What Is Not Being Discussed About the LA Fires.

[Old Crank]

31. You bring up good points about pipe sizes for water

When you install a fire system in a building the riser, the entrance pipe, is the biggest pipe. From there all others get smaller as they go away from the source. The system can be overwelmed by fire. Sprinkler heads go off when they are triggered individually. This isn't like in the movies where some one can get one to go off and the rest do also. For the most part each head is rated at 15 gallons per minute. If they all go off pressure drops and the building burns down.
Now you build a 100 house subdivision and you hook up to the city fire system for the fire hydrants. The city has pipes sized for the expected use. I don't know how many house fires at one time they size for. Five in that 100? You have enough water. ten? Maybe. All of them? No chance.

Some information on hydrants from NFPA

https://www.nfpa.org/news-blogs-and-articles/blogs/2024/01/12/fire-hydrant-flow

It gets complicated in a hurry. Things can be done to really limit damage and to increase water flow availability. Do we have the money? o we have the will to spend it? Should LA have studied the Colorado fire and the Santa Rosa fire to see if tehy needed to do more. They know there is a hazard because they have fires every year when the Santa Anna winds blow. I don't know if they are researching the situation or not and modifying best practices.