Purple Sage, WY
Purple Sage wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Purple Sage lands at the 65th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 176 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Purple Sage's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 59th percentile nationally.
Purple Sage's building exposure, zone by zone
Indirect exposure is dominant in Purple Sage (64.2% of 176 buildings): far enough from burnable vegetation to avoid flame contact, close enough for wind-blown embers. Only 35.8% sit in the Direct zone.
Where Purple Sage ranks
Inside Wyoming, Purple Sage sits at just the 22nd percentile even though it scores 65th 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, Purple Sage ranks 11,111 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 25,812 by building count (1 is largest). Within Wyoming alone, it ranks 151 of 192 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Wyoming on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Purple Sage
Purple Sage's 65th-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
Purple Sage's 64.2% 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
Purple Sage's 65th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Purple Sage, see the exposure-zones guide.