Keeping embers out

By Emma Peterson. 

The critical role of metal roofing in designing homes to withstand wildfires. 

As we enter wildfire season, creating more resilient homes and structures is top of mind for many people across the country. To learn more about the role of roofing in designing buildings that can withstand fires, Karen Edwards hosted Tim Brown of Westlake Royal Building Products and Josh Smith of J.N. Davis Roofing for an episode of Roofing Road Trips®. 

One of the biggest ways that flames spread during a wildfire is through embers getting carried on the wind to new areas – like the roof of a home. Tim elaborated:  

The reality of wildfires today, like the Altadena and Pacific Palisades fires, is that they create a firestorm from high winds. And in the face of a firestorm, a classic asphalt shingle roof often starts lifting. And if those shingles lift, embers that are carried on the wind are able to get inside the sheathing of a roof. And from there, the home is just tinder. 

The best way to avoid this is by using roofing materials that don’t let the embers enter the building envelope in the first place. Materials like Westlake’s Unified Steel Stone Coated Roofing. Tim explained, “Metal roofing locks on all four sides and something like stone coated steel will not allow embers to enter the structure. I'm not going to tell you that there are no homes with stone-coated steel roofs that burn, but usually it's due to a broken window or other ways. Not through the roof.”  

The powerful protection of stone-coated steel roofing in the face of fire is something that Josh has seen firsthand:  

We had a customer that we put a stone-coated steel roof on for back in 2015 or 2016. And that home’s in Altadena on top of the hill. And when the fire hit, their neighbor's house right above them was one of the first houses on the hillside that caught fire. And what’s really impressive is, even with wind blowing that fire towards our customer’s stone-coated steel roof, was that the steel profile of her roof was fine. Things like her aluminum gutters melted, and there was a 100 to 200 square foot section of the roof where the granular is burned off, but the roof itself was still there. 

This is just one example of many cases where metal roofing has saved homes. In fact, Tim shared a bit about some studies Westlake has performed related to fire-resilience and their stone-coated steel roofing, sharing, “ We've got case studies where we'll do aerial photos in areas of the big fires that happened in Southern California, there will be 50 homes that survived and probably 35 of those homes have stone-coated steel roofs on them. And it really goes back to the fact that stone-coated steel stops the infiltration of embers much better than anything else.” 

Listen to the whole conversation or Watch the episode to learn more about building roofs to withstand wildfires.