Tennessee Firemen Ignore Burning House Over Unpaid Subscription Fee

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by PeppyGPhiB

After reading all of this, there's one thing I still can't believe...

People in the midwest have Earthquake Insurance? I live on the Ring of Fire, and I don't have Earthquake Insurance. I don't know anyone here in Seattle who has it, and we have lots of faults running all over the place. The only people I know with EI live in California. A 5.0 is a pretty small earthquake, one that won't cause any significant - if any - damage. We have them in the west pretty regularly and sometimes you can't even really feel them.

Earthquake insurance in the midwest is as necessary as tornado insurance is in the west. In other words, ridiculous.

Nobody has earthquake insurance - it's exceptionally rare (and incredibly expensive). That was the point I was making - for the most part, earthquake coverage is a very bad investment.

[PeppyGPhiB]

Originally Posted by KSig RC

Nobody has earthquake insurance - it's exceptionally rare (and incredibly expensive). That was the point I was making - for the most part, earthquake coverage is a very bad investment.

But then someone responded that there's a fault in Missouri that caused a 5.0 a few years ago and a 6.something about 120 years ago, as if that was good cause for, as you said, very expensive earthquake insurance.

[Elephant Walk]

Originally Posted by PeppyGPhiB

But then someone responded that there's a fault in Missouri that caused a 5.0 a few years ago and a 6.something about 120 years ago, as if that was good cause for, as you said, very expensive earthquake insurance.

I take it they don't teach geography or history at Pepperdine?

From the cornerstone of American knowledge Wikipedia on the New Madrid Earthquake of 1812:

Some sections of the Mississippi River appeared to run backward for a short time.[2] Sand blows were common throughout the area, and can still be seen from the air in cultivated fields. The shockwaves propagated efficiently through midwestern bedrock. Residents as far away as Pittsburgh and Norfolk were awakened by intense shaking.[4] Church bells were reported to ring as far as Boston, Massachusetts and York, Ontario (now Toronto) and sidewalks were reported to have been cracked and broken in Washington, D.C.[5] There were also reports of toppled chimneys in Maine.

Now, that was nearly 200 years ago but:

The zone remains active today. In recent decades minor earthquakes have continued.[5] New forecasts estimate a 7 to 10 percent chance, in the next 50 years, of a repeat of a major earthquake like those that occurred in 1811–1812, which likely had magnitudes of between 7.5 and 8.0. There is a 25 to 40 percent chance, in a 50-year time span, of a magnitude 6.0 or greater earthquake.[13]

And catastrophe:

In a report filed in November 2008, The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency warned that a serious earthquake in the New Madrid Seismic Zone could result in "the highest economic losses due to a natural disaster in the United States," further predicting "widespread and catastrophic" damage across Alabama, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, Missouri and particularly Tennessee, where a 7.7 magnitude quake or greater would cause damage to tens of thousands of structures affecting water distribution, transportation systems, and other vital infrastructure.[14]

I say this, because my parents hold earthquake insurance on their house because they live pretty close to the New Madrid fault.

[aephi alum]

My own personal opinion is that the fire department should have put the fire out. They had gone out there anyway, in case a neighboring house whose owners had paid the fee caught fire (which happened - and I have to wonder how those neighbors feel now that they have to deal with fire damage). So they should have rescued any people or pets that needed rescuing, and extinguished the fire. And then they should have slapped the homeowners with a huge fee. Of course, then you have to think about whether the homeowners would have paid the huge fee, given that the fire is now out...

I live in an area where some services are municipal and some must be contracted for privately. Police, fire, recycling, snow plowing for my street, are all covered in my property taxes. Water and sewer are not - I'm on well and septic. Garbage collection other than recycling is also not paid for by my property taxes. I bought the house knowing I'd be paying monthly for trash removal, and paying a septic company every couple of years to pump my septic tank, and paying a plumber as needed if something went wrong with the well - and if I didn't pay, there would be consequences - uncollected garbage, backed-up septic, no water.

These people bought their house knowing that they would have to pay an annual fee if they wanted the fire department to take care of them, and that if they didn't pay, there would be consequences. I just think the consequences in their case should have been a hefty fine rather than homelessness.

[KSig RC]

Originally Posted by aephi alum

And then they should have slapped the homeowners with a huge fee. Of course, then you have to think about whether the homeowners would have paid the huge fee, given that the fire is now out...

You've identified the problem yourself: there's not necessarily a way to enforce that "huge fee" on the homeowner since there isn't a contractual agreement to put out the fire. The homeowners saying "I'll pay whatever it costs!" may or may not be relevant in enforcing the fee, either, depending on the particular local laws.

Once the fire happened, the fire crew's hands were pretty well tied. I'm sure it was awful for everyone involved, to be honest, to be on the scene, but it's a much more complex situation than simply levying a fine.