Melville, LA
How exposed is Melville to wildfire?
Melville's 809 buildings earn a 14th-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, Melville's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 14th percentile nationally.
Melville's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS puts 68.2% of Melville's 809 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 30.5% Direct and 1.2% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
How Melville compares
Melville scores 14th nationally and 10th within Louisiana — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Melville ranks 27,164 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 13,559 by building count (1 is largest). Within Louisiana alone, it ranks 440 of 488 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Louisiana on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Melville's low wildfire rating (14th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
What would actually reduce this score
Melville's 68.2% 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.
Where Melville's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Melville's 27,164-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Melville's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.