Thornton, IA
How exposed is Thornton to wildfire?
Thornton sits at the 7th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — among the lower wildfire-risk places nationally — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 317 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Fire likelihood alone (USFS's burn-probability figure) ranks Thornton at the 6th national percentile — 1 points below its risk-to-structures score, a gap driven by how much is actually built there.
Thornton's building exposure, zone by zone
Most of Thornton's buildings (88.6% of 317) fall outside USFS's Direct and Indirect zones entirely — that doesn't zero out the score above, it means the risk is regional, not structure-by-structure.
Thornton against the rest of the country
Thornton scores 7th nationally and 15th within Iowa — close enough that its state context doesn't change the picture the national number already gives. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Thornton ranks 29,344 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 21,179 by building count (1 is largest). Within Iowa alone, it ranks 865 of 1,017 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Iowa on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
At the 7th national percentile, Thornton rates low 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
Thornton's 88.6% Minimal-exposure share means structure-level hardening matters less here than it would elsewhere — still worth the low-cost basics, per the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Thornton's 29,344-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what minimal exposure implies beyond Thornton, see the exposure-zones guide.