Palmer, IL
Palmer, IL's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
USFS scores Palmer at the 19th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally), a figure built from 194 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Palmer's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 19th percentile nationally.
Palmer's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Palmer's buildings (88.1%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
How Palmer compares
Within Illinois, Palmer ranks higher (60th percentile) than it does nationally (19th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Palmer ranks 25,518 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 25,065 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 579 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
Palmer and the insurance market
Palmer's low rating (19th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
Hardening a home in Palmer
Because 88.1% of Palmer'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
Palmer's 19th-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 Palmer, see the exposure-zones guide.