Expat Community > Belize

terrific
Joined 2015
Posts: 812

Fire precautions in the jungle.

6 years ago

Got a phone call late afternoon from My house in Belize. Both of my sons are there at the moment.
"Are you sitting down, well my bro wants to tell you something"
My younger son then passed the phone to his brother.
"Hey we just saved a bunch of money" Knowing my sons I say and "how much will it cost me to save this money?"
"Nothing its already been saved. You know we were getting a crew in to clear a few more acres, well we have about 15 to 20 acres cleared, We just had a big fire but houses are both safe. and everybody is fine"
When we built we made sure we had at least 25 feet even at its closest point around each of the houses.
Well today while both my sons were in town the building crew who are doing some work saw a fast moving fire coming towards the compound.. The building crew had recently been putting in fencing and gates to enlarge our compound area, so had already cleared a wide swathe all around for setting the posts. The crew imediately set to work making a good fire break and watering down the houses, To a great extent they just concentrated on not letting the fire get close to the houses and ignored the rest of the area. The fire seems to have started Quite a way awayby the river on a neighbors land and swept across and onto our land. In all probably about 30 to 35 acres burnt but mostly it is grassland with scrub maybe some mature trees by the river but the lads have not got that far over and it is the neighbors land.
We have not met those neighbors as they purchased it a few years ago but as far as I know have never actually visited it. So don't know how to let them know.
We know we have been very lucky if we were not doing the fencing there would have been no one to save our place, By the time my sons arrived the crew had got a large area around us cleared and fire free. Had we not originally built with a large fire break area it would have been a lot more difficult as well.
So advice to expats building in jungle areas have a big fire break around your buildings and if possible where your land abuts another lot. we shall be keeping a good break cleared between the neighboring lots in future.
Of coarse no rain today, but lucky very little wind either.

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Fire precautions in the jungle.

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