Peña Blanca, NM
How exposed is Peña Blanca to wildfire?
USFS scores Peña Blanca at the 73rd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (well above the national norm for wildfire risk), a figure built from 524 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Peña Blanca at the 71st percentile, close to its 73rd-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS classifies 90.3% of Peña Blanca's buildings as Direct exposure, higher than its 9.7% Indirect share and far above its 0% Minimal share — a profile where 473 structures sit close enough to vegetation that lot clearing matters most.
Where Peña Blanca ranks
Inside New Mexico, Peña Blanca sits at just the 44th percentile even though it scores 73rd 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, Peña Blanca ranks 8,511 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 16,966 by building count (1 is largest). Within New Mexico alone, it ranks 277 of 495 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for New Mexico on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Peña Blanca's 73rd-percentile, 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.
Hardening a home in Peña Blanca
With 90.3% of Peña Blanca in Direct exposure, defensible-space clearing and ember-resistant construction (vents, Class-A roofing) address the exposure this page's own numbers describe, not a generic checklist. See the home-hardening guide.
Where Peña Blanca's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 524 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Peña Blanca. The exposure-zones guide covers what Peña Blanca's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.