Scientists and staff who work at volcanoes, inside storms, deep in caves, and at the bottom of the world.
Top pay: highest pay, longest training
Hurricane Hunter Pilot: Flies airplanes straight into hurricanes to collect data for forecasts. Typical pay $120k.
Mid pay: solid pay, degree or apprenticeship
Volcanologist: Studies volcanoes, how they erupt, and how to warn people before they do. Typical pay $100k.
Seismologist: Studies earthquakes and the vibrations that travel through the Earth. Typical pay $105k.
Glaciologist: Studies glaciers and ice sheets and how fast they are melting. Typical pay $95k.
Astrobiologist: Searches for life beyond Earth by studying extreme life here and on other planets. Typical pay $105k.
Severe Storms Research Scientist: Studies tornadoes and severe thunderstorms, often by intercepting them with mobile radar. Typical pay $100k.
Flight Meteorologist: Rides along on hurricane hunter planes, directing the flight and analyzing the storm in real time. Typical pay $95k.
Space Weather Forecaster: Forecasts solar storms that can knock out satellites, GPS, and power grids. Typical pay $100k.
Avalanche Forecaster: Predicts avalanches in the mountains and sometimes triggers them on purpose with explosives. Typical pay $62k.
Cave Scientist (Speleologist): Explores and studies caves, their formations, water, and strange creatures. Typical pay $72k.
Antarctic Research Associate: Keeps science experiments running in Antarctica, sometimes through a dark winter at the South Pole. Typical pay $62k.
Ice Core Driller: Drills deep into ice sheets to pull up ice that records hundreds of thousands of years of climate. Typical pay $65k.
Polar Field Camp Manager: Runs the tent camps where scientists live and work deep in Antarctica or Greenland. Typical pay $70k.
Lightning Scientist: Studies lightning, including how it starts, how to predict it, and strange cousins like sprites and jets high above storms. Typical pay $99k.
Permafrost Scientist: Studies frozen ground in the Arctic and how its thawing releases carbon, sinks roads, and reshapes landscapes. Typical pay $102k.
Deep Underground Lab Technician: Works nearly a mile underground in a former gold mine that now hosts physics experiments hunting for dark matter and neutrinos. Typical pay $55k.
Disaster Test Lab Technician: Builds full-size houses and walls, then helps blast them with hurricane winds or shake them on giant earthquake tables. Typical pay $62k.
Undersea Habitat Technician: Lives and works inside Aquarius, the world’s only undersea research lab, keeping scientists safe 60 feet down off Key Largo. Typical pay $58k.
Surf Forecaster: Predicts the size and timing of waves at beaches using storm maps, buoy data and wave models, so surfers know when to go. Typical pay $65k.
Starter: fastest way in
Storm Chaser: Drives across the Great Plains to find and film tornadoes and severe storms. Typical pay $45k.
Meteorite Hunter: Searches deserts and fields for space rocks to sell to museums and collectors. Typical pay $38k.
Antarctic Station Support Worker: Does everyday jobs like shoveling, cooking, cleaning, and cargo handling at research stations in Antarctica. Typical pay $45k.
Mountain Weather Observer: Lives on top of a mountain recording some of the worst weather on Earth. Typical pay $40k.
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.