Columbus, ND
Columbus, ND's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS scores Columbus at the 53rd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (modestly above the national average for wildfire risk), a figure built from 252 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 Columbus at the 48th percentile, close to its 53rd-percentile risk score.
Where Columbus's buildings actually sit
Columbus rates 91.7% Minimal exposure against just 8.3% Direct and 0% Indirect — of 252 buildings counted, few sit close enough to burnable vegetation for USFS to flag them individually.
How Columbus compares
Columbus's risk sits at a similar level relative to North Dakota (59th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (53rd) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Columbus ranks 14,884 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 23,081 by building count (1 is largest). Within North Dakota alone, it ranks 166 of 402 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for North Dakota on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Columbus
Columbus's elevated rating (53rd percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Columbus's 91.7% 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 Columbus's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Columbus's 14,884-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Columbus's dominant minimal exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.