Mason City, IA
Mason City, IA's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Mason City's 15,168 buildings earn a 21st-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 Mason City at the 20th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Only 6% of Mason City's 15,168 buildings carry Direct exposure and 0% carry Indirect; the remaining 94% are Minimal, which shifts the risk driving this page's score toward the surrounding landscape rather than any one structure. At 15,168 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Where Mason City ranks
Mason City scores 21st nationally and 34th within Iowa — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Mason City ranks 24,895 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 976 by building count (1 is largest). Within Iowa alone, it ranks 672 of 1,017 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Iowa on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 21st national percentile, Mason City rates moderate for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
What would actually reduce this score
Even with 94% of Mason City outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones, basic hardening — gutter maintenance, ember-resistant vents — is inexpensive relative to the regional burn-probability risk noted above. Details in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 15,168 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Mason City. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Mason City, see the exposure-zones guide.