Hill City, KS
How exposed is Hill City to wildfire?
Hill City's 1,173 buildings earn a 58th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Hill City's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 57th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
92.7% of Hill City's 1,173 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 7.3% Direct and 0% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone.
Hill City against the rest of the country
Hill City scores 58th nationally and 50th within Kansas — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Hill City ranks 13,108 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 10,807 by building count (1 is largest). Within Kansas alone, it ranks 364 of 721 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Kansas on its state page.
Hill City and the insurance market
Hill City's elevated wildfire rating (58th 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.
Hardening a home in Hill City
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Hill City (92.7% 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 Hill City's 13,108-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Hill City, see the exposure-zones guide.