Damascus, AR
Damascus, AR's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS scores Damascus at the 82nd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally), a figure built from 339 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 Damascus at the 86th percentile, close to its 82nd-percentile risk score.
Where Damascus's buildings actually sit
Of Damascus's 339 counted buildings, 83.5% 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.
How Damascus compares
There's little gap between Damascus's 82nd national percentile and its 88th percentile inside Arkansas, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Damascus ranks 5,598 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 20,586 by building count (1 is largest). Within Arkansas alone, it ranks 74 of 614 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Arkansas on its state page.
Damascus and the insurance market
At the 82nd percentile nationally, Damascus 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.
What would actually reduce this score
With 83.5% of Damascus in Direct exposure, defensible-space clearing and ember-resistant construction (vents, Class-A roofing) address the exposure this page's own numbers describe, not a generic checklist. See the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 339 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Damascus. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Damascus, see the exposure-zones guide.