St. Elmo, IL
How exposed is St. Elmo to wildfire?
St. Elmo's 927 buildings earn a 14th-percentile wildfire-risk score nationally under USFS's model — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
USFS's separate burn-probability score — fire likelihood alone, before counting what's built there — puts St. Elmo at the 14th percentile, close to its 14th-percentile risk score.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
Most of St. Elmo's buildings (83.5%) sit in the Indirect zone, where wind-blown embers rather than flame front are the mechanism USFS is scoring — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing are the interventions this pattern favors, more than defensible space alone.
St. Elmo against the rest of the country
St. Elmo's 52nd-percentile standing inside Illinois outpaces its 14th 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, St. Elmo ranks 27,001 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 12,497 by building count (1 is largest). Within Illinois alone, it ranks 697 of 1,445 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Illinois on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
St. Elmo's low rating (14th percentile nationally) sits outside the range where wildfire risk alone reshapes an insurance market — still, a homeowner here loses nothing by comparing rates.
What would actually reduce this score
Because 83.5% of St. Elmo'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.
More on how this number was built
The methodology guide shows exactly how USFS turned 927 counted buildings into the percentiles shown above for St. Elmo. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond St. Elmo, see the exposure-zones guide.