To become a smokejumper, you need one year of general outdoor experience. Included in this one year of experience must be three months of wildland fire experience on an organized crew. Competition for smokejumper jobs in recent years is resulting in applicants with four to five seasons of wildland firefighting experience competing for the very limited number of jobs that become available each year. Engine crews are made up of 3-5 wildland firefighters. A typical wildland fire engine is a heavy-duty off road vehicle able to carry up to 800 gallons of water.
Engines also carry foam to use on wildland fuels.
The foam can also be used to protect the exterior walls of a structure. These crews consist of about 20 individuals who have been organized and trained and are supervised principally for operational assignments on an incident. Generally, these crews are made up of people who have been trained to fire fight, but whose everyday job is something other than fire, i.e., timber, wilderness rangers, recreation, range. There are approximately 500 hand crews in the United States. Helitack crews are specially trained in the tactical and logistical use of helicopters for fire suppression.