Hughes, AK
Hughes, AK's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Out of every US place USFS scores, Hughes lands at the 95th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a figure built from its 71 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Hughes at the 93rd percentile, close to its 95th-percentile risk score.
Hughes's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS puts 81.7% of Hughes's 71 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 8.5% Direct and 9.9% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
Where Hughes ranks
Hughes scores 95th nationally and 84th within Alaska — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Hughes ranks 1,689 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 30,230 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alaska alone, it ranks 52 of 322 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alaska on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Hughes's 95th-percentile, very high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Hughes's 81.7% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 71 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Hughes. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Hughes, see the exposure-zones guide.