Alabaster, AL
Alabaster, AL's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Alabaster sits at the 71st percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 12,721 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Alabaster at the 74th national percentile — 3 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Indirect exposure is dominant in Alabaster (48.5% of 12,721 buildings): far enough from burnable vegetation to avoid flame contact, close enough for wind-blown embers. Only 41.4% sit in the Direct zone. At 12,721 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Alabaster ranks
Inside Alabama, Alabaster sits at just the 47th percentile even though it scores 71st nationally — the state's overall wildfire exposure is high enough to make this a relatively quiet corner of it. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Alabaster ranks 9,284 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,202 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alabama alone, it ranks 310 of 592 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alabama on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Alabaster
Alabaster's high rating (71st percentile) puts it among the places where the national carrier-pullback trend is most relevant — not a guarantee of a coverage problem, but a reason to shop rather than assume.
What would actually reduce this score
Alabaster's 48.5% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
Where Alabaster's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Alabaster's 9,284-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Alabaster's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.