Estelle, LA
How exposed is Estelle to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Estelle lands at the 48th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 7,111 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Estelle's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 41st percentile nationally.
Estelle's building exposure, zone by zone
Indirect exposure is dominant in Estelle (75.3% of 7,111 buildings): far enough from burnable vegetation to avoid flame contact, close enough for wind-blown embers. Only 3.2% sit in the Direct zone. At 7,111 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Estelle against the rest of the country
Estelle's risk sits at a similar level relative to Louisiana (54th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (48th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Estelle ranks 16,417 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,412 by building count (1 is largest). Within Louisiana alone, it ranks 226 of 488 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Louisiana on its state page.
Estelle and the insurance market
Estelle's elevated wildfire rating (48th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
What would actually reduce this score
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Estelle (75.3% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Estelle's 16,417-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Estelle, see the exposure-zones guide.