Bristol, CT
How exposed is Bristol to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Bristol lands at the 40th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 21,914 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Bristol at the 38th percentile, close to its 40th-percentile risk score.
Where Bristol's buildings actually sit
Bristol rates 42.1% Minimal exposure against just 21.2% Direct and 36.7% Indirect — of 21,914 buildings counted, few sit close enough to burnable vegetation for USFS to flag them individually. At 21,914 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Bristol ranks
Bristol's 81st-percentile standing inside Connecticut outpaces its 40th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Bristol ranks 18,774 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 628 by building count (1 is largest). Within Connecticut alone, it ranks 41 of 214 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Connecticut on its state page.
Bristol and the insurance market
Bristol's elevated rating (40th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Even with 42.1% of Bristol 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 Bristol's figures come from
Bristol's 40th-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 Bristol's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.