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In hindsight, wildland firefighting is a natural culmination of my past experiences. I thrived on remote trail crews in Colorado where I lived out of a tent all summer. I started backpacking 50+ miles at a time when I was 13. I loved working jobs that put me outside, exposed me to stressful situations, and where I worked on a team. But I had not seriously considered wildland firefighting until I was doing logistical support for fires while working as an intern for the BLM. When I learned about openings in my area, I jumped at the chance and drove many hours to meet the recruiter. When I started on a Type 6 engine that summer, I enjoyed learning all the tactics, tools, and the new lingo. At once, it was conspicuous that I was often the only woman in every situation I walked into. Whether it existed or not, I felt pressure and expectation to perform well. Going into my chainsaw course I tried to explain the pressure to my coworkers, and they tried to convince me that the pressure was not coming from everyone around me. Despite their attempts, when you are the only member of a minority struggling, there seems to be a pressure from others– real or not. Learning something new is not always easy when you are a unicorn.
Less than two weeks later I was selected for my first throw together crew roll, and it was going to be all women and non-binary people. As a former Girl Scout, I knew that I learned and performed well in groups like these and knew how important these spaces are. However, I could not have predicted how big the impact this experience would be on me.
While we were mustering and organizing gear, I was overwhelmed and could barely remember the names of the people I was meeting. What is a dragon slayer? How many MREs could we really need?
The following day we drove to our first fire in a neighboring state. While we were waiting in the parking lot of an abandoned school in the desert, we were joking about managing periods while in the woods and discussing the pros and cons of pee funnels. I resisted the feeling of wanting to relax. These were familiar conversations that had played out countless times during the earlier summers I had worked in the woods. However, my new coworkers provided nuance about how to have a period and pee when you had the limited privacy of the fire line.
The first fire was in a steep, burned-out desert canyon. The dirt was loose without the root structures and every step slid down several inches as we hiked up from the bottom and searched for hot spots. Even though we were just dry mopping, and the fire was mostly out, the conditions were miserable. I questioned every life decision that led me there.
When I finally reached the top and learned that I had to turn right around and then come back up again, there was a single tear behind my sunglasses that I quickly wiped away.
We only spent one and half days on this first fire before de-mobbing to the next fire in another desert. As we drove in, I was in awe of the 100ft Ponderosa Pines and the sprawling canyons below us. This second fire was a lighting start. Our goal was to prep a burn plan to expand the impact of the fire on the landscape and capitalize on its benefits. This ponderosa savannah needed fire to open their pinecones and propagate the next generation.
We spent the next four days prepping a road and helispots. We cut out oak brush and bucked large logs. It was getting hotter and drier the entire time. On the day of the burn, I found myself standing 30ft away from the road we had prepped to keep the fire where we wanted it. The goal was to make sure the fire would be just intense enough to be effective but not overly destructive. As I stood there, the hot shot crew started ignitions. I started to hear what sounded like jet engines taking off and saw flames peeking over the top of the canopy. I looked to my more experienced crew members, none of them were panicking, so I was going to do my best to not panic. As the fire came closer to my section of road, the torching was increasing in frequency. Just on the other side of the road was a group of four 60ft Ponderosas. Suddenly, the fire was racing through the brush. Before I could grasp what was happening, the group of ponderosas group torched, and sparks rained down around me. It was beautiful and thrilling. When the hotshot crew squad helping my crew hold the road started running back towards me, I was abruptly brought back to reality.
I started to realize that it was me that was supposed to help respond to this explosive change in events.
I started doing a head count of the crew that had been standing next to me and made sure we were all promptly walking down the line to meet our crew boss. I was stomping out tiny flames that were popping up in the grass. I could feel my eyes grow large and I couldn’t help but tighten my grip on my tool. This did not feel minimally destructive.
Our new goal, since it had jumped the road we were holding, was to at least keep the fire out of the surrounding canyons, where fighting it would be nearly impossible. We split up into our squads of 4-5 people to start tackling dozens of spot fires. On one spot fire, we had trees torching overhead. Meeting the eyes of my squad leader, I saw that they were watching the overhead fire and had our backs. We all locked in, shoulder-to-shoulder, and started removing fuel from the edge of the fire. I had only met these people less than a week ago, and when we were working together, I trusted everyone. We worked almost 18hrs that day and we had faced walls of flame, 40 spot fires, and torching trees. By the time we finally went to sleep, we had successfully kept the fire on the mesa.
We stayed on that fire for eight more operational periods. We completed countless grids on that fire looking for residual heat. The IC made sure that fire was as dead as a door nail.
In between chasing spot fires and packing mud into stump holes the morale was great. After refurb at night, we spent time sharing stories and solutions to common problems. Halfway through, someone pointed out my line pack was too big for me. The 31+ in. waist band on the pack constantly slid around the same waist that wore 26-30in waist Nomex. One of the other firefighters knew the location of an XS Mystery Ranch line pack in a different cache that would (and does) fit me much better. I saw how awesome pee funnels are for when you can only find a single tree for cover. I got awesome tips on how to tailor Nomex to fit better and how to avoid skin infections on your bra line. This beta from other female firefighters were based on experiences that many of my coworkers on my home resource never had.
After we demobbed for the final time, we still stayed in contact. Our group chat saw activity all winter. We shared our workout progress, our skiing adventures, and group photos when we got together.
When this roll was being put together there was push back from some of our colleagues. There is a persistent stereotype that if you have two or more women on a roll, you will have to separate them by trucks because they would fight too much. I personally know where this stereotype is coming from. When it feels like there is a limit on spots for women, it creates a hostile setting. In previous male dominated spaces, I am used to seeing other women as competition. However, on this roll, surrounded by people who all had this experience, the hostile setting had disappeared. I was able to stop viewing other women and non-binary people as competition and start participating in a community.
I have changed a lot since my first summer on a trail crew. Instead of being in the back of the line on hikes and trail runs, I am often passing people and closing in on the lead. A chainsaw does not feel as heavy as it once did, and I am often on the saw team for local fires. I do not have to worry if I can keep up anymore because I am often helping set the standard. Even when there are people who can lift heavier or run faster on my crew, I hope that I can be seen as an example of determination and hard work. This is thanks to the people on this crew that helped me believe that being a strong woman wasn’t anything to be scared or ashamed of.
It cannot be overstated the impact that this experience had on me. I am extremely lucky that I received this opportunity. I got to meet women in fire who have had long successful careers in many different resources. I cherished the opportunity to learn from other people that had similar backgrounds. This experience helped remove pressure to be perfect. I now have a new confidence that I carry every day. I can’t say that it made me the perfect firefighter or that there are always zero tears behind my sunglasses, but it gave me a sense of security to make mistakes and improve. I am never more than a text away from a strong support system.