She may be pint-sized, but 19-year-old Natalie Peatman has her sights set on big-time goals.

Peatman, of Napa, is one of the 26 seasonal firefighters set to graduate from the CalFire training academy today.She is no stranger to firefighting. The 2006 Vintage High School graduate has been a firefighter explorer scout with the city of Napa Fire Department and CalFire in Yountville.

“I’m ready to get out there and fight wildland fires. It’s hard work, but I really enjoy it. It keeps me fit, and I love the family feeling among the other firefighters I work with. It’s a great experience,” Peatman said. “I want to do this for the rest of my life. My mom worries about me. My dad, not so much.”This is the second graduating class of CalFire seasonal firefighters this year.

On June 22, 28 newly trained graduate firefighters didn’t have time to celebrate their achievements with parties and sleeping in late. Because of the extraordinarily high number of wildland fires in Northern California this year, the graduates found themselves headed to the fire lines almost hours after graduating.

“More than half of the new graduates will be put on the fire lines on one of the more than 100 wildland fires raging in the state right now,” CalFire training Capt. Mike Wink said. “The remainder will be set to provide staffing at CalFire stations where staff has been sent to one of the wildland fires throughout the state.”

Wink said CalFire usually does not bring on the first crew of seasonal firefighters until July. “This year we have been hiring firefighters since May. This has been an abnormal year. Traditionally, fire season opens mid-June and runs until mid-October. But that has not been the case this year — fire activity has been higher than normal for this time of the year.”

Historically the CalFire Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit employs 191 seasonal firefighters, but due to the high number of wildland fires this year, Gov. Schwarzenegger issued an executive order to increase the number to 275, Wink said.

Many of the seasonal firefighters have fire training or have worked as firefighters.

“However, we do get some applicants straight out of high school,” Wink said.

Seasonal firefighter trainee Timothy Carroll, 19, of Santa Rosa falls into that category.

“I’m new at this. I have no previous experience,” Carroll said. “I’m learning a lot and learning it fast. I think this is a great challenge. I want to do this for the rest of my life. It’s very rewarding and satisfying to know I am doing a job that helps people.”

The new recruits train for seven days, bunking down at the St. Helena CalFire station on Highway 29 and Big Tree Lane, north of St. Helena.

In that seven-day period the future firefighters are immersed in an intensive curriculum of classroom and hands-on training.

They sleep on cots and eat in the mess halls. There is nothing glamorous about the days and nights spent learning to be a wildland firefighter.

Once they graduate, the normal work schedule is three days on and four days off. But that is not etched in stone. The schedule is dictated by the need for firefighters and the number of wildland fires burning at any given time.

“This year, for instance, we have had firefighters on the line for seven days at a time,” Wink said. “The amount of time spent working depends on the conditions and level of emergency.”

The monthly pay for seasonal firefighters is $2,491, plus overtime.

All graduates are considered to be entry-level firefighters.

“We don’t send them out to wildland fires on their own. They are supervised by a company officer. There is one officer for every two to three new recruits,” Wink said.

The dropout rate is low, he said. “The first academy we only lost two recruits. They leave for a variety of reasons.”

This year, the CalFire Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit received 1,500 applications for seasonal firefighters, according to CalFire Deputy Fire Chief Tim Streblow.

“Out of that, only 60 applications were processed,” he said.쇓