Saltville, VA
How exposed is Saltville to wildfire?
USFS scores Saltville at the 77th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (well above the national norm for wildfire risk), a figure built from 1,192 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Saltville at the 79th national percentile — 2 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
1,192 buildings are counted in Saltville, and 71.2% of them sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone — flame contact, not just ember cast, is the live possibility for most of them, against 0% rated Minimal.
Where Saltville ranks
There's little gap between Saltville's 77th national percentile and its 91st percentile inside Virginia, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Saltville ranks 7,295 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 10,698 by building count (1 is largest). Within Virginia alone, it ranks 64 of 681 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Virginia on its state page.
Saltville and the insurance market
Saltville's high rating (77th percentile) puts it among the places where the national carrier-pullback trend is most relevant — not a guarantee of a coverage problem, but a reason to shop rather than assume.
Hardening a home in Saltville
Because Direct exposure dominates in Saltville (71.2%), the highest-leverage fix is defensible space, not roofing or vents alone — covered in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Saltville's 7,295-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Saltville, see the exposure-zones guide.