Walnut Cove, NC
Walnut Cove wildfire risk explained
USFS scores Walnut Cove at the 29th national percentile for wildfire risk to structures (close to the middle of USFS's national wildfire-risk range), a figure built from 1,224 real buildings rather than raw vegetation cover. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Walnut Cove's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 31st percentile nationally.
Where Walnut Cove's buildings actually sit
1,224 buildings are counted in Walnut Cove, and 65.3% of them sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone — flame contact, not just ember cast, is the live possibility for most of them, against 0% rated Minimal.
Where Walnut Cove ranks
Inside North Carolina, Walnut Cove sits at just the 2nd percentile even though it scores 29th nationally — the state's overall wildfire exposure is high enough to make this a relatively quiet corner of it. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Walnut Cove ranks 22,259 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 10,510 by building count (1 is largest). Within North Carolina alone, it ranks 755 of 772 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for North Carolina on its state page.
Walnut Cove and the insurance market
At the 29th national percentile, Walnut Cove rates moderate for wildfire risk — well short of the threshold where insurers have been withdrawing coverage, though comparing a quote costs nothing either way.
Hardening a home in Walnut Cove
Walnut Cove's 65.3% Direct-exposure share means lot clearing around the structure typically outweighs any single material upgrade here. The home-hardening guide ranks the options for a place shaped like this.
More on how this number was built
Walnut Cove's 29th-percentile score and its burn-probability figure both come from the same USFS workbook, documented in the methodology guide. For more on what direct exposure implies beyond Walnut Cove, see the exposure-zones guide.