Philadelphia, MS
How exposed is Philadelphia to wildfire?
Philadelphia sits at the 62nd percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 4,033 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Philadelphia's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 65th percentile nationally.
Philadelphia's building exposure, zone by zone
Of Philadelphia's 4,033 counted buildings, 54.2% carry Direct exposure and only 0% carry Minimal — a lopsided split that puts defensible-space clearing ahead of vents or roofing as the intervention worth doing first.
How Philadelphia compares
Philadelphia's 62nd national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 38th ranking inside Mississippi does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 24 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Philadelphia ranks 11,875 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 4,211 by building count (1 is largest). Within Mississippi alone, it ranks 259 of 420 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Mississippi on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Philadelphia
Philadelphia's 62nd-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.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Because Direct exposure dominates in Philadelphia (54.2%), the highest-leverage fix is defensible space, not roofing or vents alone — covered in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 4,033 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Philadelphia. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Philadelphia, see the exposure-zones guide.