Fort Irwin, CA
Fort Irwin, CA's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Fort Irwin sits at the 36th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 2,467 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Fort Irwin at the 40th percentile, close to its 36th-percentile risk score.
Fort Irwin's building exposure, zone by zone
2,467 buildings are counted in Fort Irwin, and 95.1% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 4.9% in Direct exposure or the 0% rated Minimal.
Fort Irwin against the rest of the country
Inside California, Fort Irwin sits at just the 4th percentile even though it scores 36th nationally — the state's overall wildfire exposure is high enough to make this a relatively quiet corner of it. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Fort Irwin ranks 20,097 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 6,360 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 1,501 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Because Fort Irwin is in California, a wildfire-hazard disclosure is legally required before a sale closes here — unusual nationally, since only these two states mandate it. The state's FAIR Plan alone carried 668,609 policies by the end of 2025. Full detail in the disclosure-law guide.
What would actually reduce this score
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Fort Irwin (95.1% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
Where Fort Irwin's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 2,467 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Fort Irwin. The exposure-zones guide covers what Fort Irwin's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.