Buffalo, MO
Buffalo, MO's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS scores Buffalo at the 82nd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally), a figure built from 1,788 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Buffalo at the 84th percentile, close to its 82nd-percentile risk score.
Where Buffalo's buildings actually sit
1,788 buildings are counted in Buffalo, and 78.2% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 21.8% in Direct exposure or the 0% rated Minimal.
How Buffalo compares
Buffalo's 99th-percentile standing inside Missouri outpaces its 82nd 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, Buffalo ranks 5,734 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 8,103 by building count (1 is largest). Within Missouri alone, it ranks 13 of 1,062 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Missouri on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 82nd percentile nationally, Buffalo carries the very high rating that has pushed some carriers to limit new business in similarly-scored places elsewhere in the country. Worth comparing quotes rather than assuming last year's renewal terms still apply.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Because 78.2% of Buffalo's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Buffalo's 5,734-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Buffalo, see the exposure-zones guide.