Gardiner, MT
Gardiner wildfire risk explained
Gardiner sits at the 97th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 785 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Gardiner at the 96th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Gardiner's buildings actually sit
Indirect exposure is dominant in Gardiner (59.6% of 785 buildings): far enough from burnable vegetation to avoid flame contact, close enough for wind-blown embers. Only 40.4% sit in the Direct zone.
How Gardiner compares
Gardiner's risk sits at a similar level relative to Montana (94th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (97th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Gardiner ranks 972 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 13,767 by building count (1 is largest). Within Montana alone, it ranks 30 of 475 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Montana on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Gardiner
Gardiner's 97th-percentile, very 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
Gardiner's 59.6% 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
Gardiner's 97th-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 Gardiner, see the exposure-zones guide.