Benoit, MS
Benoit wildfire risk explained
Benoit's 225 buildings earn a 15th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Benoit at the 14th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Benoit's building exposure, zone by zone
Only 40% of Benoit's 225 buildings carry Direct exposure and 0% carry Indirect; the remaining 60% are Minimal, which shifts the risk driving this page's score toward the surrounding landscape rather than any one structure.
Where Benoit ranks
There's little gap between Benoit's 15th national percentile and its 5th percentile inside Mississippi, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Benoit ranks 26,917 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 23,949 by building count (1 is largest). Within Mississippi alone, it ranks 400 of 420 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Mississippi on its state page.
Benoit and the insurance market
Benoit's low rating (15th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Hardening a home in Benoit
Benoit's 60% Minimal-exposure share means structure-level hardening matters less here than it would elsewhere — still worth the low-cost basics, per the home-hardening guide.
Where Benoit's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Benoit's 26,917-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Benoit's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.