Vale Summit, MD
Vale Summit, MD's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Vale Summit sits at the 58th percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — modestly above the national average for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 95 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 Vale Summit at the 55th percentile, close to its 58th-percentile risk score.
Vale Summit's building exposure, zone by zone
100% of Vale Summit's 95 buildings sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone, roughly 95 structures close enough to burnable vegetation for flame contact, not just embers — 0% fall in the Indirect, ember-only zone and 0% are Minimal.
Vale Summit against the rest of the country
Within Maryland, Vale Summit ranks higher (84th percentile) than it does nationally (58th) — one of the more fire-exposed places in a state that, overall, scores lower than that. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Vale Summit ranks 13,112 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 29,268 by building count (1 is largest). Within Maryland alone, it ranks 90 of 527 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Maryland on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Vale Summit's elevated wildfire rating (58th 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.
Hardening a home in Vale Summit
With 100% of Vale Summit in Direct exposure, defensible-space clearing and ember-resistant construction (vents, Class-A roofing) address the exposure this page's own numbers describe, not a generic checklist. See the home-hardening guide.
More on how this number was built
Every one of the two percentiles behind Vale Summit's 13,112-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Vale Summit, see the exposure-zones guide.