The Highs and Lows of Being a Wildland Firefighter 

United by Fire is a nine-part narrative podcast series that takes you inside the harrowing 2020 wildfire season in Colorado through the voices of those who witnessed it firsthand. Hear from firefighters and residents who found themselves in the path of the flames, as well as ecologists, land managers, community planners and entrepreneurs who are working to build a more wildfire-resilient future.  

The series is hosted by Kristan Uhlenbrock, Executive Director of the Institute for Science & Policy. For more information and resources from this episode, check out the episode summary page. Enjoy the transcript, and to listen to the audio version visit institute.dmns.org/united-by-fire. 

KRISTAN UHLENBROCK: Our hearts go out to all those affected by the L.A. fires. Please check out the podcast website for more resources and ways you can help: lawsofnotion.org. 

I hope you’ve been enjoying our latest season, United by Fire. There is much more to the topic that we didn’t get a chance to cover, but you’re in luck, as we have extended content coming to your feed, from learning about the firefighter experience to the role of Indigenous fire practice and knowledge, and much more. 

Before we jump into this episode, I want to let you know that we’ll be talking about suicide and mental health.  

Most wildland firefighters and those who work in land management easily share stories of what motivated them to get started in the first place and the turning points in their careers that shaped their trajectory. Like Fire Chief David Wolf: 

DAVID WOLF: I started in the fire service when I was 17, when I was convinced I was invincible. It was actually sort of an accident getting into it as a college student, I went to college to study environmental science and then switched into geology as my major and was looking for other things to do on the side. And I had a friend who just was in my dorm who had his EMT and said, “Hey, do you wanna come up to the fire station with me?” And so I did. I joined in 2000, went through Fire Academy, was in Fire Academy when 9/11 happened, continued volunteering through the rest of grad school through my PhD. 

KRISTAN: Or Elliot Padrick, who took a job this past summer working with the Colorado Mile High Youth Corps to do wildfire mitigation work.  

ELLIOT PADRICK: I just wanted to be outside all summer and this was a way to do that and do something that's really meaningful and impactful. I've always wanted to do wildland firefighting, and this is a great steppingstone to get there. 

KRISTAN: Or retired forest supervisor Monte Williams who remembers how a summer job in college changed his life: 

MONTE WILLIAMS: I was studying to be a mechanical engineer. I was two years in, but I was working for the Forest Service because the seasonal money at that time was, holy smokes, it was good money. And if you fought fires, you could almost pay for college that way. And it was the second season that I'd been working for the Forest Service, and I was out with a group of church kids, rebuilding an amphitheater in Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area. And I can still close my eyes as I'm doing now. And I can see the scene when I stood up and I said to myself, “What am I doing? This is what I love.”  

KRISTAN: When I picture a wildland firefighter, certain images come to mind. Someone in a yellow shirt and green pants, covered in ash and sweat, hiking up steep terrain with a heavy pack, carrying an ax or maybe a fire hoe. I imagine them working a 16-hour shift in blistering heat. Sleeping in tents, away from family for weeks. These are the people who move toward danger while the rest of us evacuate. 

But lately, fewer people are choosing this path and retention is down. Our fire season is stretching longer, the work is getting harder, and the pay often isn't enough to make ends meet. We’ve entered an era where megafires are becoming the norm rather than the exception. Where our communities need wildland firefighters now more than ever. So the question I’m left asking is not just how we fight these fires – but how do we support the people who fight them? 

This is United by Fire, a podcast exploring the hard truths about our landscapes and ourselves. I’m your host, Kristan Uhlenbrock. 

What I’ve come to realize from talking to people is that many of us have no clue what it’s actually like to be a wildland firefighter. 

MIRANDA STUART: If I try to go back to my friends in Philadelphia and explain what I'm going through, their reference is movies, unfortunately, that don't tell a fair narrative. They tell a Hollywood version. 

I'm Miranda Stewart. I'm the assistant fire management officer for the Bureau of Land Management in Medford, Oregon. 

KRISTAN: I met Miranda in 2024 at a conference called “After the Flames” in Estes Park, Colorado. She was giving a talk entitled: “Protecting Our Resources: Mental Health and Wellness After a Wildfire.” And what she had to say caught my attention.  

So late one afternoon before a group dinner, Miranda and I headed to my small cabin on the campus of YMCA of the Rockies for an interview. Sitting at a wood table, a herd of elk visible from a window, I asked her what attracted her to this line of work.  She remembered her first fire. And how it left its mark. 

MIRANDA: I can't believe I just got paid to do this. I got paid to be out here all night long on this fire and there's a camaraderie that's involved. There's a challenge that's involved… and there's an adrenaline piece... that would be false of me not to admit that. 

KRISTAN: Before Miranda spent her career working in fire, she grew up a city kid in Philadelphia. Her parents were educators and activists, who loved going to the theater.  

MIRANDA: So it's always been a running joke. I tell them they brought the wrong kid home all the time because I love to be outside. 

KRISTAN: After graduating high school, Miranda went off to college in Massachusetts.  

MIRANDA: I wanted to do something in biology, but I realized quickly that school was very large and very difficult to narrow down what I wanted to do. And I was struggling, I think as a lot of people do when they first go off their first year.  

KRISTAN: Her mom saw a program called the Student Conservation Association, which gives young people jobs, typically outdoors.  

MIRANDA: I actually don't think the pay has changed since ‘95. I got $50 a week. I got free housing. And I got whatever the cheapest form of transportation was to the west coast paid for. 

KRISTAN: That summer after her freshman year, Miranda moved across the country.  

MIRANDA: So I went out to Oregon, to a town called Chiloquin, which supposedly has a population of 500, and it has a rodeo ground across the street from the district, and that's where I got dropped. I may have cried a little bit as my dad pulled away, because I'm like, “what have I done?” And it turned out to be the absolute best move ever. 

KRISTAN: She graduated with her degree in biology and has been working in the fire world since 1995. Reflecting back on why she became a wildland firefighter, she recites a long list of positive features. 

MIRANDA: I get paid to spend two weeks in a tent, camped out, and working with people that are like-minded, and we have common goals and cohesion and humor, because that's how we survive. There's a lot to be said for that, and it does draw people in.  And it is satisfying and rewarding work… it's also challenging and it can be depressing in some aspects too. 

KRISTAN: When it comes to challenges, there are a million things that most of us might never consider. 

MIRANDA: It's a lot of hurry up and wait, so you have to be ready to go, go, go. And the idea is that you have two-hour readiness to respond. We sit around waiting for those orders to come in. Either we get a fire on our own home unit and we have to respond and be ready for it, or we are asked to respond nationally. And nationally includes response to Australia, New Zealand, and Canada.  

KRISTAN: The mental and physical preparations start even before any boots hit the ground. Wildland firefighters have to be prepared to leave quickly and be gone for several weeks at a time.  

MIRANDA: You have a weight limit in what you can pack. But there's also stuff you have to have. We have to have our fire shelter, our fire boots, our hard hats. So you're leaving a lot of the luxuries behind. 

Those of us that have been in this long enough have learned you have three pairs of pants. So it's a two-week assignment. You have a pair of pants for the first seven days. You put the second pair of pants on for the next seven days. So Fresh Pants Day is always really satisfying because one, you're in clean pants. You also know you're halfway through that assignment. You're on the downward slide to home. And then a clean pair to go home in because you don't want to offend people on a plane with how you might smell from being on a fire line for a long time... 10 days without a shower is my longest and I really hope I don't break that. 

KRISTAN: Wildland firefighters are a gritty bunch. They’re working in challenging environments. Everything is covered in ash and dirt. They’re eating whatever is provided. They’re digging fire lines, cutting down trees, hiking steep terrain. They’re trying to protect homes and communities. It’s not only physically demanding work but also high risk.  

MIRANDA: The end goal for any assignment is that everybody goes home and that's what matters. It's hard to balance that sometimes when we have communities that are on fire and we're working hard to protect them and we're pulling really long hours and we feel indebted to stay. But we have to go home at some point. We have to rest and recover because it impacts our wellness, our mental wellness, our resilience, our health, our physical health, and our safety, which is key. If we're not at our peak, then it impacts our ability to think clearly, to react quickly, to see big picture, and that impacts our safety. 

KRISTAN: Miranda acknowledges that it takes a certain type of person to be a wildland firefighter. And sometimes a trait that can make someone good for this job can have a flip side.  

MIRANDA: Ego is part of fire. It's what partly makes us good at our jobs, because it gives us the confidence to do that job and to act decisively and to accept that there are levels of risk we have to face, but at the same time, it can push too hard and it can push people away. 

KRISTAN: Recruitment and retention is a serious and growing challenge in the wildland fire community.   

MIRANDA: We have stations that have had to just park engines because they weren't able to hire enough people to even staff them. We are struggling to fill upper-level positions. We're struggling to recruit. And there's a lot of factors I think that play into that. You have a generation that's coming up that's way more interested in positions that look at technology and AI and being in those industries and not so much being outside. And there used to be a lot of security and comfort in being in government jobs and some of those securities have gone away and so it's not as attractive. 

KRISTAN: Another recruitment barrier is that becoming a wildland firefighter does not necessarily mean you get a full-time job. Currently about a third are hired on a seasonal basis. 

MIRANDA: There's three types of positions you can be hired for. So you could be a seasonal, which means you work for six months. You could be a permanent seasonal, which means you get benefits, but you still only work six months out of the year, but you're guaranteed to come back to that job. You can maintain your benefits during the time that you're laid off or furloughed, as we call it. And then we have permanency, full time, and they're all year round. 

KRISTAN: And then there is the pay. Entry-level wages are about $15/hr. And while there has been recent bipartisan political action to increase that pay through a retention bonus, a permanent pay increase is still in limbo with the new Congress and Administration. The seasonality, low pay... these are compounding factors for another major challenge facing the wildland fire community. 

MIRANDA: So housing is one of the biggest struggles we have for recruiting people.  

KRISTAN: Firefighters might find themselves stationed in an expensive tourist town struggling to find a place they can afford. Other times they might be in a remote location, like a National Park or on public lands where the government housing is very limited. The lack of affordable housing can create uncertainty and immeasurable stress. 

MIRANDA: We have firefighters living out of their cars, so by the end of the season, that can really have strained them and worn them down. 

KRISTAN: The physical and emotional demands of fighting fires extend long after the flames are out. Wildland firefighters have an increased risk of lung cancer and cardiovascular disease because of being exposed to smoke and other carcinogens.  

MIRANDA: We don't wear the protective gear that structure firefighters wear. So all of those toxins that are coming off of a house burning, we don't have anything that's protecting us from inhaling that smoke.  

KRISTAN: Research specific to the health impacts on wildland firefighters has been limited, but Miranda acknowledges that there are programs and people trying to address this. For example, in 2022, Congress expanded access for more illnesses that qualify under a workers’ comp claim.  

MIRANDA: So we can get coverage for PTSD now. We can get coverage for a lot of types of cancer. Which is huge because cancer is a very significant impact. I have lost so many friends to cancer, and it's a reality, and it's getting worse as we have more urban interface because of the carcinogens and toxins.  

KRISTAN: And while this added coverage was a good step forward, Miranda saw a glaring omission.  

MIRANDA: But when they came out with that list, in addition to, you know, lung cancer, they had prostate and testicular cancer. So I sent this list around to a random selection of men and women in fire and said, “what's missing?” And nobody, not even the women, saw it, but there was nothing in there for breast cancer, ovarian, or uterine cancer. So those are the things that send loud messages to women. And it's like, “okay, I guess I'm not valued,” whether or not that's the message that was intended to be sent.  

KRISTAN: And it’s not just the policies that can make women feel unseen, but their experience in general can feel unwelcoming.     

MIRANDA: I had a position where every single day, my boss said, “Women don't belong in fire. They belong home, barefoot and pregnant.” 

KRISTAN: These types of experiences can not only push women to leave the field but also create challenges for recruitment. Currently, women make up around 10-15% of the wildland fire crew. Miranda acknowledges that the culture has been changing to be more inclusive, and points to some of her own experiences throughout her career.  

MIRANDA: I have been blessed to have some incredible male mentors. And I do fear that we overlook the strong, good, positive male mentors we have in this workforce  because they're the reason I have gotten where I am in my career, choosing to select me for a position, not because I'm a female, because they really felt I was the right person for it and pushing me to learn and to think outside the box. 

KRISTAN: As the severity of wildfire increases across the U.S., the pressure on those who currently serve is even greater. Which is one reason why Miranda is speaking up. She wants to improve the field for her colleagues, from the physical health threats to the mental health challenges that have historically gone unspoken. 

MIRANDA: High divorce rates, high suicide rates, high substance and alcohol abuse, unfortunately, have accompanied the first responder world and are not unique to the wildland firefighter community, but they exist there just as much.   

KRISTAN: Part of the reason can be the on and off nature of the job, which not only makes them ineligible for mental health services in the off-season, but also, they lose their connection to others that understand what they just went through. 

MIRANDA: As a seasonal, you get cut off. Like at the end of the season, "Thanks for being here. You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here."

KRISTAN: And sometimes these firefighters are members of the community they are deployed to protect, adding to the emotional burden when a fire whips through.  

MIRANDA: Beloved places that are dear to us, where we may have grown up or hiked with our dad. So when those fires come through and they're devastating, it takes a toll, and whether we recognize it or not, it becomes very personal. It can, for many of us, feel like a failure. And to have to have that reminder, because we live in this community now, and we're facing these blackened trees, and these lost areas, and these communities that burned, it's taxing. 

KRISTAN: But the first step in addressing these issues is talking about them openly to reduce the stigma.  

MIRANDA: I am encouraged by the conversations and this increase of acknowledgement of mental health. The younger generation of firefighters that we hire are actually great in that respect because it is part of their normal conversations. They grew up with a much more open conversation about mental health. Seeing a clinician, a therapist, is as normal to them as going to their dentist. And that's how it should be for all of us. You do still have a generation that is not as open to that, but there's a lot of work being done to close that gap to give tools that are easier to use for folks that are not comfortable talking about mental health, to help them identify within themselves and within their crews when they may be experiencing something. 

KRISTAN: The mental health support for wildland firefighters has evolved. From something that was piecemeal years ago to a growing call to action in recent years that’s driving change – like creating new programs with dedicated staff and resources. People recognize that a one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work. So agencies are adapting their methods to meet firefighters where they are - both physically and emotionally.  

MIRANDA: We've really changed how we respond to a critical incident. We don't pull them off the fire line anymore and stick them in a windowless hotel room. We look to meet them where they're comfortable. And that might mean we need to find a clinician that's willing to hike up the mountain and spend a couple nights sleeping out in a tent with that crew where they're comfortable because then they're going to build that trust, they're going to open up to you, they're going to talk to you. And that's been a game changer. And it has helped some of those folks that were resistant to mental health shift their perspective about it. 

KRISTAN: To help make mental health conversations more approachable, the community has developed a straightforward way to check in. It's a color-coded system that allows firefighters to communicate their mental state without having to dive into complex emotional territory. Think of it like a weather warning system, but for mental wellbeing. 

MIRANDA: We use what's called the continuum spectrum. So we break it down into four easy colors for you to identify where you're at. So you don't have to get emotional and touchy feely, which firefighters are just not really good at usually or comfortable with, but it's green, yellow, orange, red. Green is where you want to be. You're not always going to be there. Red is that high level you know, intervention point. And the reality is we're going to fluctuate across that spectrum.  

And if we see our comrades exhibiting the signs that are putting them in orange and red, we have to be able to speak up. It's as simple as being a leader and saying, "Guys, we've been burning for three weeks straight. We haven't had any days off. We lost a burn yesterday, even though we did a great job of catching it. And I know that personally, I'm tired and I'm finding myself in the orange. Where are you guys?"

And just letting them take that pulse of color, it's an easier conversation than some of the more emotional words that you would normally use for mental health and teaching leadership to say, "We need a day off and this is what I need to get back to green. I need to take a day, take my kids and go fishing, and that's going to help me to reset so that I can be in my best state to come back to this again." 

KRISTAN: According to research from the U.S. Fire Administration, first responders are more likely to die by suicide than in the line of duty. One recent study of 246 wildland firefighters found that 22% reported a history of at least one suicide attempt, and 36% reported current suicidal ideation. And much of it is associated with PTSD symptoms. It's a sobering statistic that underscores why mental health awareness and peer support are so critical. This is why Miranda and her colleagues are working to create an environment where checking in on their crew member's mental health is as normal as checking their equipment. But changing deeply ingrained cultural attitudes takes time and persistent effort. 

MIRANDA: It's a spectrum of understanding how to talk to each other, how to recognize the signs within ourselves. It's knowing that there's that coworker that's always bubbly and happy and outgoing. The person that never stops talking and it annoys you maybe, but you suddenly realize that they're withdrawing and they're not speaking up and they're not as bubbly and they're not coming in with their dumb jokes all the time. And so that's that recognition: something is changing. And you don't have to get in the weeds of knowing what it is, but being able to say to them, “I see this change in you and I'm here as your peer if you want to talk about it.” 

So we're teaching our firefighters to have those conversations, to lean in on each other, to remove the stigma. We have to recognize that we have, unfortunately, a high rate of death by suicide. And we're never going to get to zero, but if we don't do something those numbers are not going to come down, and they need to come down. 

KRISTAN: One of the biggest requests I’ve heard from the fire community is for more recognition and consistent support from the top.  

MIRANDA: This is about doing what's right and supporting with a consistent budget for these programs, allowing it to be at the field level where they get to make the decisions because they know their people and not at higher levels. I admire the work that's done at the higher levels. I worked at the higher levels, but I also know that there is a disconnect to what the field feels they need. We can't always dictate that. So, finding that happy medium for how do we centralize some of the programs that are of value, but we give that freedom to the field units to do what they feel is right to support their folks and have the resources they need. What we can control is the resources we give to these folks to support them better in their jobs, be it nutrition, fitness management, mental health resources, that whole picture of wellness so that they can function, they can come home at night to their families and continue to come back. 

Because I've seen the impacts to my friends, my coworkers, because I've dealt with death by suicide in my own family, and I know that not talking about these things, it doesn't lead to a positive outcome. If we don't fight for what's right, we are going to lose some of the best people we have. We're going to lose some because they retire, some because they take new jobs, but tragically we're going to lose some because that's the outcome they feel is all that's left for them is death by suicide. 

KRISTAN: Breaking the stigma of mental health takes time. But signs of progress keep Miranda going.  

MIRANDA:  I've just had moments in working with people that I thought would never embrace or open up to mental health approach me and open up about what they didn't know about themselves until they heard it. So just getting the word out to these folks, letting them know you're not alone. It's okay to not be okay.  I would love to see us get to no deaths by suicide, but if we can at least not have nine in a four-month period, that's a big change. We can do better. We need to do better. We're behind the curve and I think we will be for a long time. 

KRISTAN: For wildland firefighters, one of the unnerving things that some face is retirement. Retirement isn't just about leaving a job - it can be a loss of an identity. After feeling that sense of purpose, of doing an intense job, of being part of a tight-knit community, the prospect of walking away can be daunting.  

MIRANDA: For the federal firefighters, it is mandatory at 57. We know this coming in, but I cannot tell you how many of them I see approaching 57 and they are terrified, absolutely terrified to retire because they have done nothing but commit their entire life to fire. And we have not supported them to teach them how to have that life outside of fire, how to engage back in your hobbies, your families, your friends, your spiritual connections, whatever's important to you. And so at 57, on your birthday, you're done in fire full time. You can take another job. You can go be in maintenance or you can go be a superintendent or a chief of resources or a wildlife biologist. But their hearts are in fire, and that's where they want to be. And they don't know how to disengage from that.  

KRISTAN: Miranda is also facing her own questions about what she wants to be doing after spending almost 30 years in the fire community, including in this newer role with the Bureau of Land Management.    

MIRANDA: I told them I would give them three years. They said, "Give us at least 18 months." I'm like, "Okay, there's a happy medium in there somewhere." But I was transparent that if they're hiring me now thinking I'm staying until I'm 57, I'm not. I want to be able to exit while I'm still in a good place with the work that I do, that I'm still physically and mentally able to do something else. A lot of people think that I'm going to leave fire and still stay in fire, and I say I would be very surprised if that's true. I may go work in a vineyard and enjoy social interactions with people there, or go work on a farm, or maybe finally learn to grow flowers and not kill them all. Who knows?  

KRISTAN: The wildfire landscape is transforming before our eyes. Fire seasons now stretch nearly three months longer than they did in the 1980s, and more people are building homes in fire-prone areas. Add in climate change and persistent drought, and we're facing fires that burn hotter, spread faster, and grow bigger than ever before. It's a perfect storm that puts unprecedented pressure on our firefighters. But even as the demands on firefighters continue to mount, there's still something that calls people to this line of work. And Miranda hopes that new people will find their way to fire.    

MIRANDA: These fires, these seasons, they're draining all of us and I don't know that I would wish this on a new firefighter, but at the same time, I don't want you to miss out on the amazing opportunities. You get to be in places a lot of human beings don't go to, like parts of national parks that are not open to the public or areas of the forests that don't have trails and so people don't have access to them and incredible adventures you're not going to get in social media and on a TV. 

KRISTAN: For Miranda, the sense of purpose, of service, of the experiences that come from working as a wildland firefighter go beyond the personal to something that is more fundamental – it’s caring about people.  

MIRANDA: I don't care if you're the poorest house out there or the richest house out there. There's no boundaries like that. And that's important to let these communities know that. When you get to drive through town and see those signs that the kids have made that say, "thank you, firefighters," it's hard to put words to what that kind of feeling is... it’s very gratifying. 

KRISTAN: The career of a wildland firefighter means a journey of intense ups and downs. The physical and emotional toll is undeniable and ripples through their lives. Yet in my conversations with firefighters and leaders like Miranda, I hear determination alongside the struggle. I see a workforce evolving - not just in how they fight fires, but in how they care for each other. 

These changes matter because wildfires are changing. And when we support our firefighters, we strengthen our entire community's resilience to face whatever challenges lie ahead. 

Credits 

KRISTAN: Laws of Notion is a production of the Institute for Science and Policy at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. I’m your host Kristan Uhlenbrock. This episode was produced by me and Tricia Waddell with support from Carson Frame and Jordan Marks. Fact-checking by Kate Long. Sound design by Seth Samuel. Original music by Ryan Flores and additional tracks by Epidemic Sounds. For a full list of credits, check out the show notes.  

To listen to the audio version, or for more information and additional resources on wildfires in Colorado, please visit institute.dmns.org/united-by-fire.

Check out all the seasons of the Laws of Notion podcast at lawsofnotion.org. 

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