Viking, MN
Viking wildfire risk explained
Out of every US place USFS scores, Viking lands at the 79th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 106 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Viking at the 77th national percentile — 2 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Viking's buildings actually sit
56.6% of Viking's 106 buildings sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone, roughly 60 structures close enough to burnable vegetation for flame contact, not just embers — 43.4% fall in the Indirect, ember-only zone and 0% are Minimal.
How Viking compares
Compare Viking's two percentiles: 97th within Minnesota, only 79th nationally — a gap of 18 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Viking ranks 6,656 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 28,773 by building count (1 is largest). Within Minnesota alone, it ranks 25 of 914 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Minnesota on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Viking
Viking's 79th-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.
Hardening a home in Viking
Viking's 56.6% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
Where Viking's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 106 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Viking. The exposure-zones guide covers what Viking's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.