Canton, NC
Canton wildfire risk explained
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Canton at the 78th national percentile for risk to structures, well above the national norm for wildfire risk — a score built from 2,464 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Canton's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 81st percentile nationally.
Canton's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Canton's buildings (66.2%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
Canton against the rest of the country
Canton's risk sits at a similar level relative to North Carolina (80th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (78th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Canton ranks 7,064 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 6,366 by building count (1 is largest). Within North Carolina alone, it ranks 156 of 772 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for North Carolina on its state page.
Canton and the insurance market
Canton's 78th-percentile, 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.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Because 66.2% of Canton's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
Where Canton's figures come from
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 2,464 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Canton. The exposure-zones guide covers what Canton's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.