DALLAS — The numbers surrounding the Los Angeles area wildfires are staggering.
29 people dead.
Thousands of residents displaced.
Nearly 17,000 structures burned.
Losses estimated to be at least $52 billion.
While it took three weeks to fully contain the two separate wildfires, their impact will be felt for years.
Because of that devastation, the Y’all-itics team decided to examine our risk here in Texas… and it’s greater than you might think.
“It absolutely could happen here. It has,” Wes Moorehead told us on the most recent episode. “Bastrop complex in 2011 burned 1,660 homes, very devastating wildfire. So, we’ve seen that level of wildfire right here in Texas.”
Wes Moorehead is the new deputy director of the Texas A&M Forest Service, the lead agency that battles wildfires in our state.
Moorehead says there’s some “nook or cranny” in the state that’s always burning.
A recent report, in fact, ranked Texas as the third most dangerous state for wildfires, behind only California and Colorado.
So, firefighters here pay close attention to damaging wildfires that break out in other states for a couple of reasons.
First, Texas often sends help.
Moorehead says our state sent more than 100 firefighters and dozens of fire suppression engines to California.
Second, firefighters want to learn what worked, and what didn’t, when fighting the wildfires, which devastated urban areas in Los Angeles.
And according to Moorehead, that’s the biggest problem facing Texas right now: the state’s “wildland urban interface” (WUI) has grown exponentially. In other words, we continue to blur the line between urban and rural here in Texas.
“We’re at 31 million Texans now and they have built out into that WUI, that wildland urban interface, like never before. And so, we’ve got folks, we’ve got homes, we’ve got businesses exposed to the wildland fuel. So, you’re exactly right. What used to be maybe a rural issue, those wildfires happened out there, out yonder, now it’s in people’s backyards.”
Listen to the entire episode to find out why Moorehead and other firefighters are asking lawmakers for $350 million during the legislative session, and how those dollars will help keep your family and property safe.