Natchitoches, LA
Natchitoches, LA's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS scores Natchitoches at the 60th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (modestly above the national average for wildfire risk), a figure built from 8,045 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Natchitoches's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 62nd percentile nationally.
Where Natchitoches's buildings actually sit
USFS puts 41.7% of Natchitoches's 8,045 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 17.4% Direct and 40.9% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to. At 8,045 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Natchitoches compares
Compare Natchitoches's two percentiles: 75th within Louisiana, only 60th nationally — a gap of 15 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Natchitoches ranks 12,603 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,094 by building count (1 is largest). Within Louisiana alone, it ranks 120 of 488 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Louisiana on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Natchitoches
Natchitoches's elevated wildfire rating (60th 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.
Hardening a home in Natchitoches
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Natchitoches (41.7% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 8,045 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Natchitoches. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Natchitoches, see the exposure-zones guide.