Whether or not you live in a part of the country prone to raging wildfires, protecting your family from fire is still of paramount importance. While there's no such thing as a fireproof home, there are plenty of things that you can do to make your house safer.

Every year, more than 3,200 Americans die in fires — more than all natural disasters combined. Another 16,000 are injured, and around $15 billion in property is lost, according to the U.S. Fire Administration.

Basic fireproofing tips include such common sense actions as: Don't leave your pots and pans unattended while you're cooking. Keep space heaters at least three feet away from anything combustible. Look for a space heater that automatically shuts off if it tips over. If your electrical outlets or panels are hot to the touch, call an electrician.

The most important fire-protection feature inside your home is the smoke detector. More than 60 percent of deaths from house fires in recent years happened in homes that either had no alarms of ones that failed to operate, according to the National Fire Protection Association.

Smoke and carbon monoxide alarms, which are separate, should be installed on every floor. Smoke alarms should be in every bedroom. You should test them monthly and should be interconnected — so when one sounds in the basement, you'll hear it wherever you are. While such interconnected alarms are common in new construction, they are not found in many older homes.

Newer smoke alarms use radio signals to do this, so you don't need to have your house rewired to install them. One battery-powered model, made by Kidde, sells for around $40 at Lowe's and Home Depot.

The quicker you can react to a fire, the better, fire officials say.

"Time is the one element that's working against you anytime you have a fire or carbon monoxide problem," said Edward Bradley, fire chief in Plymouth, Mass.

While there is broad agreement on the importance of smoke alarms, fire sprinklers are far more contentious. Fire officials call them an effective way to save lives and limit property damage and are pushing to make them mandatory in new housing.

But developers say they are too costly. They have been fighting efforts to make sprinklers mandatory through local building codes, arguing that smoke alarms offer enough protection.

Smoke alarms, however, aren't much good when the enemy is a massive wildfire. That's why fire officials in much of the West are campaigning to help homeowners stop fires from spreading onto their property by cutting down the amount of flammable brush around the home.

For the past four years, California has required that homeowners clear brush within a "defensible space" that extends 100 feet from the house.

"Our theme is: You provide the defense, we'll provide the offense," said Tonya Hoover, the state's acting state fire marshal.

Fire officials in California are trying to educate homeowners to create two zones: an area within 30 feet of the home that's free of large trees and other flammable vegetation and an area 70 feet from the property line with thinned-out trees and plants.

Of course, that requires work and maintenance. Branches should be at least six feet off the ground, 10 feet from your chimney and should not hang over your roof. Weeds and dead grasses should be cut to six inches or shorter.

You shouldn't wait to clear away brush and dead trees until fire season hits. Fire officials say there have been several cases in which people using motorized equipment have inadvertently sparked wildfires.

Which varieties of plants and trees you use on in your yard also make a difference. Plants vary by region, but in general, experts advise using ones that have a high moisture content and low levels of sap, resin or oil.

Trees like eucalyptus, olive or anything that produces natural oils are "like large Roman candles" said Janet Upton, spokeswoman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

If you are building a new home in an area that borders on a forest or a grassy area, experts advise designing your landscape and your house with fire in mind. Using fire-resistant roofing shingles made of asphalt, metal or clay rather than wood is probably the most important step.

The most-fire-resistant shingles have a "Class A" rating. Highly flammable cedar shake shingles are banned in many areas because they can catch fire, fly off the roof and spark other fires. A hot ember can be blown for miles.

Planners and developers in some Western communities are keeping these lessons in mind.

In Spokane, Wash., developer Chris Heftel is selling plots of land on a mountain to people who want to build luxury custom homes. But he's requiring homeowners to keep fire danger in mind. Before they are built, homes must pass an architectural review for fire safety.

"You have to demonstrate that you haven't created a risk," Heftel said.

And in Cordillera, a development of mountainside multimillion-dollar homes near Vail, Colo., homeowners are required to clear brush and dead trees on their properties or face a $3,000 fine.

Planners are also getting serious about designing neighborhoods to make sure that there are two ways to exit during a fire and plenty of room for emergency vehicles to maneuver, said Eric Lovgren, wildfire mitigation manager for Eagle County, Colo.

"There aren't very many small fires anymore," he said. "They're getting more intense."