California Resident Credited With Creating Homemade Water Pump That Saved Home from L.A. Fire
While the Los Angeles fires have destroyed up to 20,000 structures and left tens of thousands of people displaced, some homes have miraculously escaped the blazes.
One white mansion in Malibu, owned by Waste Management CEO David Steiner, shockingly survived despite all the homes on either side of it burning to the ground. Highly fire-resistant materials are likely to thank for the oceanside mansion’s narrow escape.
But Palisades Highlands father and son, Gene and Patrick Golling, credit the survival of their house—when most in the neighborhood perished—to a homemade water pump and their swimming pool.
Before evacuating, the pair used the water pump they’d bought last summer and directed 20,000-gallons of water from their swimming pool on to their home and the surrounding hillside.
When they returned two days later, the father and son were thrilled to see that the method had saved their home.
Patrick told NBC 4 Los Angeles that he was “shocked” when he saw his house had survived the flames.
“This tree that had caught fire and this hill below,” he said, describing how the flames had reached their property. “That’s when it occurred to us, if [the property] wasn’t soaking for five hours, that the fire would have lit up and burned everything.”
Gene Golling told the news outlet he’d bought his pump for $3,700 as a precautionary measure and had already tested the device.
As the Palisades Fire advanced, Golling and his son spent 10 hours dousing their home and surrounding property.
“People should be better prepared for future fires,” Patrick told the outlet. “Fires aren’t going anywhere.”
How a homemade pump can save homes
The pump they used to soak their house and surrounding property was made by a small South Pasadena company called Brushfire Battle Systems, owned by Southern California native David Whitman.
“I advertised for years,” Whitman told Realtor.com®. “I spent thousands advertising. I bought a full page ad in the Malibu Times. I didn’t get one sale. Zero. I’m like, ‘Why am I wasting money?’”
These days, Whitman has more business than he can handle, with hundreds of back orders.
The pumps, which Whitman described as “little fire engines,” are self-contained sprinkler systems that pump water out of swimming pools and onto properties.
Whitman says people are so panicked, that they’re calling and expecting him to deliver a pump that day. “No!” he says. “These are hand-crafted. It’s an eight- to 12-week lead time. There is training involved. You’re ordering the BMW of water pumps.”
He adds: “I haven’t had a day off since the fires started.”
The pumps can shoot 90 gallons of water a minute.
(Brushfire Battle Systems LLC )
Creating the handmade fire pump
Whitman, a high school environmental science teacher, created the pumps in 2019 when he realized that many L.A. residents had water sources right in their backyards.
“I’m like, ‘What the hell? Why aren’t people using their pools to fight fire and protect themselves?’ So I started researching high-pressure water pumps, AG irrigation systems,” he told NBC 4 Los Angeles.
He credits his years in environmental science for making him aware of climate change and the havoc it can wreak.
“He has first-hand knowledge of the changing rainfall patterns, bark beetle ravaged forests, declining snow packs in the Colorado river watershed and Sierra Nevada,” says his company’s website. “The drought maps seem to be getting redder all the time.”
Whitman began researching what he could do to help homeowners in November 2018, when fires near Paradise, CA, burned 150,000 acres and forced 52,000 people to evacuate. The fires were reportedly started by downed power lines.
(Brushfire Battle Systems LLC )
“During this research, he kept running across burned down homes with full swimming pools filled with ash,” the site says. “Why, he questioned, couldn’t that water be put to use to protect the home, even if no one was home?”
Video on the website shows a pump on a tripodlike device near a pool shooting huge streams of water on a house. According to the company, the pump can deliver 90 gallons of water a minute with a 200 foot radius.
The eight types of pumps offered range in cost from $1,895 to $5,895, which is a lot cheaper than building a new home.
The pump is powered by a Honda engine, is lightweight, and can be carried by one person, according to the website.
“Homeowners can also choose to set up water cannons, run hoses to them and start the system before they evacuate,” says the site. “Water cannons are like having one to three fire fighters on your property. Once operational, the water cannons will run until either the pump runs out of fuel, or the pool is empty. An empty pool is better than a full pool full of ashes.”
Whitman calls the swimming pools that dot almost every yard in Los Angeles, “beautiful water tanks.”
“A fire engine holds 300 gallons of water,” he says. “A swimming pool holds 30,000 gallons. That’s 100 nice red fire engines lining your street.”
The pumps can also be utilized by firefighters. Whitman warns that the pumps aren’t made for untrained homeowners to fight an active fire.
“Do not fight a raging brush fire yourself,” his website states in all caps. “You are not trained in wildland brush fire tactics or home defense.”
The pumps also come with mandatory training on how to use and maintain them. They do not, unfortunately, come with a break on California’s sky high insurance rates, sure to be even higher after the fires.
The future of the handcrafted fire pump
Due to the sudden overwhelming demand of Whitman’s product, he is meeting with partners who are going to help him streamline the pumps’ manufacture.
“Everything’s coming into place,” he says.
While Whitman isn’t happy about the reason his pumps have suddenly become popular, he admits he feels vindicated after spending years selling no more than 20 to 30 pumps a year and generally having his warnings dismissed. He tells of having a contract to supply 12 pumps to a housing community last year in Marin County, only to have the HOA change its mind.
“They were like, ‘You know, Dave, that’s cool. The fire department said we shouldn’t buy them,’” he says incredulously.
“All of us in the fire industry who sell fire defense have been warning people for awhile,” he says. “California needs to get its act together. These fires are unmanageable. Neighborhoods need to fight for themselves.”
Chances are, Whitman’s company will be busy for quite some time.
Realtor.com is partnering with the REALTORS® Relief Foundation to raise funds to support victims of the January 2025 Southern California wildfires. The foundation provides urgent housing-related assistance to homeowners affected by disasters.
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