Scales Mound, IL
How exposed is Scales Mound to wildfire?
USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model puts Scales Mound at the 24th national percentile for risk to structures, close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — a score built from 300 actual buildings. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Scales Mound's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 25th percentile nationally.
Where Scales Mound's buildings actually sit
Indirect exposure is dominant in Scales Mound (88.7% of 300 buildings): far enough from burnable vegetation to avoid flame contact, close enough for wind-blown embers. Only 10.3% sit in the Direct zone.
How Scales Mound compares
Compare Scales Mound's two percentiles: 69th within Illinois, only 24th nationally — a gap of 45 points that marks it as unusually exposed for its own state. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Scales Mound ranks 23,981 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 21,628 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 449 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
Shopping for coverage in Scales Mound
At the 24th national percentile, Scales Mound rates moderate for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
What would actually reduce this score
Because 88.7% of Scales Mound'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.
Where Scales Mound's figures come from
Scales Mound's 24th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Scales Mound's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.