Dayton, IA
How exposed is Dayton to wildfire?
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Dayton at the 24th national percentile for risk to structures, close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — a score built from 573 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Dayton at the 24th percentile, close to its 24th-percentile risk score.
Dayton's building exposure, zone by zone
65.5% of Dayton's 573 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 34.6% Direct and 0% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone.
Dayton against the rest of the country
There's little gap between Dayton's 24th national percentile and its 37th percentile inside Iowa, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Dayton ranks 23,944 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 16,194 by building count (1 is largest). Within Iowa alone, it ranks 639 of 1,017 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Iowa on its state page.
Dayton and the insurance market
Dayton's moderate rating (24th 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 Dayton
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Dayton (65.5% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
Where Dayton's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Dayton's 23,944-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Dayton's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.