Clay City, KY
How exposed is Clay City to wildfire?
Out of every US place USFS scores, Clay City lands at the 53rd percentile for wildfire risk to structures — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — a figure built from its 703 buildings, not the land around them. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Clay City's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 56th percentile nationally.
Where Clay City's buildings actually sit
703 buildings are counted in Clay City, and 87.8% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 12.2% in Direct exposure or the 0% rated Minimal.
How Clay City compares
Compare Clay City's two percentiles: 79th within Kentucky, only 53rd nationally — a gap of 26 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Clay City ranks 14,970 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 14,621 by building count (1 is largest). Within Kentucky alone, it ranks 117 of 552 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Kentucky on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Clay City's elevated rating (53rd percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Clay City's 87.8% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Clay City's 14,970-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Clay City, see the exposure-zones guide.