Also called: Wildland Fire Chief, Incident Commander
Leads the wildfire program for a national forest or park: crews, budgets, prescribed burns, and big fire responses.
In the off-season you plan prescribed burns and train crews. When a big fire starts, you might take command of hundreds of firefighters, aircraft, and bulldozers, making life-or-death decisions about where to hold the line and when to evacuate towns.
Federal GS pay plus overtime and hazard pay during fire season.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
Bachelor's degree (4-year), about 4 years after high school. Usually 10-20 years of fire experience climbing the qualification ladder; a degree in forestry or fire science is common.
Ways in: On-the-job training, 4-year college, Certification. Training cost: Get paid while you train.
Majors to look at: Fire Science, Forestry, Natural Resource Management.
Growing faster than average. Wildfire seasons are longer and federal fire workforces are being reorganized.
Low risk for 10 years. AI fire-spread models and satellite detection inform plans; leading crews, prescribed burns and incident calls stay human.
Classes: Earth science, Biology, Speech.
Official data: O*NET occupation 33-1021.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.