Selma, VA
Selma wildfire risk explained
USFS scores Selma at the 76th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (well above the national norm for wildfire risk), a figure built from 271 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Selma at the 74th national percentile — 2 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Selma's building exposure, zone by zone
87.5% of Selma's 271 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 12.6% Direct and 0% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone.
Selma against the rest of the country
Selma scores 76th nationally and 90th within Virginia — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Selma ranks 7,454 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 22,490 by building count (1 is largest). Within Virginia alone, it ranks 66 of 681 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Virginia on its state page.
Selma and the insurance market
Selma's high rating (76th 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.
What would actually reduce this score
Because 87.5% of Selma'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 Selma's figures come from
Selma's 76th-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 Selma's dominant indirect exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.