Riverbend, MT
How exposed is Riverbend to wildfire?
Riverbend's 410 buildings earn a 94th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Riverbend's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 92nd percentile nationally.
Where Riverbend's buildings actually sit
98.8% of Riverbend's 410 buildings sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone, roughly 405 structures close enough to burnable vegetation for flame contact, not just embers — 1.2% fall in the Indirect, ember-only zone and 0% are Minimal.
How Riverbend compares
Riverbend's risk sits at a similar level relative to Montana (86th percentile statewide) as it does nationally (94th) — this place isn't unusual for its own state either way. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Riverbend ranks 1,862 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 19,031 by building count (1 is largest). Within Montana alone, it ranks 69 of 475 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Montana on its state page.
Riverbend and the insurance market
Riverbend's 94th-percentile, very high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
Hardening a home in Riverbend
Riverbend's 98.8% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 410 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for Riverbend. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Riverbend, see the exposure-zones guide.