Vandenberg AFB, CA
Vandenberg AFB, CA's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Vandenberg AFB at the 95th national percentile for risk to structures, in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a score built from 1,412 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Vandenberg AFB at the 93rd percentile, close to its 95th-percentile risk score.
Where Vandenberg AFB's buildings actually sit
Most of Vandenberg AFB's buildings (80.5%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
Vandenberg AFB against the rest of the country
Inside California, Vandenberg AFB sits at just the 74th percentile even though it scores 95th 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, Vandenberg AFB ranks 1,568 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 9,576 by building count (1 is largest). Within California alone, it ranks 413 of 1,570 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for California on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Vandenberg AFB's 95th-percentile score lands in California, the only two states requiring a wildfire disclosure at sale. California's surplus-lines homeowners market passed 300,000 policies for the first time in 2025, driven by carriers pulling back from wildfire-exposed areas statewide. The disclosure-law guide covers what it requires.
What would actually reduce this score
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Vandenberg AFB (80.5% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
Where Vandenberg AFB's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Vandenberg AFB's 1,568-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Vandenberg AFB's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.