How Much Do Wildland Firefighters Make? 2026 Pay by Grade, Overtime and Hazard Pay

Searches for “firefighter jobs” mix city fire departments with wildland fire. This page is about wildland fire: the federal crews of the Forest Service and the Interior Department, state forestry agencies, and private contract crews. A wildland firefighter’s pay has four parts: base pay, overtime, hazard pay and, for federal employees, a daily incident premium. Base pay is predictable. The rest depends on how busy the fire year is.

How much do federal wildland firefighters make in 2026?

An entry-level federal wildland firefighter earns $21.14 an hour in the Rest of U.S. pay area in 2026, before overtime and premiums. The Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025, which Congress passed on March 14 and the President signed on March 15, 2025, created permanent special base rates for wildland firefighters at all levels, including temporary and seasonal employees, and replaced the temporary supplement they had received for four years (U.S. Department of the Interior, Mar 15, 2025).

The law, codified at 5 U.S.C. 5332a, raises the General Schedule base rate by 42 percent at GS-1, 36 percent at GS-3, 33 percent at GS-4, 30 percent at GS-5, 27 percent at GS-6 and 24 percent at GS-7, tapering to 1.5 percent at GS-15. The special rate counts as basic pay for all purposes, including locality pay, and the Forest Service told employees it counts toward retirement, which the old supplement did not. OPM publishes the result as the GW tables. Federal firefighting jobs are now posted in the 0456 Wildland Fire Management series with “GW” in the grade.

Grade (2026, step 1)	GW base, hourly	Rest of U.S., hourly	Rest of U.S., annual	Los Angeles, hourly	Alaska, hourly
GW-3	$18.06	$21.14	$44,112	$24.64	$23.90
GW-4	$19.82	$23.20	$48,424	$27.05	$26.24
GW-5	$21.68	$25.37	$52,957	$29.58	$28.69
GW-6	$23.61	$27.63	$57,670	$32.21	$31.24
GW-7	$25.61	$29.98	$62,570	$34.95	$33.90
GW-8	$27.68	$32.40	$67,617	$37.77	$36.63

Source: OPM 2026 Wildland Firefighter (GW) salary tables, which include the 1 percent January 2026 raise. Rest of U.S. locality is 17.06 percent, Los Angeles 36.47 percent and Alaska 32.36 percent. Accessed Sep 13, 2026.

For comparison, a non-fire GS-3 on the regular 2026 Rest of U.S. table earns $15.54 an hour. The permanent Fire Hire announcement for 2027, 27-FIRE-P1R14610, lists GW-3 and GW-4 firefighter pay of $44,112 to $68,844 a year. GW-3 and GW-4 are entry and second-season grades; see wildland firefighter jobs for crew types and how to get hired.

How does overtime work for wildland firefighters?

Overtime is paid at one and a half times your hourly rate for hours ordered or approved beyond 8 in a day or 40 in a workweek. OPM’s rule is that employees whose basic pay is at or below GS-10, step 1, get their hourly rate times 1.5, which covers every entry grade (OPM, Overtime Pay, Title 5, accessed Sep 13, 2026). OPM’s hourly GW table lists the overtime rate for each step: $31.71 at GW-3, $34.80 at GW-4 and $38.06 at GW-5, step 1, in the Rest of U.S. If your job is nonexempt under the Fair Labor Standards Act, OPM notes that FLSA overtime is computed under separate rules, so your exact rate can differ slightly.

Overtime is where season pay grows. The 2025 law did not change overtime or hazard pay, but the Forest Service told employees that overtime rates rise automatically because they are figured on the higher base rate. Fire assignments run long: Colorado’s state fire agency tells applicants to expect shifts of up to 16 hours a day on assignments of two weeks or longer. A slow fire year means few overtime hours, and nobody can promise a number in advance.

When do wildland firefighters get hazard pay?

Federal firefighters get a 25 percent hazard pay differential when they work on the fireline of a wildfire, and from September 14, 2026 on prescribed fires too. OPM’s schedule of hazard pay differentials lists 25 percent for “participating as a member of a firefighting crew in fighting forest and range fires on the fireline” (5 CFR Part 550, Appendix A). The differential is paid for all hours in pay status on the day you do the hazardous work, not only the hours on the line (5 CFR 550.905).

Until now, prescribed burns did not qualify. On August 14, 2026 OPM published a final rule adding a 25 percent differential for crew members “on the fireline directly involving the implementation and control” of prescribed fires, effective September 14, 2026 and applying from the first pay period that begins on or after that date. It covers GW firefighters and wage-grade employees. OPM named ignition, holding, patrol, mop-up, line construction and snag felling as the hazardous work; pre-ignition preparation is not covered. OPM estimated about 10,000 GS and 2,500 wage-grade employees at USDA and Interior could be affected, and the Forest Service based its $20 million fiscal 2026 cost estimate on about 250 hours of prescribed fire work per employee (Federal Register, Aug 14, 2026).

What is Incident Response Premium Pay?

Incident Response Premium Pay is a flat daily bonus for federal employees deployed to a qualifying fire: 450 percent of your hourly rate of basic pay for each qualifying day, capped at $9,000 in a calendar year (5 U.S.C. 5545c). It was created by the same 2025 law and applies to Forest Service and Interior wildland firefighters plus other employees certified for incident duties, including militia.

• Qualifying incidents: wildfires, prescribed fires and severity assignments, where crews are pre-positioned in high-risk areas. An initial response to a fire that is contained within 36 hours does not qualify.
• Location: the deployment must be outside your official duty station, or inside it while you are assigned to a fire camp or other designated field location.
• How it is paid: Interior’s field guide says the rate uses your hourly pay including locality, any part of an eligible day earns the full daily amount, two incidents in one day still pay once, and travel days to and from a qualifying incident count.
• Limits: the daily rate cannot exceed the rate for GS-10, step 10. The premium is not basic pay for any purpose, so it does not count toward retirement or annual leave payouts, and it is left out of FLSA overtime calculations.
• Who is excluded: administratively determined (AD) emergency hires, who are not federal employees, and contract crews, because the law covers only Forest Service and Interior employees.

Source: Department of the Interior, Wildfire Incident Response Premium Pay: An Implementation and Field Guide, June 2025. Interior describes rest and recuperation leave after assignments as often three days; premium pay continues during R&R only if you stay on an approved extension away from home.

How does a fire season’s pay add up?

Add the pieces day by day. Here is one 16-hour fireline shift on a qualifying incident for a GW-3, step 1, in the Rest of U.S., using OPM’s published rates. This is our arithmetic, not an agency figure, and it assumes title 5 overtime rates.

Pay item	Rule	Math	Amount
Base	First 8 hours at $21.14	8 × $21.14	$169.12
Overtime	Next 8 hours at $31.71	8 × $31.71	$253.68
Hazard pay	25% of hourly rate for 16 hours in pay status	16 × $5.285	$84.56
Incident Response Premium Pay	4.5 × hourly rate, once a day	4.5 × $21.14	$95.13
Total for the day			$602.49

Sources: OPM 2026 RUS (GW) hourly table; 5 CFR 550.905 and Appendix A; 5 U.S.C. 5545c. Accessed Sep 13, 2026.

At that grade the $9,000 premium cap is reached after about 95 qualifying days ($9,000 divided by $95.13). Days at the station, training days and short initial attack fires earn base pay and any overtime, but no premium. That is why two firefighters on the same crew can finish a season with very different totals: one year may bring months of assignments, another only a few.

Staffing is up. The Forest Service’s goal for 2026 was 11,300 wildland firefighters at GS-9 and below on board by mid-July, and on August 17, 2026 it reported 11,745, or 105 percent of the goal (Forest Service, Wildland Firefighting Workforce, accessed Sep 13, 2026). Interior’s crews now sit in the U.S. Wildland Fire Service, which the department established on January 12, 2026. Compare other outdoor pay on our pay report.

What do state wildland fire agencies pay?

State fire pay is set by each state’s own salary tables, and these are the figures the agencies publish for entry and near-entry jobs.

Agency	Job	Published pay	Season and hiring
CAL FIRE	Fire Fighter I (seasonal)	$4,296 to $5,432 a month base, plus $1,460 to $1,846 Extended Duty Week Compensation every 4 weeks; $52,900 to $66,889 total	Up to 9 months. Applications Nov 1 to 30, with possible later cutoffs; hiring can start in January
Oregon Dept. of Forestry	Wildland Fire Suppression Specialist Entry (class 8254)	$3,473 to $5,045 a month on the state salary table, by bargaining unit, pay option and step	June to October; apply January to June, most jobs filled by April
Washington DNR	2026 seasonal firefighter, initial attack hand crews	$3,642 to $4,074 a month	3 to 6 months, May to late September; applications open in November
Colorado DFPC	Firefighter Temporary Aide (Module Crewmember), 2026	$21 to $25 an hour, usually hired near the minimum	Up to 9 months, March to November 2026; no benefits except sick leave
Colorado DFPC	Firefighter I: Module Crewmember, full time	$27.64 to $33.17 an hour ($57,492 to $68,988 a year)	Posted October 2025, Colorado residents only

Sources: Join CAL FIRE, Fire Fighter I; Oregon DAS Classification and Compensation, classes 8254 and 8255; ODF South Cascade District hiring page; Washington DNR 2026 Southeast Region initial attack hand crew posting and seasonal firefighting page; Colorado DFPC careers page and postings DFPC-WFMS-FF1MOD-10/2025 and the 2026 Pueblo temporary aide posting. Accessed Sep 13, 2026.

Oregon’s experienced class, Wildland Fire Suppression Specialist (8255), runs $3,796 to $6,084 a month. ODF’s South Cascade District page still lists lower entry pay, $2,825 to $4,055 a month, so confirm the rate on the actual posting. State jobs have perks the federal tables do not show: Washington DNR’s 7 to 14 day fire academy includes meals and lodging, and ODF says free summer housing may be available at its Dorena, Holeman and Sweet Home guard stations. Open state and contract jobs are listed at wildland firefighter jobs, including Oregon.

What do private contract fire crews pay?

Contract crews on federal fire contracts are paid under the Service Contract Act wage determination, which in 2026 means just under $30 an hour base in the West. Miller Timber Services, an Oregon contractor, says its 2026 Forest Service contracts use Wage Determination 1995-0221, Revision 73: $29.74 an hour base fire rate for the firefighter classification in the Western Region, plus $5.09 an hour in health and welfare for the first 40 hours of the week, for $34.83. Overtime is figured on the base rate, $44.61 an hour. Rates for state agreements, fuels projects and prescribed burning were still “in negotiation” (Miller Timber Services, accessed Sep 13, 2026).

The trade-off is steadiness. Contract income depends on dispatches and projects, which is why Miller Timber says it holds several fire agreements and contracts to give crews the most work days. Contract crews also do not receive federal Incident Response Premium Pay, which the law limits to Forest Service and Interior employees. Miller Timber hires entry-level firefighters, provides the training, and asks for five online pre-course certificates before its hands-on training and pack test; see outdoor job certifications for the red card courses.