Five years after a wildfire devastated the town of Paradise, people are working together to make homes safer. New means of gathering data can play a role.
“There are a couple thousand houses down there and there’s not a lot to stop it so we want to stop it on this ridge,” said Kotowski.
Which is why they handed over control of their property’s irrigation system to Chief Dave Winnacker of the Moraga-Orinda Fire District.
“He will basically wet down the surfaces, wet down the areas and deal with it,” said Kotowski.
Chief Winnacker teamed up with undergrad students at Vanderbilt University to come up with an app that allows his fire department to access web-enabled sprinkler systems throughout Moraga and Orinda.
It’s a new tool in the fight against #wildfires.