Williamsport, PA
Williamsport wildfire risk explained
USFS scores Williamsport at the 45th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (modestly above the national average for wildfire risk), a figure built from 9,995 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Williamsport at the 45th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Williamsport's building exposure, zone by zone
84% of Williamsport's 9,995 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 6.8% Direct and 9.2% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone. At 9,995 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
Williamsport against the rest of the country
Compare Williamsport's two percentiles: 73rd within Pennsylvania, only 45th nationally — a gap of 27 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Williamsport ranks 17,315 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 1,613 by building count (1 is largest). Within Pennsylvania alone, it ranks 548 of 1,991 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Pennsylvania on its state page.
Williamsport and the insurance market
Williamsport's elevated wildfire rating (45th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
Hardening a home in Williamsport
Williamsport's 84% 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.
Where Williamsport's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Williamsport's 17,315-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Williamsport's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.