Alta, IA
How exposed is Alta to wildfire?
Alta sits at the 5th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 992 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Alta at the 5th national percentile — 0 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Alta's building exposure, zone by zone
Alta rates 91.9% Minimal exposure against just 8.1% Direct and 0% Indirect — of 992 buildings counted, few sit close enough to burnable vegetation for USFS to flag them individually.
How Alta compares
There's little gap between Alta's 5th national percentile and its 10th percentile inside Iowa, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Alta ranks 30,104 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 11,991 by building count (1 is largest). Within Iowa alone, it ranks 915 of 1,017 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Iowa on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Alta
Alta's low wildfire rating (5th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
What would actually reduce this score
Even with 91.9% of Alta outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones, basic hardening — gutter maintenance, ember-resistant vents — is inexpensive relative to the regional burn-probability risk noted above. Details in the home-hardening guide.
Where Alta's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Alta's 30,104-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Alta's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.