Dunbar, WV
Dunbar wildfire risk explained
Dunbar's 4,002 buildings earn a 67th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — well above the national norm for wildfire risk. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Dunbar at the 69th national percentile — 1 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Dunbar's buildings actually sit
4,002 buildings are counted in Dunbar, and 89% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 10.9% in Direct exposure or the 0.1% rated Minimal.
How Dunbar compares
Dunbar's risk sits at a similar level relative to West Virginia (60th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (67th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Dunbar ranks 10,322 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 4,244 by building count (1 is largest). Within West Virginia alone, it ranks 171 of 429 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for West Virginia on its state page.
Dunbar and the insurance market
Dunbar's 67th-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
Dunbar's 89% 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
Dunbar's 67th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Dunbar, see the exposure-zones guide.