SAN ANTONIO – Six months after a space hearth and getting again on their toes, Maria Lozano and her circle of relatives are dealing with homelessness once more.
“They said nothing survived — no apartments, and we lost everything,” Lozano mentioned.
Their new house is long past. A fireplace within the vacant space subsequent door unfold after being carried by way of the winds of a tropical typhoon.
“Fast, it burned fast,” Lozano mentioned.
A month previous, in July, Victor Villarreal feared a an identical destiny.
“The fire department shows up, and next thing you know, that house was fully engulfed. Man, they couldn’t do nothing about it,” mentioned Villarreal, who lives close to a number of vacant houses.
A large hearth in a vacant two-story house on West Poplar used to be too shut for convenience.
“It’s been going on. I was here three months ago. They burned the house next door,” Villarreal mentioned.
Vacant structure fires expanding
Data gathered by way of SAFD displays an expanding downside with vacant structure fires.
“We know that our fire behavior is up in these vacancies,” San Antonio Fire Chief Charles Hood mentioned.
In 2021, 16% of the 546 fires SAFD spoke back to have been in vacant constructions, together with houses and business constructions.
The subsequent 12 months, that share jumped to 26%.
As of July 31 this 12 months, 29% of SAFD’s hearth calls have been for vacant constructions.
“I think a lot of it has to do with temperature with the unhoused population,” Hood mentioned.
Chief Hood mentioned unsheltered other folks went within vacant constructions to get out of the chilly years in the past.
“Now we have vacant buildings in this city where people have gotten in, and it’s like a commune in there, and they’re staying out of the heat now,” Hood mentioned.
This vacant condominium advanced on SW thirty sixth Street stuck hearth on Aug. 6.
Dozens of firefighters spoke back to stay the hearth from spreading to the entire block. SAFD believes unsheltered other folks began it.
“Upwards of 60 to 80 people out there in the middle of the day in the heat. That same amount of people had to respond to another two-alarm fire later on that evening,” the manager mentioned.
Keeping firefighters protected
When fires get started, protection is on the most sensible of thoughts.
Many of those vacant constructions across the town are structurally risky, making it unhealthy for firefighters to pass within.
SAFD is operating with the town’s construction products and services division to obviously establish unhealthy constructions with 4×4 placards.
“It tells us the structure has been identified as unsafe by fire prevention and safety,” Hood mentioned.
They’re additionally making those tactical fear stories so crews know the most efficient and most secure means to reply.
“To have all of this information where the plugs are, where the exposures are, is going to really help you at three in the morning,” the manager mentioned.
Hood mentioned those stories will save lives when it comes to unhealthy and vacant constructions.
But those are simply band-aids to a multi-pronged downside.
“It’s going to take everybody to kind of solve this. But in the meantime, we have to be safe while everybody else, including us, is trying to figure that solution out,” Hood mentioned.
SAFD is operating carefully with Development Services at the placard program to establish unhealthy constructions.
An open data request displays there are over 11,000 known vacant, overgrown, or unhealthy constructions within the town.
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