Nelson, IL
Nelson wildfire risk explained
Nelson sits at the 6th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 104 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Nelson at the 5th national percentile — 0 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Where Nelson's buildings actually sit
USFS classifies 82.7% of Nelson's buildings as Minimal exposure, the largest of the three zones here by a wide margin over 17.3% Direct and 0% Indirect — a landscape-level risk rather than a building-by-building one.
How Nelson compares
Compare Nelson's two percentiles: 30th within Illinois, only 6th nationally — a gap of 25 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Nelson ranks 29,774 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 28,840 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 1,009 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Nelson
Nelson's low rating (6th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
With 82.7% of buildings rated Minimal exposure, Nelson gets less benefit from structure hardening than a Direct- or Indirect-dominant place would — the home-hardening guide explains why the zone matters.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Nelson's 29,774-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Nelson, see the exposure-zones guide.