Wildfire Risk to Communities

Wildfire Risk to Communities is a free, easy-to-use website with interactive maps, charts, and resources to help communities understand, explore, and reduce wildfire risk. It was created by the USDA Forest Service under the direction of Congress in the 2018 Consolidated Appropriations Act (H.R. 1625, Section 210). As wildfires increase in frequency and severity across the country, Wildfire Risk to Communities uses the best available science to not only identify risk, but also provide resources for communities to manage and mitigate risk.


Wildfire Risk to Communities is built from a variety of nationally consistent data, including vegetation and fuels from LANDFIRE, weather from the National Weather Service, and community data from the U.S. Census Bureau, each with different vintages. (See the FAQ “what time period do the data reflect.”) Some of the data produced through the Wildfire Risk to Communities project is available for exploration online and all of the data are available for download as GIS raster layers.


Documentation corresponding to all the ZIP files in the "Data and Resources" section can be found at this Research Data Archive.

Data and Resources

Field Value
appAudience Civilians, Citizen Scientists, Geospatial Scientists, Environmental Scientists, Data Scientists
appVideos ["https://vimeo.com/642862066?fl=pl&fe=sh"]
catalogTarget ckan
cndp WSTC
dataAuthType public
doi 10.2737/RDS-2020-0016-2
lang en
ndp_creator_md5 29d304491fe8a7fb0a3960ed85790ca6
pocName Connect With Us
pocWebsite https://wildfirerisk.org/contact/
publisherType org
purpose <p><em>Wildfire Risk to Communities</em> is designed to help community leaders such as elected officials, community planners, and fire managers understand how risk varies across a state, region, or county and prioritize actions to mitigate risk. This is the first time that maps and data about community wildfire risk are available nationwide.</p>
status submitted
theme ["Terrain and Fuels","Population and Vulnerability","Community Risk Reduction","Fire Innovation Unit - eligible for FireWERX Challenge","Climate & Weather","Environment","Geospatial","Population & Society","Science & Technology","Health & Life Sciences"]
uploadType application
Tags
  • burn-probability
  • conus
  • coterminous-united-states
  • environment
  • environment-and-people
  • fire
  • fire-detection
  • fire-ecology
  • fire-effects-on-environment
  • fire-likelihood
  • fire-planning
  • fire-suppression
  • forest-management
  • fuels-management
  • geoscientific-information
  • hazard
  • landscape-management
  • pre-suppression
  • prescribed-fire
  • risk-assessment
  • society
  • structure
  • wildfire-hazard-potential
isopen False
metadata_created 2026-10-30T16:41:05.042435
metadata_modified 2026-10-30T16:41:05.042440
notes <p><em>Wildfire Risk to Communities</em> is a free, easy-to-use website with interactive maps, charts, and resources to help communities <a href="https://wildfirerisk.org/understand-risk/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">understand</a>, <a href="https://apps.wildfirerisk.org/explore" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">explore</a>, and <a href="https://wildfirerisk.org/reduce-risk/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">reduce </a>wildfire risk. It was created by the USDA Forest Service under the direction of Congress in the 2018 Consolidated Appropriations Act (<a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1625/text" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">H.R. 1625, Section 210</a>). As wildfires increase in frequency and severity across the country, <em>Wildfire Risk to Communities</em> uses the best available science to not only identify risk, but also provide resources for communities to manage and mitigate risk.</p><p><br></p><p>Wildfire Risk to Communities is built from a variety of nationally consistent data, including vegetation and fuels from LANDFIRE, weather from the National Weather Service, and community data from the U.S. Census Bureau, each with different vintages.&nbsp;(See the <a href="https://wildfirerisk.org/about/faq/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">FAQ </a>“what time period do the data reflect.”) Some of the data produced through the Wildfire Risk to Communities project is available for <a href="https://apps.wildfirerisk.org/explore/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">exploration</a> online and all of the data are available for <a href="https://wildfirerisk.org/download/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">download</a> as GIS raster layers.</p> <p><br></p> <b>Documentation corresponding to all the ZIP files in the "Data and Resources" section can be found at <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/rds/archive/catalog/RDS-2020-0016-2" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">this Research Data Archive</a>.</b>
num_resources 63
num_tags 23
title Wildfire Risk to Communities