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arXiv · 2512.19514

Residential structure survivability to large wildfires in the United States

Mukesh Kumar·John T. Abatzoglou·Crystal A. Kolden·Mojtaba Sadegh
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Abstract

Wildfire impacts on US communities have escalated in recent decades, highlighting the need to better understand factors that influence wildfire outcomes. We find that 567,000 homes were exposed to wildfires across the contiguous US during 2001-2020, two-thirds of which occurred and increased five-fold in the Western US. While residential structure survivability - the percent of structures within a wildfire perimeter that survive the fire - remained stable in the Eastern US in the past two decades, it declined by 10% in the West. Survivability was explained by structural age, surrounding fuels, and fire weather. Survivability was 87% for homes built pre-1990 compared to 92% for post-1990 homes in the West. Survivability was lowest in forests compared to grasslands and shrublands. Finally, survivability was markedly lower for fires coincident with extreme fire weather. Our results suggest that modern building codes, fuel management, and proactive planning can strengthen wildfire resilience.

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Mukesh Kumar, John T. Abatzoglou, Crystal A. Kolden, Mojtaba Sadegh. 2025-12-22. Residential structure survivability to large wildfires in the United States. https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.19514

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