Palo Blanco, TX
Palo Blanco wildfire risk explained
Palo Blanco's 86 buildings earn a 85th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Palo Blanco's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 85th percentile nationally.
Where Palo Blanco's buildings actually sit
USFS puts 95.4% of Palo Blanco's 86 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 4.7% Direct and 0% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
Where Palo Blanco ranks
Palo Blanco scores 85th nationally and 74th within Texas — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Palo Blanco ranks 4,712 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 29,672 by building count (1 is largest). Within Texas alone, it ranks 474 of 1,795 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Texas on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Palo Blanco
Palo Blanco'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
Palo Blanco's 95.4% 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.
Where Palo Blanco's figures come from
Palo Blanco's 85th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Palo Blanco's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.