Lapwai, ID
Lapwai wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Lapwai lands at the 85th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a figure built from its 507 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Lapwai's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 88th percentile nationally.
Where Lapwai's buildings actually sit
76.9% of Lapwai's 507 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 23.1% Direct and 0% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone.
How Lapwai compares
Inside Idaho, Lapwai sits at just the 56th percentile even though it scores 85th nationally — the state's overall wildfire exposure is high enough to make this a relatively quiet corner of it. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Lapwai ranks 4,816 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 17,221 by building count (1 is largest). Within Idaho alone, it ranks 103 of 232 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Idaho on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Lapwai's 85th-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.
What would actually reduce this score
Lapwai's 76.9% 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
Every one of the two percentiles behind Lapwai's 4,816-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Lapwai, see the exposure-zones guide.