Hercules, CA
Hercules wildfire risk explained
Hercules sits at the 91st percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 7,045 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Hercules's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 93rd percentile nationally.
Hercules's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS puts 83.5% of Hercules's 7,045 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 7.8% Direct and 8.8% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to. At 7,045 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Hercules against the rest of the country
Hercules's 91st national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 64th ranking inside California does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 27 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Hercules ranks 2,765 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,433 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 563 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 Hercules 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.
Hardening a home in Hercules
Because 83.5% of Hercules's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
Where Hercules's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Hercules's 2,765-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Hercules's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.