check the filter to the water pump if none of the faucets are working. But more likely, especially if only one or two of the faucets-typically those higher in elevation than the rest-aren't working, it's a leak somewhere.

Jacks & Leveling

Aside from not having everything rolling around, or doors swinging violently open, the primary reason to stay level is your fridge. When running on propane, a fridge in an RV needs to be really level. Otherwise, you can get an airlock, which is crappy to fix. Sometimes it's as easy as just driving down the road, and leveling out a few hours later, after everything's shaken loose. Other times there's a repairman and a bill associated.

So stay level.

And FYI, though on those big rock stars Class As there are hydraulic leveling jacks, the ones you crank down on your trailer aren't for leveling you out. You should already be level when you put them down, as those bad boys are purely there to keep your unit from shaking like a Polaroid picture when you walk around or come in and out the door.

Also note that, as far as the jack on the tongue of a trailer goes, never get talked into one that only works on electric.

That is, you can have a manual jack-one you crank by hand to get it to go up and down. They're bad ass, but yeah, it's a lot of work. And then there are those that are combos-you can do it manually or push a button and it'll do it for you. But if you get one that is strictly electric well, when the motor blows you are either jacked up and hitched up for good, or you won't be able to get the jack up to hitch back up. Either way sucks. Trust me, I've been there.

Towing a Vehicle with a Motorhome

So you've got a big ol' motorhome and would like to tow a car-known as a toad or I guess sometimes a dingy-so that, you know, you don't have to pack up your house and try to find a place to park it every time you feel like a drive.

Personally, we've always chosen campervans or trailers over motorhomes just for this reason. Even when we owned our first Dutchmen Class C RV, we didn't tow anything behind, we just rode bikes everywhere. It was more limiting, yes, but having two engines to deal with sounds like a nightmare to me.

If you're into it though, note that you'll need a tow bar or dolly. A tow bar allows you to drag your car along behind you with all four wheels on the ground. People tell me it's easier to hook up, the system allows for a little bit of sway back and forth when connecting, so it's not as precise as many tow vehicle / trailer hitch systems. A tow dolly means you drive the front two wheels up onto a very small trailer type apparatus, and the back two roll along nicely.

Towing a Vehicle Behind an RV with a Tow Bar

These can work with sticks or automatic transmissions, and again all four wheels will cruise along the highway with you. That probably means you'll wear your tires out evenly as opposed to the back two getting more work (as in a tow dolly) than the front two. You can decide if that's better or worse. I say worse. Discount Tire disagrees.

People I've spoken to who've had both systems always seem to love the tow bar over the dolly. They talk about how much easier it is to hook up. Personally, I've never used either and don't know for sure. Sorry, I'm not God. Or your mom.

You'll need a tow bar (sometimes called the wishbone) and a base plate. The latter attaches to the frame of your toad. Most cars require a very specific base plate, nothing universal here. So if yours isn't something that people commonly tow, and there's no existing model out there, you may need to drop the big bucks to have one fabricated.

The tow bar itself can be something permanently installed on your RV, which can just kind of hang around back there while you're not towing, too.

Note that you'll need to hook your toad up to your RVs lights and turn signals, too.

Other downsides include your vehicle racking up miles (since all four wheels are on the ground), even though they're not really miles, and certain vehicles need to have their drivetrain modified to avoid completely destroying the fabric of time. Our good friend Greg at Bare Naked Family also clued us in to one big time bummer: you can't backup when you're hooked up this way. The toad just goes everywhere and anywhere you don't want it to.

That's a big concern once you realize that with your 40′ Class A rockstar plus a vehicle behind, you may often find yourself in a situation where you dead end it and just can't turn around. Time to unhitch the toad, whip it all around, and hook back up. You'll definitely hate your wife about 15 minutes into it.

Towing a Vehicle Behind an RV with a Tow Dolly

This is more like those little Uhaul trailers where you drive the front two wheels up, lock it all down, and just the back two cruise around on the ground.

The dolly gets hooked up to the motorhome, typically via a normal hitch system like you'd use for any trailer, and then you pull your car up onto it. They're no good for rear-wheel-drive, because though it would seem that you could just drive any two wheels up onto the dolly, you actually have to drive the "drive" wheels. So on a front-wheel-drive vehicle, those are the front wheels, but on a rear-wheeler, that'd be the back wheels, so you'd be backing up onto the dolly.

And towing a vehicle in reverse is like peanut butter on a pizza, even the ninja turtles get sick after it's over.

Though everyone swears by the tow bar setup, these sound good because you can always buy a new car-or load up a rental-as the trailers can be universal (though I suppose you might have trouble going from a Mini Cooper to a Ford F-350).

Apparently, on the downside, the dolly itself can be expensive and the actual hooking up can take a long time. But if you're full-timing, you'll be a pro in what, a week tops?

Oh, and then you've got to have somewhere to stash the dolly once you get the car off of it.

Trailers, Neutral and Other Concerns

You could also just hook up a full-sized trailer, drive your car up on it, and bam, you're good to go. You can back up. Normal trailering lights and brakes would work. And you'd be kind of a nutjob.

Cars don't typically tend to move when in park, so theoretically you're going to need to at least pop it into neutral, if not get the whole accessory lights action going.

Have fun you crazy kooks!

Towing a Trailer with a Vehicle

Now we're talking about a trailer, and you tow it with a vehicle. Most folks tend to go with an F-150 or similar truck. Somehow those giant Fifth Wheels that are bigger than most trailer park trailers can be hauled with an F-150. I don't get it.

We originally towed our 6000lb Airstream (those massive Fifth Wheels are closer to 15000lbs) with a 1996 Chevy G20. That's roughly equivalent to an F-250. It was overheating city, even in the relatively small Appalachians.

So we upgraded to a 2006 Ford E-350 (that's a van) with the biggest rear suspension available (4:1 I believe) and haven't had an issue yet. Asking a dealer what you'll need might do you right. Then again, dealers suck, so taking a six month course on transmissions or buying your mechanic uncle a 12 pack of Busch might be the better route.

Weight Distribution

Your tow vehicle may be rated to two 12,000 lbs, but there's another factor involved: tongue weight. Most hitches have the tongue weight right on them. Determining your tongue weight requires you to, well, weigh your trailer at the point where the jack touches the ground.

You can buy a high-capacity hydraulic scale, and they've got them on Amazon for around $150 that can weigh up to 1000lbs. That would be sufficient for us. Larger trailers (ours is 6000lbs loaded) may have a heavier tongue weight, though most hitches I've seen in the real world are weighted for no more than 800-1000lbs.

Our Airstream's manual also came with a guide to weighing the tongue with just a bathroom scale. It involves constructing some type of miniature teeter totter and wearing a bathroom. No, actually you really can do it.

Weigh Your Tongue with a Bathroom Scale
I won't pretend like I know what I'm talking about here, but This website explains it all in detail.
Get yourself a cheap scale. Now round up a cinder block, a 4×4 plank of wood 4′ or longer, two short pieces of pipe, and another piece of wood approximately the thickness of your scale. $150 starts to sound good the minute you start wondering where you'll get some pipe. The pipe may not even be necessary, but this is what they tell you to do.

Regardless of all the above, you can increase your tongue weight using a weight distributing system. Which really just comes down to having the right kind of hitch. It'll come with two areas where you install these bars that go back to the rear of your tongue, and then hook up to special attachments via chains.

They're not exactly cheap-the whole system costs around $250 for an 800lb load capacity. That includes the hitch itself, which is a bit more involved than a normal one, as well as the mounts where you hook the chains up, the bars themselves, and all of the mounting gear.

If you've already got one but don't have the manual, essentially you take the bars themselves and-making sure the top side is up, you can tell because the chain comes out of the top-place the hammerhead-looking thing into the hitch. Then you pull the rear mounts swivel down, set one of the chain's links on the mount's notch, and push it all up. I usually like to set mine on a link which makes it slightly difficult to push up, but doesn't require two hands or anything.

Before doing this, make sure that your trailer's tongue is already properly hooked up to the hitch, and that there is no weight on the hitch already (ie, you're jacked up high enough that the trailer isn't pushing down on the hitch, but that the ball is more or less completely covered.

Once you've got the chains hooked up, you can start lowering. As weight is applied to the hitch, the bars do there thing, tightening and working their magic.

Note that you never want to try and take these off with weight still on the hitch. To remove them, first jack your trailer up so that the weight is off of the hitch all together. You can test this by giving the weight distributing bars a little kick. If they swing freely, you're good to go. If they're really tight, well, trying to remove them like that will result in a loud thud at best, or your smashed foot in the worst scenario.

Sway Bars

You can also grab a sway bar, which may or may not come with your weight distribution kit. You'll need a special ball on the (typically) curbside of your trailer's tongue, and then another smaller hitch ball on your actual hitch.

The sway bar connects these two balls and you then tighten the entire apparatus with a lever. What this basically does is prevents wind and small irregularities in your driving from causing the trailer to sway behind you like crazy, while still allowing you to turn as much as you normally could. Well, to a degree. Extreme turns, like those where you think you're going to kiss, can break the hitch ball.

Ours has broken a few times, and I've gone several months now without using our sway bar at all. We tend to stay off of freeways and travel at slower speeds on the backroads, so sway is less of an issue for us.

Wheelbase

Everything above matters little if you don't have adequate wheelbase. Specifically, "wheelbase" refers to how far apart your front and back axles are. The longer, the better.

Why?

Imagine you're rolling down some freeway, barreling 85mph downhill. Suddenly the road gets really bumpy, or you come to one of those little mini-jumps that tend to form where the road hits a bridge or overpass. Now think about this in your car-you start bouncing around.

When you've got a trailer on the back, it starts leaning forward and backward. When it leans forward, more weight is exerted on the hitch, pushing it down further than usual. When the back of your tow vehicle goes down, the front comes up. If you rely on the front wheels to steer (like we all do), if they lift off the ground, or even if they have less than maximum weight on them, steering suddenly becomes a very big problem...if possible at all.

Weight distribution systems also help with this, so if you're experiencing issues like a floating feeling when breaking or going over bumpy terrain at higher speeds, give the weight distribution system a try.

Turning with a Trailer

When you're driving around a Prius, you can flip that thing around without ever cross the yellow line. When you make a turn with a large trailer, or any trailer really, it doesn't track right behind you. So if you're making a turn, take it as widely as possible. Especially on right turns.

And use your mirrors to make sure everything's coming along smoothly.

Using Your Mirrors

Aside from normal driving stuff like not hitting into other people, there are two things you'll want to use your mirrors for.

The first is called "not hitting into the guy you're passing". It's a bit different from the typical situation you'll experience in a car or truck. You have to be able to judge how far back the guy is. This comes largely with practice, and while practicing feel free to give the other guy a ridiculous amount of space. No one wants to be your target practice.

The second is to use your shadow. You won't always be blessed with the shadow on the right side of your rig, but when you do have it, it'll help you understand exactly how far back the ol' girl goes, aiding in that whole practice makes damn-near-perfect-enough.

Some truckers will flash their headlights at you after you pass them. They're not being dicks, they're just giving you the "trucker okay." Love it when it happens. It's like getting a wave from a fellow biker gang member. You only get it if you get it.

Backing Up

You could probably write a sexy romance novel on how some guys can back into any space. But only guys who can back into any space would ever read it, and we're already sexy enough, so what would be the point.

The main thing to know about backing up is that whatever way you'd turn to get your tow vehicle into the spot, turn the opposite way. That is, if you turn the steering wheel left, your trailer is going to go straight.

Having a hitch / tongue setup that doesn't allow you to kiss (that is, touch the tow vehicle to the trailer) very easily is a blessing. We can make a more than 90° turn with regards to where the van and trailer connect, and it allows us to get in anywhere.

Also, rely on your wife, or oldest son, or the person you rely on the most in your life. Get a system of hand signals down with them. Let them know which side you're blind on, where you need help, and trust them. You watch them in the mirror and the front end of your tow vehicle, and largely allow them to guide the trailer in. You are the hands, they are the eyes.

Don't let "helpful" fellow RVers help guide you in, or just ignore them if they try. If you crash into something, busting up expensive state park or RV park property and your precious home on the road, it's on you. That helpful RVer can just go back to his own world, scot-free.

Heaters

Heat is, how do they say it in French? I don't know, "nice"?

You can chase summer all year long, but even in the desert-in January-it gets cold at night. And truly, if you're interested in making the most of this life, you'll quickly realize that the "off season" is the way to go to truly experience places like Yellowstone, Yosemite, or any other bustling attraction that pulls in tourists during the warmer times in any given area.

Aside from a campfire, there are essentially three ways to pump heat into your RV.

Space Heaters

You know them from every day ordinary life. Plug it into a wall, it makes heat. They can stink for a few minutes when they first get fired up, like burning laundry, but that typically goes away pretty quickly. Space heaters are cheap (you can score one for less than $100), and do a great job. However, they require that you have access to at least 20amp service, and if you're running anything else, you'll probably want 30amp or better.

So you'll be largely limited to boondocking or just running it-and it alone-when you've got your generator running.

Our Favorite Heaters
We've tried them all. For a space heater, we use the Vornado Whole Room Vortex Heater. It's compact but still packs a punch. One of these can easily heat a campervan, and holds up even with our 31′ Airstream.
Catalytic Heaters

Catalytic heaters are like the Jesus Christ of heating an RV. By that I mean they can walk on water and raise people with really cool names from the dead. Or at the very least, heat your RV without electricity and much less propane than a typical built-in propane heater.

They work by doing some fancy magic that has the term "catalytic" in it. Old school models would actually produce a small flame-you'd light this pink insulation looking stuff, it'd actually catch on fire, and then the heat would come pouring out. They worked great, but were scary as hell and would stay hot for hours even after you turned them off. Kind of freaky if you've got pets or little ones running around. Pets and little ones are, after all, quite stupid.

So they don't require electricity, use less propane, and are super dangerous. Well, times have changed and the tech behind these heaters has as well. Still, you'll hear stories of people who die from them, and as we're not in the business of being lawyers we won't say these tales are unsubstantiated.

But unlike an electric or vented heater, you'll want to always make sure that you've got fresh air coming in when using a catalytic heater. They put off very little carbon monoxide (or so I'm told), but they use a lot of oxygen. So if you've got an airtight rig and you're using one, eventually the oxygen could get completely sucked out. No oxygen means your lungs can't work. Without your lungs, the rest of you tends to move on to that great spirit in the sky as well.

When it comes to efficiency though-and when used properly-catalytic heaters are the best option for those of us full-timing it.

Built-in Propane Heaters

We haven't had much luck with built-in heaters. Firstly, they use a lot more propane than catalytics and require electricity. Why? Because they also need a fan to blow the heat into your RV.

The built-in propane heater in our Airstream didn't work from the day we got it (though the trailer was some 35 years old when purchased). In our 1978 VW Bus we had one, and it worked wonderfully. Except our Bus only had a tiny 2 gallon propane tank. That would last us a night and a half if we were diligent about turning it off when it actually got hot at night. Luckily, the switch to do so was right at the foot of our bed, so just a small toe tap would do the job.

The annoying part was that we needed electricity to run the fan to blow the heat around. Which isn't always great if you're not hooked into a steady power supply like at a private RV park.

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How Everything in an RV Works on Wand'rly

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I've heard of people who buy RVs and get a complete walk through. A dealer tells them how everything works and then, believe it or not, for years on down the road everything just does work.

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Whether you are suffering from asthma and allergies or simply want better air quality in your home, you may have come across whole house air purifier systems when searching for an air purifying solution online. When compared to portable room air purifiers, on first glance whole house air purifiers may seem like the perfect solution. After all, these systems will be able to cover the entire home as its name suggested, right? Unfortunately the term "whole house air purifier" is a misnomer, as many systems sold promise much more than they can deliver.

If you're interested in purchasing a whole house air purifier system in lieu of multiple portable air purifier units, let's take a look at how whole house systems work and why they may not be able to clean the air in your entire home.

Read more about a new technology that may work even better than installing a complete whole house air purifier.

How do whole house air purifiers work?

As mentioned above, "whole house air purifier system" is a catch-all term used by an unregulated industry, which can sometimes confuse consumers - many assume it's an advanced equipment that can be installed into your existing residential HVAC system to clean and purify all the air in your home.
Whole house air purifying systems can be broken down into these main different types of systems:

Filter-based units that are installed in HVAC furnace systems and air intake points

Duct-based units that are installed into air duct path, before or after the air handler in a central HVAC unit

Stand-alone systems installed into closets or attics, followed by installing additional air intake and exhaust into the home

Because all of these units generally may need an HVAC tech to install, there is a lack of transparency in regards to the system's cost and effectiveness. As it stands, if you simply search online for "whole house air purifier" systems you'll often find HVAC repair and servicing vendors pitching these systems as a worthwhile investment.

But what these vendors often don't clarify are the types of system they are selling and what comparable options there are on the market. For filter-based units, vendors may be charging you a premium for simply opening your HVAC unit and swapping out a filter medium.

For more involved systems such as the duct-based systems, these are often extremely cost prohibitive (and labor-intensive) - giving consumers sticker shock as vendors and HVAC service companies often don't make the total cost clear on their website and literature, further confusing consumers.

With this guide, you'll have a better idea of what each type of whole house air purifier system entails, how they work and what their potential negatives may be.

Working in conjunction with your residential HVAC unit

Before we discuss the different types of whole house air purifier systems listed above, you should be familiar with how most modern HVAC units work in a home. Although HVAC stands for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning - most residential systems in the United States only entail heating and cooling - thereby placing the burden of ventilating on exhaust fans and windows (for natural ventilation). This means exactly what you think: if you're running your home's heating or cooling system - the system isn't necessarily introducing fresh air into your home. In fact, most outside air comes into homes by infiltration from the cracks and openings in windows and doors, even when they are closed.

Most homes in the United States utilize either a heat pump system or a split setup of forced air heating system along with a central air cooling system (using the same ductwork within the home), a whole house air purifier system that works in conjunction with this type of HVAC system will be affected by an HVAC system's limitations, which we will discuss further along below.

Replacement filter based "whole house" air purifiers

In essence, replacement filter-based "whole house" air purifiers are simply furnace filters for your HVAC unit. These are sold as either a media filter or a more expensive electronic air cleaner to be installed into your HVAC unit in lieu of the media filter. Sometimes, replacement filters for return air path are also combined with furnace filters as an air purifier solution. You'll often find these replacement air filters sold in bulk quantity at home improvement stores as they are meant to be changed frequently.

Replacement air filters for return air grills: thin 1-inch filters sold in packs.

Replacement filters for furnace/system: thick 5-inch filters, usually sold individually.

While some of these filters are marketed as air purifiers, their main purpose is first and foremost keeping dust and debris from your HVAC system, allowing the system to run efficiently - and not as an air purifying solution for your home.
Negatives of replacement based filters for HVAC as an air purifier solution:

Requires your HVAC unit to be constantly running. In order for the air in your home to actually flow through the filter media and have potential pollutants go through the filtration process, you'll need to actually run your HVAC system constantly with the blower fan of the system on. This can be excessively wasteful in energy when compared to a portable unit.

Limited by the design of a home's HVAC system. Replacement based filters that are sold as an air purifier solution are hindered by the limits of an HVAC unit to circulate and ventilate air through your home. As we've established above, most residential systems are forced-air based and their primary function is to cool and heat your home by forcing air through ductwork into each individual room, NOT to purify the air in the room.

Limited locations where air is pulled into system. Air being pulled into a forced-air based HVAC system comes from the return air grill, which for most homes is either in the hallway ceiling or hallway wall and not in each individual bedroom. Because most modern homes are limited to only 2~3 return air grills, these replacement air filters can only filter limited locations within a home, as larger particles such as animal dander can settle quickly and will not be able to travel the distance to the filter media, even with the pressure difference from the supply air forcing airflow to the return air intake.

Difficult to maintain. Furnace based filters are not easily accessible for many homes and are hard to replace frequently, potentially causing build-up of bacteria and mold within the filter medium, further spreading them when the forced-air system pushes contaminated air through your home

Duct-based whole house air purifiers

Duct-based whole house air purifiers are a significantly more expensive solution when compared to replacement filter based whole house air purifiers. These solutions essentially replace a section of your ductwork, generally in the return air path area before the air reaches the HVAC air handler unit and in place of the ductwork are installed filters. Filtration is done at this level within the ductwork and some of the more expensive variations utilize HEPA filters. For systems that utilize HEPA filters, the blower of the existing HVAC system cannot take care of the additional pressure drop and has to be replaced with a more powerful blower.

Because these systems are still relying on filtration as their main air purifying method, you will still need to replace these duct-based air filters on a regular basis. Adding to the difficulty, because of their location (generally within crawl space of a home), these filters are much more difficult to replace vs. replacement filter systems mentioned above. Examples of such systems include the IQAir Perfect 16 or the PureAir systems. These systems cost thousands and will require professional installation.

Given their professional installation requirement, many of these duct-based systems are unsurprisingly sold through HVAC servicing vendors - adding a layer of conflict of interest and lack of transparency in your options. Most vendors will simply carry one type of unit and not offer or mention other available solutions - even if they may be more cost effective for your home.
You'll find duct-based systems usually installed in three different configurations:

1. Bypass config in the return air path of a ductwork. The filter medium is installed in one of the return air ductwork, leaving the other as a "bypass" to not impede airflow of your HVAC system. (Yes, this means the other return path won't be filtering any pollutants based on this system configuration).See diagram 3 below for reference.

2. Non-bypass config in the return air path of a ductwork. These whole-house HEPA air purifier systems are installed at the main point of where return air ductwork is located, just before the air enters the heating and cooling system of your home. Because HEPA can restrict airflow to an HVAC unit (reducing the effectiveness of their primary function of cooling and heating), these type of non-bypass systems often come with their own blowers to further induce air to your HVAC unit.

3. Non-bypass config in the supply air path of a ductwork. Instead of being installed in the return air path (of where air is being pulled into a system), these type of whole-house air purifier systems are installed in the air supply path of the ductwork (where air is being pushed out of a system). See diagram 4 below for reference.

Negatives of a duct-based whole house air purifier system:

Limited to homes with a forced air HVAC system. Because these are duct-based systems, they are of course limited only to homes with a forced air HVAC system. If you don't have forced-air heating or central air cooling, you will not be able to use these systems.

Inefficient as it requires HVAC unit to be constantly running. Like replacement filters above, because these are installed into your ductwork, they simply aren't filtering unless your system is actually running. If you're the type to not frequently run your cooling or heating system because your house is well insulated and energy efficient - then you will still need to continue running your system fan for filtration to actually happen.

Bypass config still lets in unfiltered air. Many duct-based systems are installed in a bypass configuration into your HVAC unit (see diagram 3 above). They are installed this way in order to not impede airflow to your cooling and heating system, but because there will be unfiltered portions in a bypass configuration, this negates the point of a whole house air purifier system since partial, unfiltered air is still being taken to your HVAC system to be distributed to the rest of your home.

Mold and algae can grow in the duct. With high enough humidity levels, mold and algae can grow within a duct-base system. These filter based systems cannot take care of the pollutants being generated in the part of the duct that comes after the filter.

Limited to your home's HVAC design. Like replacement based whole house air purifiers, duct-based systems are limited to your HVAC ductwork and how many return air grills you have in your home, and where they are located. This limits the area where the air is actually being purified.

Does not work well with multiple zone systems. Modern homes with two and three zone ductwork systems may not work well with these duct-based whole house air purifier system unless you install separate whole house system for each zone which would become prohibitively expensive.

Whole house air purifier system vs portable room air purifier units

As you can see with the many pitfalls above, a whole house air purifier system relies heavily on your home's HVAC system. But the reality of the situation is that your home's HVAC system and ductwork are designed to efficiently cool and heat the air in your home, not to clean the air in your home or introduce outside fresh air.

Beyond the points listed above for each type of whole house air purifier system, you should also consider the negative aspects of a whole house air purifier system when compared to a portable air purifier unit.
Negatives of whole house vs. portable units

Mismatched design purpose. HVAC systems are designed to cool and heat a home, and limited return air paths are to ensure proper airflow and pressure. Because of this a whole house air purifier system is only going to be able to take in air and pick up pollutants in one area of the house where the return air grill is located (generally in hallways and not in bedrooms). In comparison, you can take your portable unit from room-to-room, cleaning the air of the space you utilize the most.

Can be ineffective. Duct-based whole house air purifier system are ineffective in bypass configuration as they will still partially let in unfiltered air. A portable system is designed to clean all the air in its designated volume.

Inconsistent performance between homes. The performance of a whole house air purifier system isn't consistent as each home and its HVAC system (along with the ductwork) is unique, whereas portable units are designed to clean a specific square footage.

Energy inefficient. May not be energy efficient when you compared a whole house air purifier system to a portable unit. As the whole house system is married to the HVAC, you will need to constantly run your HVAC fan (or cooling and heating system) to actually filter the air.

Expensive. Whole house air purifier systems can be incredibly cost prohibitive, especially when you factor in the labor cost from an HVAC servicing vendor. Ductwork systems are especially expensive while only pulling in air from select locations in the home and may end up costing more money vs. buying individual portable units for each room of your home.

Lack of transparency and confusing options. If it's a replacement filter based system, what will fit with your HVAC system? Or return path grill? If it's duct-based, where should you install for proper airflow and actual filtration? What about modern homes with zoned cooling/heating? Compared to portable units, you will need to make many decisions shrouded behind sales pitches and hidden prices.

Whole house air purifier systems sound good on paper, but not in actual practice

For many people, the initial concept of a "whole house" air purifier system can sound appealing. After all, these systems are labeled as "whole house" units - even though realistically they are only filtering in air from select locations of a home. Because of how many whole house systems are sold, information about these air purifier solutions is often lacking in transparency, especially when sold through HVAC technicians and service vendors.

HVAC systems in a residence are designed to heat and cool your home and their primary function is simply not to purify the air in your home. The filter elements for an HVAC system are meant to protect the system first, and filter pollutants as a distant second. At the end of the day, portable units offer the flexibility and choices that whole house based systems won't be able to match, both in cost-effectiveness and actual air purifying efficiency.

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Complete Guide to Whole House Air Purifiers vs. Portable Units

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Whether you are suffering from asthma and allergies or simply want better air quality in your home, you may have come across whole house air purifier systems when searching for an air purifying solution online. When compared to portable room air purifiers, on first glance whole house air purifiers may seem like the perfect solution.

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Technological developments often tend to provide quality of life improvements which people wouldn't necessarily expect. Tesla is an intriguing example in this regard. Its Bioweapon Defense Mode, built into most of their recent car models, has proven to be of incredible value to Californians this week.
Tesla's Bioweapon Defense Mode is Godly

For those who are unaware of 's technology, the Bioweapon Defense mode has nothing to do with actual warfare. More specifically, it can be useful if a nuclear attack is ever launched, although it is doubtful many people will be in their car when it happens.

The Bioweapon Defense Mode is designed for one specific purpose. It keeps the air quality inside the car at an optimal level at all times. In California, this technology is of great value right now. Anyone trying to escape the massive fires ravaging the state will find themselves close to the fires in question. As such, the air quality inside most cars will begin deteriorating very quickly, which is not a positive development by any means.

A perfect example where Tesla's technology would be useful is the below video. Driving close to the fire engulfed in smoke, the air quality in the car deteriorates quickly. Having pets in the car only makes it so much more important to keep the air quality high.

This was seen from the 23 at around 9:30AM. At that point Kannan road was closed. #WoolseyFire pic.twitter.com/6CJYMZIccU

- Null TX (@nulltxnews) November 9, 2018

With Tesla's native technology , car owners have far fewer problems in this regard. The air readings inside their Tesla car show everything is fine even while driving through fires on both sides of the road. That is quite spectacular, and it highlights the further need for such technology in the automotive industry. Although not everyone has the money to buy a Tesla vehicle, this technology can be manufactured by others as well.

While this may just be one "oddball" example to highlight the potential of Bioweapon Defense Mode, it shows this is not just a gimmick. It is unclear if this feature can effectively help save lives, but those who have access to this concept will be glad they paid the extra money first and foremost. Any quality of life improvement during such troublesome times is worth keeping an eye on.

One thing Elon Musk's company may want to reconsider is potentially renaming this technology. A Bioweapon Defense Mode sounds pretty aggressive, although its purpose is also pretty clear when looking at the name itself. Considering how military officials may be favoring bioweapons in the future, there may be a lot more use cases for this technology as time progresses.

The big question is whether or not developments like these can turn things around for the company as a whole. Tesla still isn't a profitable business by any means, although this "feel good" story will certainly generate some positive attention as well. Technology will be an ally to humankind first and foremost, even though not everyone may see things in a similar light at first.

JP Buntinx is a FinTech and Bitcoin enthusiast living in Belgium. His passion for finance and technology made him one of the world's leading freelance Bitcoin writers.

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Tesla's Bioweapon Defense Mode Proves Useful in California - NullTX

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Technological developments often tend to provide quality of life improvements which people wouldn't necessarily expect. Tesla is an intriguing example in this regard. Its Bioweapon Defense Mode, built into most of their recent car models, has proven to be of incredible value to Californians this week.

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Air pollution has a significant and pervasive impact on public health. According to the World Health Organization, it is now considered "the world's largest single environmental health risk," with more than three million people dying every year as a result. This is more than twice the number of people that die in vehicle accidents each year.

Health and safety are important to us. Just as we've designed Model S and Model X to avoid collisions or protect their occupants when one happens, we felt compelled to protect them against the statistically more relevant hazard of air pollution*. Inspired by the air filtration systems used in hospitals, clean rooms, and the space industry, we developed a HEPA filtration system capable of stripping the outside air of pollen, bacteria, and pollution before they enter the cabin and systematically scrubbing the air inside the cabin to eliminate any trace of these particles. The end result is a filtration system hundreds of times more efficient than standard automotive filters, capable of providing the driver and her passengers with the best possible cabin air quality no matter what is happening in the environment around them.

The air filtration system was put to the test in real-world environments from California freeways during rush hour, to smelly marshes, landfills, and cow pastures in the central valley of California, to major cities in China. We wanted to ensure that it captured fine particulate matter and gaseous pollutants, as well as bacteria, viruses, pollen and mold spores.

We then decided to take things a step further and test the complete system as we would on the road, but in an environment where we could precisely control and carefully monitor atmospheric conditions. A Model X was placed in a large bubble contaminated with extreme levels of pollution (1,000 µg/m ³ of PM2.5 vs. the EPA's "good" air quality index limit of 12 µg/m ³). We then closed the falcon doors and activated Bioweapon Defense Mode.

The plot below shows the subsequent evolution in pollution levels inside the vehicle and inside the bubble. In less than two minutes, the HEPA filtration system had scrubbed the air in Model X, bringing pollution levels from an extremely dangerous 1,000 µg/m ³ to levels so low as to be undetectable (below the noise floor) by our instruments, allowing us to remove our gas masks and breathe fresh air while sitting inside a bubble of pollution.

Not only did the vehicle system completely scrub the cabin air, but in the ensuing minutes, it began to vacuum the air outside the car as well, reducing PM2.5 levels by 40%. In other words, Bioweapon Defense Mode is not a marketing statement, it is real. You can literally survive a military grade bio attack by sitting in your car.

Moreover, it will also clean the air outside your car, making things better for those around you. And while this test happened to be done with a Model X, the same would be true of the new Model S now in production.

Tesla will continue to improve the micro-geometry and chemical passivation defenses in the primary and secondary filters, which are easily replaceable, so this will get better the longer you own your car. Suggestions for improvement are welcome.

* According to the World Health Organization, average annual PM2.5 levels (the most dangerous form of pollution) reach 56 µg/m ³ in Beijing, 25 µg/m ³ in Mexico City, 21 µg/m ³ in Hong Kong, 20 µg/m ³ in Los Angeles, 20 µg/m ³ in Berlin, 17 µg/m ³ in Paris, and 16 µg/m ³ in London. Based on the findings of a 2013 study conducted at Harvard, these levels of pollution would result in population-averaged life expectancy reductions of 23 months in Beijing, 10 months in Mexico City, 9 months in Hong Kong, 8 months in Berlin and Los Angeles, and 7 months in Paris and London.

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Putting the Tesla HEPA Filter and Bioweapon Defense Mode to the Test | Tesla

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Air pollution has a significant and pervasive impact on public health. According to the World Health Organization, it is now considered "the world's largest single environmental health risk," with more than three million people dying every year as a result. This is more than twice the number of people that die in vehicle accidents each year.

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Fire relief

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Update this whenever we do something new!

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Links to disaster relief housing resources

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This page provides resource information related to Disaster Housing. You can access information from past and present programs and resources.Disaster Housing Resource CenterAlternative Housing Pilot Program - The Alternative Housing Pilot Program (AHPP) was a one-time, four-year pilot to identify and evaluate better ways to house disaster survivors.

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US Department of Housing and Urban Development

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US Department of Housing and Urban Development

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Good place to go for questions on legal requirements

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HUD.gov / U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)

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HUD provides housing support and uplifts communities. Let us guide your next steps to the right place.

Find Housing Assistance

HUD provides housing support and uplifts communities. Let us guide your next steps to the right place.

Find Housing Assistance

At President Biden's directive, the COVID-19 National Emergency declared in March of 2020 ended on May 11, 2023.

Learn More

Find disaster resources from HUD and other Federal and state agencies to help with disaster recovery.

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At the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), we provide mortgage insurance on loans made by FHA-approved lenders.

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HUD.gov / U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)

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HUD provides housing support and uplifts communities. Let us guide your next steps to the right place. Find Housing Assistance HUD provides housing support and uplifts communities. Let us guide your next steps to the right place. Find Housing Assistance At President Biden's directive, the COVID-19 National Emergency declared in March of 2020 ended on May 11, 2023.

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Container housing

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Modern Prefab and Modular Homes. Steel frame modulars and shipping container homes built in Alberta Canada and delivered throughout Western Canada and Western USA, including California, Washington, British Columbia, Alberta Edmonton, Calgary, B.C. Vancouver, Okanagan, Whistler, San Francisco, Seattle , Los Angeles, Gulf Islands, Victoria, Nanaimo.

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Ten Fold is an IP licensing company that develops technology for people and products that move using patented lever-based systems that transform the shape and utility of your products.