Spokane’s Blaze Barrier starter fires up new funding for fast-track wildfire protection program
Jacob Schuler is not a firefighter. But in 2021 he heard from a friend who first arrived at the scene of a fire in Stevens County, Wash. A friend explained how fire extinguishers are used to reduce or contain brush fires when there is no access to water.
“The standard operating procedure is to grab the shovels and start digging for the fire line,” Schuler told GeekWire. “It removes the grass, once the fire has arrived, it must be extinguished because it loses power.”
That day the flames were too fast for the catcher and the fire ran into a neighboring field and was extinguished, Schuler said. The 30-day Ford-Corkscrew Fire has burned 16,000 acres and destroyed 18 homes.
“Hearing that story, that when the water is gone they grab the shovels – that was a statement of the problem to me,” said Schuler, then tried to find a solution.
Spokane-based Blaze Barrier was born out of Schuler’s desire to provide firefighters and homeowners with a quick-acting tool to fight wildfires. The technology works by connecting a series of modules containing monoammonium phosphate, a non-toxic extinguishing powder. When a fire reaches the line fuses, the modules ignite and knock down the flames while also creating a fire suppression barrier to stop the fire’s progress.
“It’s like a fire hydrant in a box instead of the manual labor of digging weeds away,” said Schuler. The line is quick and easy to use in its storage box, the powder is biodegradable, and unused lines or modules can be picked up and reused.
Blaze Barrier is suitable for certain types of wildfires and grass fires. It is not intended to work against large fires cooked by strong winds, such as those that overpower fire trucks or jump through trees.
“We hear consistently well from firefighters, that giving them an extra 5-10 minutes or reducing the intensity of a fire is a game changer for them,” Schuler said. “It allows them to get into a better position so they won’t be overtaken.”
Blaze Barrier recently closed a $760,000 seed funding round, with Avista Development and Barton Ventures leading the round with the participation of 12 angel investors. The company previously raised a $300,000 seed round, and a Kickstarter campaign raised nearly $53,000.
The startup employs six people and is actively leasing a 9,500-square-foot manufacturing facility where it hopes to eventually assemble 1,000 fire hoses per day.
The 25-foot Blaze Barrier retails on the company’s website for $295. A patent is pending on the system developed by Schuler in which the modules are connected together. And the company was recently cleared by the US Department of Transportation to ship via common carrier.
The video below, showing previous iterations of the Blaze Barrier, shows how the system is used and ignited:
