Utica, SC
Utica wildfire risk explained
Utica's 787 buildings earn a 65th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — well above the national norm for wildfire risk. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Utica at the 69th national percentile — 3 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Utica's building exposure, zone by zone
787 buildings are counted in Utica, and 50.6% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 46.6% in Direct exposure or the 2.8% rated Minimal.
How Utica compares
Utica's 65th national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 37th ranking inside South Carolina does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 28 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Utica ranks 10,916 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 13,752 by building count (1 is largest). Within South Carolina alone, it ranks 299 of 474 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for South Carolina on its state page.
Utica and the insurance market
Utica'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.
What would actually reduce this score
Because 50.6% of Utica's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
Where Utica's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Utica's 10,916-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Utica's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.