Megargel, AL
Megargel wildfire risk explained
USFS scores Megargel at the 75th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (well above the national norm for wildfire risk), a figure built from 64 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Megargel's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 75th percentile nationally.
Megargel's building exposure, zone by zone
64 buildings are counted in Megargel, and 56.3% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 43.8% in Direct exposure or the 0% rated Minimal.
How Megargel compares
Megargel's 75th national percentile looks worse in isolation than its 60th ranking inside Alabama does — this place is on the milder end for its own state, by 15 points. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Megargel ranks 7,744 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 30,487 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alabama alone, it ranks 235 of 592 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alabama on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Megargel
Megargel's high rating (75th percentile) puts it among the places where the national carrier-pullback trend is most relevant — not a guarantee of a coverage problem, but a reason to shop rather than assume.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Because 56.3% of Megargel's buildings sit in the Indirect zone, sealing the ember pathway (vents, roofing, gutters) is the intervention this page's data actually supports — see the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Megargel's 75th-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 Megargel, see the exposure-zones guide.