These types of fires are increasing as more vacation homes are built and improved transportation systems allow more people to live outside city centers. The longer response times for these out of the way locations gives the fire more time to get out of control, making these fires very difficult to fight. Most fire fighters are trained to fight either wildfires or structure fires. Interface fires require both skills, and it is very difficult to balance the two. This was not the only occurrence, however.
Fire is a normal part of most forest and range ecosystems in temperate regions of the world.
Fires historically burn on a fairly regular cycle, recycling carbon and nutrients stored in the ecosystem and strongly affecting the species within the ecosystem. Annual acreage consumed by wildfires in the lower 48 states dropped from about 40-50 million acres per year in the 1930's to under 5 million acres by 1970. A Western Washington study showed that modern wildfires are estimated to consume only about a tenth of the biomass each year that prehistoric fires burned. During the period 1977-1994 people caused 80 percent of the wild land fires in Washington State while nature caused 20 percent. In addition to typical methods of occurrence, structure fires are a potential secondary hazard of earthquakes and riots.