Bear Creek, AK
Bear Creek wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Bear Creek lands at the 16th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a figure built from its 870 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Bear Creek at the 17th national percentile — 1 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Bear Creek's building exposure, zone by zone
Of Bear Creek's 870 counted buildings, 99.2% carry Direct exposure and only 0% carry Minimal — a lopsided split that puts defensible-space clearing ahead of vents or roofing as the intervention worth doing first.
Where Bear Creek ranks
Bear Creek's risk sits at a similar level relative to Alaska (20th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (16th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Bear Creek ranks 26,463 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 12,983 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alaska alone, it ranks 258 of 322 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alaska on its state page.
Bear Creek and the insurance market
Bear Creek's low wildfire rating (16th 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
Bear Creek's 99.2% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
Where Bear Creek's figures come from
Bear Creek's 16th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Bear Creek's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.