the thought of losing your home and all the hard work put into it is awful, fingers crossed
Thank you. watching the fires near me app and an site is quite useful. there's a grass fire 41km away under control but been burning for days now. there another to the south of me which is much further away but less than 100km. that one is another matter. it's out of control still. but it's not the first time we have faced this.
When we lived in the south of England we had an incident every 3 years on average. and by that I mean a bad incident taking out over 100 acres of grassland and threatening our home. we have been forced out once. we were evacuated for 5 days. I used to ring home and get the answering machine and be relieved because it meant that 1 the telephone line still existed (it was under ground for the most part except obviously at the house), 2) we still had electricity, now the cables ran across the common & nature reserve, so they still existed and 3)the actual physical device still existed to answer in the first place. I was told many times I was too logical, too cold hearted about it and that I should go home and check. the fire brigade were using the hose as their closest access point to the fire the night we were told to leave. going back wasn't going to change that our help. our home and several others were only saved because an aircraft pilot taking off from a private air field near by speed the smoke and reported it. no names get recorded so we could only ever put something in an the national papers to day thank you, but we also asked various radio stations to say thank you as well for us.
After that, cycling or driving home and seeing the smoke over our area again used to have our thoughts as here we go again. which bit this time. whose done what. minor fires every season workout fail, sometimes 3 or 4 of them. major fires every 3 years on average. biggest took out +400acres and was started by a tin BBQ (one of those £2.99 jobs) put down on a dry peat 'soil'. strange that it caught fire, dry peat!
So I guess we have just traded one for the other. the difference here is that it is country wide, they are used to it, every road had notices giving the fire risk status and you have to have a permit for an open fire once another type notice goes up. this like open garden fires are banned, but pizza ovens with proper chimneys are fine etc. it all depends on how it is done.
But we know the drill and here is a coordinated effort much more so than the south of England ever was. we have a fire pan, we will pack an emergency bag if it gets to level 4 in our area and we leave at level 5 (assuming I can get out that is). we watch and listen. it's all we can do, plus keep the water tanks topped up, particularly the bore water because it is a gravity feed and we have hoses all around the home. keeping ground damp around us and under the house helps.
but it will make all the difference. 
