The fires were finally contained when buildings were dynamited along a wide boulevard to provide a fire break, similar to the strategy used in fighting forest fires. Only a few deaths were attributed to the San Francisco fires, but other earthquake- initiated fires have been more destructive and claimed many more lives. For example, a 1923 earthquake in Japan triggered an estimated 250 fires, which devastated the city of Yokohama and destroyed more than half the homes in Tokyo. More than 100,000 deaths were attributed to the fires, which were driven by unusually high winds.