Sherman, IL
Sherman, IL's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Sherman sits at the 26th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 1,843 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts Sherman at the 27th percentile, close to its 26th-percentile risk score.
Sherman's building exposure, zone by zone
1,843 buildings are counted in Sherman, and 77.1% of them are Indirect exposure — ember-driven risk rather than the 14.7% in Direct exposure or the 8.2% rated Minimal.
How Sherman compares
Sherman's 72nd-percentile standing inside Illinois outpaces its 26th national percentile — this is a hotter spot than most of its own state, even though the state as a whole runs cooler nationally. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Sherman ranks 23,410 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 7,934 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 400 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
Sherman and the insurance market
Sherman's moderate wildfire rating (26th percentile) isn't the kind of score driving the carrier pullback making news in the highest-risk Western markets — but a standard homeowners quote is still worth comparing on its own terms.
What would actually reduce this score
With ember exposure the dominant pattern in Sherman (77.1% Indirect), vent screens and roofing material tend to matter more than lot clearing alone. The home-hardening guide covers both.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Sherman's 23,410-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Sherman, see the exposure-zones guide.