Opelousas, LA
How exposed is Opelousas to wildfire?
Opelousas sits at the 47th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 8,222 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Opelousas's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 49th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS puts 67% of Opelousas's 8,222 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 16.8% Direct and 16.2% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to. At 8,222 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Opelousas compares
There's little gap between Opelousas's 47th national percentile and its 50th percentile inside Louisiana, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Opelousas ranks 16,858 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,037 by building count (1 is largest). Within Louisiana alone, it ranks 243 of 488 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Louisiana on its state page.
Opelousas and the insurance market
Opelousas's elevated rating (47th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Hardening a home in Opelousas
Opelousas's 67% 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
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 8,222 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Opelousas. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Opelousas, see the exposure-zones guide.