Rochester, VT
Rochester wildfire risk explained
Rochester's 179 buildings earn a 16th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Rochester at the 16th national percentile — 0 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Rochester's buildings actually sit
179 buildings are counted in Rochester, and 52.5% of them sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone — flame contact, not just ember cast, is the live possibility for most of them, against 0% rated Minimal.
How Rochester compares
Within Vermont, Rochester ranks higher (55th percentile) than it does nationally (16th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Rochester ranks 26,490 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 25,691 by building count (1 is largest). Within Vermont alone, it ranks 81 of 179 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Vermont on its state page.
Rochester and the insurance market
Rochester's low rating (16th 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 Rochester
Because Direct exposure dominates in Rochester (52.5%), 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
Every one of the two percentiles behind Rochester's 26,490-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Rochester, see the exposure-zones guide.