Crooked Creek, WV
Crooked Creek wildfire risk explained
USFS scores Crooked Creek at the 94th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally), a figure built from 159 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Crooked Creek at the 95th national percentile — 2 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Of Crooked Creek's 159 counted buildings, 96.2% 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.
Crooked Creek against the rest of the country
Crooked Creek scores 94th nationally and 92nd within West Virginia — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Crooked Creek ranks 2,063 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 26,508 by building count (1 is largest). Within West Virginia alone, it ranks 36 of 429 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for West Virginia on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Crooked Creek
At the 94th percentile nationally, Crooked Creek carries the very high rating that has pushed some carriers to limit new business in similarly-scored places elsewhere in the country. Worth comparing quotes rather than assuming last year's renewal terms still apply.
What would actually reduce this score
Because Direct exposure dominates in Crooked Creek (96.2%), the highest-leverage fix is defensible space, not roofing or vents alone — covered in the home-hardening guide.
Where Crooked Creek's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Crooked Creek's 2,063-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Crooked Creek's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.