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Maricopa County, Arizona

Wildfire risk in Maricopa County: where it is highest, and why

Wildfire risk in Maricopa County spans a wide range, from lower-scored places like Queen Creek at 20.0 to higher-scored areas near Cave Creek at 81.8. Most of the places we scored fall in the Moderate tier, with 129 points there.

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Maricopa County — the largest fires on record, at their perimeter centres, with the county’s main communities. Select a marker for its detail.
At a glance

Half of Maricopa County scores Moderate or worse

We scored 191 points across Maricopa County on the same 0–100 scale a Satelife address report uses, and they do not land in one place. 3% of them come out Very High, while 9% are Low. Which end your own parcel sits at is not something a county map can tell you.

Very High 3% · 6 of 191 points High 20% · 38 of 191 points Moderate 68% · 129 of 191 points Low 9% · 18 of 191 points
Safest end we measured 20 near Queen Creek · Low
Middle of the county 43.2 Moderate — half of Maricopa County is above this
Most exposed end we measured 81.8 near Cave Creek · Very High

And the federal models agree it is a fire county

Relatively High FEMA National Risk Index — wildfire risk rating · index score 99.6 / 100
$42.2M / yr FEMA NRI — expected annual loss from wildfire · rated Relatively High
0.21% USFS Wildfire Risk to Communities — mean annual burn probability · 90th-percentile cell 0.55%
4.5 ft USFS WRC — mean conditional flame length · 94% of the county carries burnable fuel

FEMA NRI also rates Maricopa County: all-hazards risk Very High · social vulnerability Relatively Low · community resilience Very Low · annualised wildfire frequency 0.0019.

Sources: FEMA National Risk Index 1.20.0 (Dec 2025), county record · USFS Wildfire Risk to Communities v2.0, mean of the grid cells inside the county. Both describe the county as a whole, never an address in it.

What does your Maricopa County address score?

A county range shows the spread. Your parcel sits somewhere inside it — the report says where, and what to do about it.

Free to request · PDF report with a 0–100 score, the drivers behind it, and a mitigation plan

Local context

What the data says about Maricopa County

At the county level, FEMA’s National Risk Index rates wildfire risk as Relatively High, and wildfire expected annual loss as Relatively High. Since 1984, 11.5% of Maricopa County has burned within mapped fire perimeters.

Fire record

Where the fires actually were

Fire perimeters in and around Maricopa County are not rare in the historical record: 242 perimeters are mapped since 1984, totaling 677,609 acres.

The largest fire listed for this county is the Bush fire (2020), at 193,604 acres.

The most recent large fire is AFM - Hazen (2026). Another major incident tied to this county is the Cave Creek Complex (2005), which is marked as partly in the county and totaled 250,243 acres. Structure-loss details are not provided here for Valley (2015).

Bush Fire (2020) in Maricopa County, Arizona - The Bush Fire burning in central Arizona on June 17, 2020 as seen from space
Bush Fire, 2020 — Maricopa County. Photo: NASA · Public domain
Woodbury Fire (2019) in Maricopa County, Arizona - The BLM Gila District's Safford Hand Crew works on the Woodbury Fire, Tonto National Forest, Arizona. Credit: BLM/Kress Sanders
Woodbury Fire, 2019 — Maricopa County. Photo: BLMArizona · Public domain
242 mapped fire perimeters centred in the county since 1984
677,609 acres inside those perimeters since 1984
11.5% of the county's area, as a share of 23,792.4 km²
AFM - Hazen 2026 most recent large fire on record
Named fires on record
  • Bush Fire2020193,604 acres
  • Woodbury Fire2019123,973 acres
  • Cave Creek Complex Fire2005250,243 acres in totalcrossed into the county
  • Edge Complex Fire200572,327 acres
  • Sand Stone Fire202427,390 acres
  • Siphon Fire202415,527 acres
  • Wildcat Fire202414,402 acres
  • Sears Fire202014,477 acres

Perimeter sources: NIFC Interagency Fire Perimeter History · WFIGS Interagency Perimeters · largest on record: Bush 2020. Perimeters are simplified for display; acreage is the figure the source records.

Communities

Where in the county you are matters most

Among larger cities, several have lower typical scores, including Phoenix at 20.0 and Chandler at 20.0, while Mesa is somewhat higher at 23.9. Tempe stands higher than those at 30.0.

Some smaller communities and foothill/desert-edge areas score notably higher, including Anthem at 56.0 and Cave Creek at 52.1. Fountain Hills is also elevated at 49.5, which fits the wider county pattern of higher risk outside the lowest-scored urban core areas.

Anthem village · 23,190 people
56 High
Rio Verde village · 2,210 people
53.5 High
Cave Creek village · 4,892 people
52.1 High
New River village
51.9 High
Fort McDowell village
50.7 High
Fountain Hills town · 23,435 people
49.5 Moderate
Gila Crossing / Kuiwa village
49.1 Moderate
Morristown village · 186 people
49 Moderate
Wittmann village · 684 people
48.4 Moderate
Mobile village · 100 people
47.9 Moderate
31 more communities in Maricopa County
San Lucy Village / Si:l Mek village
47.7 Moderate
Carefree village · 3,690 people
47.1 Moderate
Desert Hills village
46.8 Moderate
Maricopa Village / Pee-posh village
46.7 Moderate
Wickenburg town · 7,474 people
46 Moderate
Aguila village · 565 people
45.7 Moderate
Litchfield Park village · 6 people
45 Moderate
Goodyear city · 121,116 people
41.8 Moderate
Komatke / Komaḍk village
39 Moderate
Waddell village
37.7 Moderate
Sun Lakes town · 14,190 people
36.9 Moderate
Gila Bend town · 1,892 people
36.9 Moderate
Avondale city · 96,196 people
36.6 Moderate
Surprise city · 167,537 people
34.5 Moderate
Buckeye city · 119,007 people
34.2 Moderate
Sun City West town · 25,806 people
32.8 Moderate
Tempe city · 192,838 people
30 Moderate
Paradise Valley town · 12,658 people
29.7 Moderate
Sun City town · 37,810 people
28.3 Moderate
Youngtown village · 6,165 people
27.8 Moderate
El Mirage town · 35,805 people
26.4 Moderate
Mesa city · 515,486 people
23.9 Low
Queen Creek town · 87,006 people
23.3 Low
Peoria city · 203,252 people
21.7 Low
Phoenix city · 1,675,144 people
20 Low
Chandler city · 282,048 people
20 Low
Gilbert city · 279,569 people
20 Low
Glendale city · 257,125 people
20 Low
Scottsdale city · 246,068 people
20 Low
Tolleson town · 7,216 people
20 Low
Guadalupe village · 5,523 people
20 Low

The score is the median of the sampled points nearest that community — a community-scale indicator, not a score for any individual property in it. Population comes from the community's own record where the source carries one.

Terrain & fuels

Terrain, vegetation and fuels

Terrain scores are fairly flat in many places, with a county middle point of 40.0 and a high of 65.0 near Gila Bend. Vegetation and fuels are generally elevated in the scored points, with a middle point of 79.5 and a high of 80.0 in unincorporated Maricopa County.

Fire weather was not measured in these county scores.

What is measured does still show local contrasts: hazard-zone scores run up to 85.6 at Gila Crossing / Kuiwa, and fire-history scores reach 95.0 near Fort McDowell.

40 median terrain score (max 65 near Gila Bend)
79.5 median vegetation & fuels score (max 80 near unincorporated Maricopa County)
Fire weather

Fire weather across Maricopa County

Fire weather was not measured at the sampled points in Maricopa County. The other four indicators on this page were, and the bars below show what they found.

What drives it

Which part of the risk moves, and which doesn't

Across the county, the overall wildfire risk middle point is 43.2, with scored places ranging from 20.0 up to 81.8. That spread means buyers can see very different risk conditions from one part of Maricopa County to another.

By tier counts, Moderate is the largest group at 129 points, followed by High at 38 and Very High at 6. So while many places cluster in the middle, a smaller set of locations sits in clearly higher-risk territory.

Each bar is what one part of the score covers across Maricopa County, on the same 0–100 scale. A long bar is a part of the risk that depends on where you are; a short one is the same almost everywhere.

Terrain
40–65 highest near Gila Bend
Vegetation & fuels
20–80 highest near unincorporated Maricopa County
Hazard zone
10–85.6 highest near Gila Crossing / Kuiwa
Fire history
5–95 highest near Fort McDowell
Overall score
20–81.8 highest near Cave Creek

The tick on each bar is the middle value. Tier boundaries — Moderate at 25, High at 50, Very High at 75 — are the faint lines behind them.

Show every number behind these bars
Layer Min Median Max Lowest place Highest place Points
Terrain 40 40 65 unincorporated Maricopa County near Gila Bend 190
Vegetation & fuels 20 79.5 80 Queen Creek unincorporated Maricopa County 191
Hazard zone 10 34.7 85.6 unincorporated Maricopa County Gila Crossing / Kuiwa 191
Fire history 5 5 95 unincorporated Maricopa County near Fort McDowell 191
Composite 20 43.2 81.8 Queen Creek near Cave Creek 191

Independently of Satelife's layers, the USFS Wildfire Risk to Communities grid puts the county's mean annual burn probability at 0.21% (90th percentile cell: 0.55%), with a mean conditional flame length of 4.5 ft. 94% of the 26,223 grid cells inside the county carry burnable fuel at all.

Source: USFS Wildfire Risk to Communities v2.0 (ImageServer, county extent).

CAL FIRE has no mapped Fire Hazard Severity Zone at 191 of the 191 sampled points — the zones cover Local Responsibility Areas, and most of this county is state or federal land. At 154 of them the USFS grid above supplied the hazard reading instead; at the remaining 37 the hazard weight is renormalised away rather than scored as low.

191 sample points on a ~2.3 km grid, plus one at the centre of each community, weighted with the Satelife county profile v1 · median layer coverage 90%. Scores are 0–100 and comparable within the county, not across states.

For a property

What a county range means for one address

For property-level context, the USFS Wildfire Risk to Communities product reports a mean annual burn probability of 0.21, with a 90th-percentile cell value of 0.55. It also indicates that 93.9% of Maricopa County is in places that can burn.

This same product reports a mean conditional flame length of 4.5 feet. Together with FEMA’s countywide Relatively High wildfire rating, that supports treating wildfire risk as a meaningful part of due diligence for homes, land, and listings in this county.

Across 191 sampled points in Maricopa County, the score runs from 20 to 81.8 — two neighbouring parcels can sit in different tiers. A county number is the middle of that spread; it says nothing about which end yours is at.

Find out where your Maricopa County parcel sits

Slope, the fuel touching the structure, the road out, the fire history within a mile — measured at your address, not averaged across the county.

Free to request · PDF report with a 0–100 score, the drivers behind it, and a mitigation plan

Coverage

ZIP codes we cover in Maricopa County

Every one of the 148 ZIP areas that touch Maricopa County — we run address-level reports in all of them. They are grouped by the median score of the points we sampled inside each, which is a neighbourhood-scale indicator and not a score for any property: two homes in the same ZIP routinely land in different tiers.

High 10 ZIPs

Moderate 39 ZIPs

Low 15 ZIPs

No sampled point inside 84 ZIPs

85006 Phoenix · 85008 Tempe · 85009 Phoenix · 85012 Phoenix · 85013 Phoenix · 85014 Phoenix · 85015 Phoenix · 85017 Glendale · 85019 Glendale · 85021 Glendale · 85023 Glendale · 85024 Desert Hills · 85026 Tempe · 85027 Desert Hills · 85028 Paradise Valley · 85029 Glendale · 85031 Glendale · 85033 Glendale · 85034 Phoenix · 85035 Tolleson · 85037 Tolleson · 85040 Phoenix · 85041 Phoenix · 85043 Tolleson · 85044 Guadalupe · 85045 Komatke / Komaḍk · 85048 Guadalupe · 85050 Carefree · 85051 Glendale · 85053 Peoria · 85054 Paradise Valley · 85083 Desert Hills · 85118 Queen Creek · 85119 Queen Creek · 85120 Queen Creek · 85121 Sun Lakes · 85202 Mesa · 85203 Mesa · 85205 Mesa · 85206 Gilbert · 85208 Gilbert · 85209 Queen Creek · 85210 Mesa · 85212 Queen Creek · 85213 Mesa · 85215 Fort McDowell · 85224 Chandler · 85233 Gilbert · 85236 Gilbert · 85249 Sun Lakes · 85250 Scottsdale · 85254 Paradise Valley · 85257 Scottsdale · 85258 Paradise Valley · 85259 Fountain Hills · 85260 Paradise Valley · 85266 Carefree · 85282 Tempe · 85284 Guadalupe · 85286 Chandler · 85295 Gilbert · 85296 Gilbert · 85302 Glendale · 85303 Glendale · 85304 Peoria · 85305 Peoria · 85306 Peoria · 85307 Litchfield Park · 85308 Sun City · 85309 Litchfield Park · 85310 Sun City · 85324 New River · 85329 Tolleson · 85332 Wickenburg · 85343 Buckeye · 85357 Aguila · 85378 El Mirage · 85379 Surprise · 85381 Peoria · 85382 Sun City · 85388 Waddell · 85392 Litchfield Park · 85541 · 85553

Grouped from 64 of 148 ZIP areas — the rest had no sample point fall inside them. The community shown is the nearest mapped place to the ZIP's centre.

ZIP areas are Census 2020 ZIP Code Tabulation Areas intersecting the county boundary.

Where to go next

Maricopa County wildfire risk in context

Arizona wildfire risk The statewide picture and every county page we publish Wildfire risk by state Every state and county we cover How Satelife calculates wildfire risk Data sources, layers, score composition, honest limits Create a wildfire evacuation plan Zones, egress routes, refuge areas Run a report for a Maricopa County address PDF + score + mitigation plan
FAQ

Frequently asked questions about Maricopa County wildfire risk

Is wildfire risk the same everywhere in Maricopa County?

No. The scored places range from 20.0 up to 81.8, so risk varies a lot by location.

What does FEMA say about Maricopa County wildfire risk?

FEMA’s National Risk Index rates Maricopa County’s wildfire risk as Relatively High, and its wildfire expected annual loss rating as Relatively High.

How much of the county has burned in recent decades?

Since 1984, mapped fire perimeters cover 11.5% of the county, totaling 677,609 acres.

What is the biggest fire listed here, and what is the most recent large fire?

The largest listed fire is Bush (2020) at 193,604 acres. The most recent large fire is AFM - Hazen (2026).

Was fire weather included in these county scores?

No. Fire weather was not measured in the county scores shown here.

This page is generated from a Maricopa County data pack assembled on 2026-09-05 (pack v1.0). Scores are sampled across the county, not measured at any individual address, and are informational decision support — not a substitute for official evacuation orders, a fire-agency hazard determination, or an insurer's underwriting judgement. Data versions: fema_nri 1.20.0 (Dec 2025) · landfire per adapter · nifc_history All Years View · wfigs current · wrc v2.0 (2024) · zcta Census 2020.

What does your parcel look like, layer by layer?

A county range shows the spread. An address-level Satelife report shows where in that spread your property actually sits — PDF, per-layer score, and a prioritized mitigation plan.

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