North East, MD
North East wildfire risk explained
North East sits at the 34th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 1,312 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts North East at the 33rd percentile, close to its 34th-percentile risk score.
North East's building exposure, zone by zone
USFS puts 70% of North East's 1,312 buildings in the Indirect exposure zone, versus 29.7% Direct and 0.4% Minimal — a place where the fire doesn't need to reach the structure directly for embers to.
North East against the rest of the country
North East's 52nd-percentile standing inside Maryland outpaces its 34th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, North East ranks 20,732 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 10,011 by building count (1 is largest). Within Maryland alone, it ranks 254 of 527 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Maryland on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
North East's moderate rating (34th 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
Because 70% of North East'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
Every one of the two percentiles behind North East's 20,732-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond North East, see the exposure-zones guide.