[aurizon]

Blame the Sierra Club and their ilk. Forests evolve to have trees and an 'understory', bushes and smaller plants, grasses etc. In a natural forest man has not meddled with the natural fires that burn this understory periodically. Aboriginal tribes lived in forests and got burned out and learned to assist nature with frequent small burns. These kept the understory in check. Now civilised man stamped out each fire and a huge inventory of unburned understory accumulated. Then a few dry years and the understory dried out and became a huge flammable mass. Fires could not be controlled. The hot air spread and dried out all growth it its path - which was then like gasoline as the volatiles were cooked off and fire was able to progress faster than a man could run, and the wind created a blowtorch effect that dried out roofs/structures and they also burnedn. The only solution is wide structural gaps(fire breaks) around buildings and understory burning every 2-3 years - as needed.