Cornell, IL
How exposed is Cornell to wildfire?
Cornell's 347 buildings earn a 10th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Cornell's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 9th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
USFS classifies 90.2% of Cornell's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 9.8% Direct and 0% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one.
How Cornell compares
Compare Cornell's two percentiles: 42nd within Illinois, only 10th nationally — a gap of 32 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Cornell ranks 28,514 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 20,388 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 843 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 10th national percentile, Cornell rates low for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Even with 90.2% of Cornell 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
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 347 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Cornell. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Cornell, see the exposure-zones guide.