Summersville, WV
Summersville wildfire risk explained
Summersville sits at the 76th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 2,001 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Summersville at the 77th national percentile — 1 points above its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
62.7% of Summersville's 2,001 buildings fall in USFS's Indirect exposure zone — ember cast rather than direct flame — against 37.3% Direct and 0% Minimal. Vent screens and roofing material matter more here than lot clearing alone.
Summersville against the rest of the country
There's little gap between Summersville's 76th national percentile and its 69th percentile inside West Virginia, which means the state comparison mostly confirms what the national score already shows. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Summersville ranks 7,707 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 7,477 by building count (1 is largest). Within West Virginia alone, it ranks 133 of 429 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for West Virginia on its state page.
Summersville and the insurance market
Summersville's 76th-percentile, high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
Hardening a home in Summersville
Summersville's 62.7% Indirect-exposure share points at embers, not flame contact, as the main pathway — ember-resistant vents and non-combustible roofing rank ahead of defensible space here. Detail in the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Summersville's 76th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what indirect exposure implies beyond Summersville, see the exposure-zones guide.