Santee, NE
How exposed is Santee to wildfire?
USFS scores Santee at the 93rd national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (in USFS's highest wildfire-risk band nationally), a figure built from 159 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Santee at the 89th national percentile — 4 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Santee's building exposure, zone by zone
50.9% of Santee's 159 buildings sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone, roughly 81 structures close enough to burnable vegetation for flame contact, not just embers — 49.1% fall in the Indirect, ember-only zone and 0% are Minimal.
Santee against the rest of the country
There's little gap between Santee's 93rd national percentile and its 99th percentile inside Nebraska, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Santee ranks 2,335 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 26,485 by building count (1 is largest). Within Nebraska alone, it ranks 6 of 583 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Nebraska on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 93rd percentile nationally, Santee carries the very high rating that has pushed some carriers to limit new business in similarly-scored places elsewhere in the country. Worth comparing quotes rather than assuming last year's renewal terms still apply.
Lowering exposure, not just insuring around it
Santee's 50.9% 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.
Where Santee's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Santee's 2,335-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Santee's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.