Ipswich, MA
Ipswich, MA's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Ipswich's 1,533 buildings earn a 29th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Ipswich at the 26th national percentile — 3 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Ipswich's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Ipswich's buildings (85.7%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
Ipswich against the rest of the country
Within Massachusetts, Ipswich ranks higher (72nd percentile) than it does nationally (29th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Ipswich ranks 22,341 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 9,020 by building count (1 is largest). Within Massachusetts alone, it ranks 70 of 248 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Massachusetts on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Ipswich's moderate wildfire rating (29th 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.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Because 85.7% of Ipswich'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.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 1,533 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Ipswich. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Ipswich, see the exposure-zones guide.