Kilauea, HI
Kilauea, HI's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Kilauea sits at the 92nd 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 1,375 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Kilauea at the 90th national percentile — 2 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Kilauea's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS puts 54.6% of Kilauea's 1,375 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 45.4% Direct and 0.1% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
Where Kilauea ranks
Kilauea's 92nd national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 56th ranking inside Hawaii does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 36 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Kilauea ranks 2,484 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 9,728 by building count (1 is largest). Within Hawaii alone, it ranks 72 of 163 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Hawaii on its state page.
Kilauea and the insurance market
Kilauea's 92nd-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.
Hardening a home in Kilauea
Kilauea's 54.6% 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
Kilauea's 92nd-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Kilauea, see the exposure-zones guide.