Brandsville, MO
How exposed is Brandsville to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Brandsville lands at the 80th percentile for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — a figure built from its 130 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Brandsville's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 83rd percentile nationally.
Brandsville's building exposure, zone by zone
Of Brandsville's 130 counted buildings, 91.5% carry Direct exposure and only 0% carry Minimal — a lopsided split that puts defensible-space clearing ahead of vents or roofing as the intervention worth doing first.
How Brandsville compares
Compare Brandsville's two percentiles: 97th within Missouri, only 80th nationally — a gap of 17 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Brandsville ranks 6,271 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 27,718 by building count (1 is largest). Within Missouri alone, it ranks 28 of 1,062 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Missouri on its state page.
Brandsville and the insurance market
Brandsville's 80th-percentile, very high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
Hardening a home in Brandsville
Because Direct exposure dominates in Brandsville (91.5%), the highest-leverage fix is defensible space, not roofing or vents alone — covered in the home-hardening guide.
Where Brandsville's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 130 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Brandsville. The exposure-zones guide covers what Brandsville's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.