Bigelow, MN
Bigelow, MN's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Bigelow at the 6th national percentile for risk to structures, among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — a score built from 168 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Bigelow's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 5th percentile nationally.
Where Bigelow's buildings actually sit
Most of Bigelow's buildings (64.3% of 168) fall outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones entirely — that doesn't zero out the score above, it means the risk is regional, not structure-by-structure.
How Bigelow compares
There's little gap between Bigelow's 6th national percentile and its 9th percentile inside Minnesota, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Bigelow ranks 29,635 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 26,099 by building count (1 is largest). Within Minnesota alone, it ranks 830 of 914 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Minnesota on its state page.
Bigelow and the insurance market
Bigelow's low wildfire rating (6th 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 Bigelow
Even with 64.3% of Bigelow outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones, basic hardening — gutter maintenance, ember-resistant vents — is inexpensive relative to the regional burn-probability risk noted above. Details in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Bigelow's 29,635-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Bigelow, see the exposure-zones guide.