Giant Earthship vs wildfire: Did good prepping save this ecovillage?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 ธ.ค. 2023
- Dan Schultz spent 15 years building his off-grid, self-sufficient utopia with whimsical homes and trees and gardens that produced enough fruit, nuts and produce to feed the half dozen residents for much of the year. The one thing they worried about was fire and last August their fears were realized.
Caught in the path of the Smith River Complex fire that burned for 86 days and consumed nearly 100,000 acres, Dan’s ecovillage suffered some major losses: the 3 story lodge that housed 4 or 5 people burnt to the ground, as did their community kitchen and A-frame cabin, but other buildings survived with just broken windows, like the huge Earthship greenhouse, or with minor charring, like the Hobbit Hole shelter.
One of the toughest losses for Dan was all the perennial food sources, or what made them truly a permaculture - “permanent agriculture” - homestead. “The orchard trees, you work for years to nurture them,” explains Dan. “They’re like your children, you know. We had 100 fruit and nut trees, we produced a couple thousand pounds of food from our orchard trees”.
Shortly after the fire was extinguished Dan and volunteers got started rebuilding. They first had to clear trailer after trailer of rubble, spending $3000 on landfill fees. Their entire water system melted, all the PVC piping and polyethylene tanks, so for a couple months they bathed in the river and "bucketed up" water for washing. They just installed a new system in time for winter.
Volunteers and donations arrived from across the country. The community kitchen was rebuilt from old barn wood and lumber milled from fire-damaged trees on the property. A donated geodesic dome structure waits where the A-Frame once stood. Dan says they will never rebuild the lodge.
Today, the earthship, hobbit home, greenhouse home and roundhouse are all patched up and occupied. With the trees and produce from the earthship, and replanted garden, they can still grow enough vegetables to avoid the hour drive to the supermarket, and they await the spring to see just what of their orchard still lives. As they wait, Dan is constructing a mosaic from the rubble tile; it’s a phoenix rising from the ashes.
Dan's fundraising: www.gofundme.com/f/sustainabl...
Original video: • He quit all to build o...
Fire footage credit: / @gasquetmike8320
On *faircompanies: faircompanies.com/videos/his-... - แนวปฏิบัติและการใช้ชีวิต
Please revisit in 6 to 12 months.
Thumbs up if you agree so Kirsten will know..
yes that would be great to see how he is doing
I would love a revisit, I have plans of building an earthship home on my 5 acres this spring/summer
I was hoping you would go back, but dreading it too. I didn’t want to see the devastation. Honestly though, it has been wonderful to see the community rising from the ashes. Thank you Kirsten xx
I watched the first episode. This news is genuinely heartbreaking. I'm in awe of Dan's resilience. I don't know if I could find the motivation to rebuild after everything that he's lost.
Kirsten, you and your husband are amazing. The stories you present us with are unique and enriching. Thank you for your discoveries of outstanding alternative homes!
Would love to see this place again in spring to see what plants and trees come back.
heartbreaking to see all the hard work turned to ash but also inspiring to see Dan's & the land's resilience
It might serve as a giod learning experience as to how to buils fire survivable structures. Now they know what will survive. Tile mosaic everything!
@@jonothandoeser definitely, and you'll notice that most of what survived was well away from the treeline (as well as above & below it) so even a small fire break could help (though wind currents along the terrain would be a major factor for those deadly floating embers).
🤔I'd wonder if it's feasible to actually carve their homes into the landscape ... effectively protecting it with several inches of earth... that'll definitely be more fire resistant (though they'll need to come up with innovative ways to let the light shine in).
@@tophlaw4274 All lessons to learn. I like the earth-sheltered idea. With a little observation and rebuilding, this place could survive the next fire with minimal damage.
My heart breaks for Dan....he's super positive and resilient human being i wish him the best, does anybody know his website so people can help him...Thank You... 🕊️
Look under the title of the video and click on “more” scroll down and you will see the link to his go fund me page.
Go fund me link in description
@@truthbetold2611 Hello Truth, yes I found it a few hours later after searching the more info....... thank you very much, I love Kirsten's channel but I do wish that sometimes she put more accessable information or contact info for the people she interviews literally in the video..... Mr
Schulz clearly needs help and has has vast useful knowledge for millions of people out there..... He is the type of people we all should support..... I love what he has done with his property..... Truth, if you celebrate the Holidays, I hope they are Happy for you, and you have a great time, Be Well 🕊️
I am SO glad that you are recovering from the fire! We have been active in proactive thinning since 2017 and are starting to believe that we also could survive a fire here in NorCal. The tile mosaics saving those structures ….what a HAPPY surprise! We will definitely use tile work on exteriors now! Thank you for sharing your story.
Wonderful update - I am SO happy to see that they did not give up and abandon the place! I feel like next spring will be such a burst of new growth and natural abundance that it will make it all so worth it in the end. Thank you for sharing Dan's story & experience so we can all take a page from his resilient way of life.
The most amazing thing to me is that those parakeets lived. Birds are so sensitive to air that they breathe. You have to be careful what products you use in your house and everything. I think it’s just a miracle that they still here. They are tiny, phoenixes all on their own❤
It really says something about a home when I could instantly recognise it from the tiny thumbnail image. "I know that curved red line of pixels!"
Devastating to hear about the fire; it reminds me of a gorgeous 300-acre farm in a valley at the top of New Zealand's South Island, where we house-sat in the off-grid, plywood-and-what-not house and took care of the three herding dogs, their flock of sheep and a few cattle. We were told about when a disgruntled forest worker who, upon being fired himself, set the forest ablaze. The couple living there could only watch as it all burned around them. The forest is returning beautifully now of course but I can't imagine the fear and heartbreak it casued. The lady was tearing up just recounting the story to us.
Good to see the earthship doing well!
The human story of it - to face the loss of your dreams and find it within you to rebuild.
This was painful to watch. So much work and love put into this community. I can't get over how some buildings survived while all around them was burnt bushes and trees!! Fire has a mind of its own for sure. Glad to see that they are rebuilding and the Phoenix Rising is such a perfect symbol for this place. Thank you Kristen for sharing this story. 🙏
🤗 THANKS KIRSTEN,FOR RETURNING SHARING AS WE WATCH THE RESTORATION PROCESS 👍💚💚💚
Dan rocks! "A notch above camping and a step above the Flintstones."
More homes and buildings should be insulated with a layer of hempcrete to allow for better fire resistance. Hope you all can rebuild safely. Blessings.
I hope they get many wonderful surprises in the spring 🌱🌼
Saw a video of the property before the fire, that's so sad all that's gone. But he seems like he'll build something even better soon enough.
There is still plenty of hope! He' s dealing with the aftermath fairly well, hopefully there insurance coverage to help the rebuild. Thanks Kristen for the follow up video.
I heard there was no insurance
Thank you for going back to this site and seeing how they are so resilient and rebuilding their lives from the ashes. I hope that you will return again in a couple years to see the regrowth of this amazing place and the people who live there.❤❤❤❤
You can’t pluck a good apple from a dead tree. The tree is alive. Not the last apple, simply the last apple of the last season. Glad things survived, buildings, animals, people. Glad they are rebuilding and not too devastated to start over. The phoenix is perfect and using the tiles that came out of the fire is so poetic and is what moves it to perfection. Thanks for the follow up. In three springs it will be more lush than it has ever been. Here’s hoping that they build tile walls on every new build.
I'm amazed at Dan's resilience. God bless you. Ps: Dan has amazing friends.
Whoa... how very sad that they lost so much to the fire; there was such devastation! I remember the original video of this wonderful place. But there is so much hope for the future throughout this video, too - it's really inspiring. I truly do hope that winter doesn't bring them more hardships, and that spring brings many wonderful, positive surprises for them. My heart goes out to them, and I wish them all the best in their rebuilding - they've certainly done a wonderful job of it so far already; such a lot of hard work! I'm glad they've had such help with donations of building materials, too.
So heartbreaking to watch this second episode, but how wonderful that you had documented everything so beautifully just before the fire. I take my hat off to Dan and the community.
Saw this amazing community when you posted well before the fire 🔥
To see it now in it's wounded state makes me feel this devastation is a cruel side of nature..
The parts that were not burnt gives a foundation to rebuild..
Best wishes to the community for raising this sanctuary back to what it could be again..seems the support has been forthcoming..thankyou for sharing..
Amazing resilience.
"It's nice to give life a chance, right?"
Damn! I just watched your original documentary on Dan's property for a second time about a week ago.
It's horrible to see the loss here. Difficult to weigh in words.......
Fortunately, Dan is an extremely positive person who's own momentum will help carry him through this.
I'm also looking forward to springtime. Hoping Dan's orchard makes an astonishing comeback!
I was so impressed by the last video and then to see this update is both heartbreaking and inspiring.
This was such an important video to film. Thankyou!
Oh man this is so sad to see. I remember seeing this guy's work before the fire. I am about 2 hours south and 90% of my property burned in 2015 but my house survived miraculously.
Thanks for taking us back to this community. May they prosper in the years to come.
There's plenty left to rebuild on. But now, instead of being among green trees, they're now among standing charcoal reminders of the forest that once was.
Good news is there won't be another fire like that for a hundred years.
In wetter times lightening might be accompanied by rain. Which would limit the extent of the burn. But maybe not as likely during drought times.
It does my spirit good to listen to this episode! Thank you for updating the first on the Giant Earthship. Lessons to learn here. And PHOENIX RISING is epic!!!!❤
Thanks for sharing this. I grew up in Del Norte County, and lived there for fifty-seven years. I moved in 2017, and watched your first video on this place. I was very worried about them, when the fire hit, because I knew they were in the direct area of it. I am so happy that they survived, along with their solarium. They will come back, even better! Merry Christmas to all, and God bless!
@Kirsten, thank you so much for doing another segment on this great property/retreat! Really shows you care about what matters :)
That was really something - hope you return in the spring to follow up - it may just be amazing!
What trauma! This group's courage and strength are truly inspiring. Sending them prayers of love and support❤️
I first had to take a break cause I couldn't bear seeing the destruction.
However upon returning I was pretty delighted, you actually came through really well. People, Sheep, Earthship (WOW!!), Treehouse, Mason structures, Hobbit Hole ;-)
Guess the smart little piggy built his house from stone.
Perhaps the next big lodge should be a mason cob structure.
Forrest ground should be thriving with new growth by next spring, the fruit trees may take a couple of years.
That is a true growth mindset for resilience
It's so fascinating to see the impact on a food forest of a ground fire. Will you do a follow-up in spring?..all the best to the community
It’s a miracle the earthship and some other buildings survived.
What a devastating loss after years of hard work! I hope you will go back in the summer to see how they are doing after planting.
This is definitely the way to live.
Build an inverted water wheel.
Never heard of such a thing ?
Let me explain..
A water wheel uses water falling onto it to offset the weight of the wheel and cause it to turn right, well a inverted water wheel uses bellows bags on the wheel to lift one side causing it to turn.
Imagine a wheel that has wedge shaped bellows bags say 1x2x3 and let's use 12 of them for the sake of clock positions for the explanation.
So from 7 o'clock position to 12 o'clock position the bags are full of air but the 12 o'clock is in the middle of transferring to the 6 o'clock position through the pipeline.
One cubic foot of air has the lifting strength of 62 pounds each bellows bag has 3 cubic feet of air which has the lifting strength of 186 pounds. So from 7 to 11 o'clock that's 5 bags which is a total of 930 pounds of lift strength. So now we have to transfer the bag at top through a pipe to the adjacent bellows bag at bottom of the wheel to start all over again. We use a pair off rails that slowly getting closer to the wheel. The bellows bags have a hard board on top with two rollers on top. Those rollers rotate into the rails and gradually shut the bag. Then a spring loaded lock engages and keeps the bag shut until it gets unlocked a at the 5 o'clock position when it hits a lever. So then it's ready to receive air again. The water level is across the 11:30 to 12:30 position that's where the air transfers to the 6 o'clock position.. all bags have a pipe connecting to the adjacent bellows bag like 6-12, 7-1, 8-2, 9-3, and so on.
There system relays on the lifting strength of the 5 bags on one side of the wheel to push one bag through the squeeze chute on top. I have described it in length on radio station twice and gave extensive description on air. So legally it's not patentable anymore because of being described in full to the masses. It's free to the world. I have government date stamps on the documents that described it in length with diagrams too. So I'm the original inventor of this. And I'm giving anyone who wants to build it can do some without fear of getting sued. This thing is some awesome! It can't be put anywhere even to drive a pump in the desert. The bigger it is the more powerful it is. You can install it in the ground so it won't freeze. You have to put the tank in the ground then air up the bags then put in the water. Tons of torque. Gear on shaft up to surface to working area.
That tile Phoenix is perfect! Enigmatic, and exemplary of what this place has been through, and what it's all about 🙌♾️💖
I love this Man's passion he's expressions about loss being humbling and also having few dark days, but yet he keeps passionate about moving forward almost like he new one day devastation would come thru and wipe out just about everything in its path, The resilience of the land coming back to life gives you the strength to push forward and rebuild. Thanks for Sharing...
"Give life a chance!" That's the spirit! Inspiring.😃
Wow, wow, wow....amazing. I so hope that this wonderful home will rise and flourish again, and live forever through future generations; and that they will learn how to develop this home so it is much more fire resistant in another hundred years. Blessings to all who work on this fabulous project - they are a gift to Mother Earth. I do hope you return this spring/summer to see how this home has evolved in the meantime. And thank you so much for this video! Blessings to you, and the work you do, also.
the figs have a decent chance of coming back. a lot of mine die back to the ground during hard freezes but as long as the roots survive they're ok. i wish them all the best with rebuilding. this is so sad but they have a great attitude and i have faith that they will come back from it.
This is such a hopeful video after the devastation and utter mess of such a fire. The prosaic acceptance of life, good and bad bits and all, is the true beauty. Kristen, thank you so very much for this follow up, please do keep us all informed on their recovery!
Wow, I'm glad you were able to return there. I am sure that community, be it a slow process, will return. Thanks for showing us what can grow out of "devastation".
This was heartbreaking to watch. I’m glad you could save much. This and the PNW is my most loved area of the country for many reasons. How wonderful your home is. I know how much work it takes but there is much pleasure in that. I was raised on a mini farm and learned how to live this way yet cannot put that knowledge to use. I am now sort of stuck in the SE where most waste resources and throw bags and bags of mixed trash into huge compactors and hardly anyone gardens. Too much land is wasted on golf courses, huge vehicles are very popular, people eat unhealthy foods, etc. I do what I can with local limited recycling and a very small community garden at the public school.
Their ability for the resilience is amazing. Accept the power of nature, learn from it, and keep going with smiles on the face. Wow, such an inspiration. Made me feel so good after watching. Thank you!!
I can’t believe it, I remember watching this remarkable community. I so deeply sorry for your loss xx
I saw the original tour of the village and often wondered (dreamed) about it.
My heart is broken to see the devastation, and uplifted by how much of it survived.
I hope you do another tour this spring/summer, I can't wait to see how Mother Nature will regenerate.
Even if you don't feel like it right now, you are so truly blessed!
Wow! I watched your initial video and to see the fire damage is so sad. I love the positive attidude and the saying "give life a chance!'❤
I'm so glad you went back for an update! I appreciated the back & forth, showing us what we were currently looking at compared to what it was on your last visit. It was heartbreaking & hopeful all at the same time. 💚
The sad thing is, this fire episode will repeat itself
It is supposed to happen again..
Watching in tears at times and thankful at others! I just flew up Little Jones creek rd today. heartbreaking. I remember it before the fire so well.
Great reporting/story. Sorry for your loss.
I was so confused when I started watching this and oh! my heart when I realised what had happened. So hopeful that all will return for your beautiful village.
This broke my heart. I had watched the original episode and just loved the idea and the buildings. Sad to lose all those beautiful buildings. Just goes to show that I really should be building my Earthship.
“Give Life A Chance” - Dan … what an amazing man. I pray Spring will make his heart sing.
Such an inspirational video! I hope you can do a series on their rejuvenation and journey. I'd love to see a video in a year. So hopeful and Dan is such a positive person.
Sorry for your losses, grateful for all that is there!
Thank you for showing us this. I also live in a forested area of the Pacific Northwest and during the past Fire seasons we have seen some incredible damage from fires. Luckily we have not been affected by fires. But we also have made changes to our property management system to protect us as best we can from fires. We still have more projects to complete including putting large water tanks near our buildings so we can run a sprinkler system if needed on the roofs for building safety. Anyways, a great segment and update. I wish them all the best and I hope you will check back with them in a couple of years to see the progress!
So heartwarming to see, tearful and touching
Wow I'm so happy everyone including animals is ok and your all healing along with the earth it's a very special place blessings from Australia .
Such a wonderful story of resilience. I loved the previous video but this one shows even more the love and care these people put in living there. Hopefully you'll go back in spring to check on the progresses?
God bless all those who gave things and help. Wow….pays to have great friends.❤❤❤
😮😢😢😢 my heart breaks for you. I’m so sorry for your losses.
Amazing video. Thanks for sharing this experience with us.
So sorry Dan and friends, I hope you can rebuild. God be with you all!
Oh my goodness !!! Hard lessons. This was excellent.
That was amazing! Resilient nature and resilient people. Thanks for setting that story out in the wider world.
came across the first one a few days ago, the comments were a bit disheartening. this is a relief, thanks!
I am very sorry to see the fire came through the property. 💜🦋
This a really fascinating and uplifting film! Thank you for sharing!
my family and i was so worried about these guys when the fire was burning! oh its so good to see they are okay and rebuilding with the same creativity
You are an inspiration with your positive attitude. My wife and I watched the first and were amazed at what you had done. Heartbreaking to see the damage. The phoenix is a nice touch. Stay strong.
Dan is resilient and inspiring!
sad and hopeful...thank you
Within this horrible tragedy... such a huge lesson about the tiled buildings! This knowledge can bless millions. Much love
O my gosh! Wildfire is devastating. Yet you be reborn from the ashes. Best wishes in rebuilding your life
Firstly, thanks for the update, really appreciated. Sounds like a great place
It's great that some buildings and plants have survived, and that everyone is ok. Hope lessons can be learned for how to improve resilience from that.
I read somewhere that naturally rewilded woods are more resilient than planted ones.
Are the pipes not buried underground?
Beautiful work ❤
I do hope you will continue to visit and report on the progress of this land and it's people...
Interesting video, Kirsten. Thanks for the revisit.
Great episode!
The greenhouse is actually kind of a cool place to call home.
Just incredible! This would make a great movie.
What a great video. The garden lady is a hoot.
I hope you go back again in the Spring!
The epitome of perseverance and resiliency.
The spirit of thriving with creativity and endless resources of Mother Earth...is so inspiring!
Sad to see such damage to a beautiful place and area😢. We have friends there that lost their house and everything they own not once but twice in the last 18 years. I know it maybe hard to read this but getting reasonable insurance now is next impossible and there still a greater risk of another forestry fire due the the burnt and dead vegetation, so if the choice is to remain and rebuild please do so with the smartest building practice that can withstand fires! I certainly hope yall have a strong recovery and a safe future!
This makes me want to build underground, like some of those nice underground dome houses you have on your channel and whatever I need to have above ground would be built of earth (cob, adobe, rammed earth) and concrete. Losing so much would be a gut punch. I like how well they have picked up and kept going instead of giving up.
Next spring when some of the fruit and nut trees come back to life from the roots/trunk they can let the trees generate new leader branches and side branches. Then they can graft on replacement fruit and nut varieties.
I hope you'll go back in a year or two for a progress report!
May you rebuild and flourish with life once again.