{ "source": "Cooked Index — occupational AI risk register", "page": "https://cookedindex.com/jobs/dredge-operators/", "methodology": "https://cookedindex.com/methodology", "notice": "Verdicts are re-examined as evidence accumulates. Re-fetch before relying on this; the page above always carries the current score.", "scored_at": "2026-08-11", "model": "claude-opus-5", "occupation": { "title": "Dredge Operators", "soc_code": "53-7031", "category": "Transportation", "us_employment": 1040, "median_annual_wage": 49640 }, "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 53, "contested": false, "near_boundary": false, "dimensions": { "task_resistance": 14, "embodiment": 17, "liability_shield": 8, "trust_premium": 4, "judgment_accountability": 10 }, "reasoning": { "task_resistance": "Trimble/HYPACK dredge guidance and automated cut-profile following already handle the pay-line tracking, but nobody has automated feeling the cutterhead load through the ladder, clearing a rag or cobble jam, resetting spuds and anchor wires in a running current, or working a swinging drag arm in chop — which is why this lands at 14 and not 18: the plotting is gone, the hull-handling is not.", "embodiment": "You work on a floating hull that pitches, in weather, with high-pressure discharge line, wire under tension, winches, and a cutterhead that can be pulled up for tooth changes — an uncontrolled marine environment where a slip means overboard, so 17 rather than the low teens reserved for jobs where the physical part is occasional site visits.", "liability_shield": "There is no dredge operator licence; you may carry a USCG credential for the vessel, an MSHA Part 46/48 card on a sand-and-gravel operation, or nothing at all beyond employer sign-off, and when a dredge cuts outside the permitted template or hits a pipeline it is the contractor and the permit holder answering to the Corps of Engineers — 8, not 3, because those vessel and mine-safety cards are real gates on who gets in the cab.", "trust_premium": "The client sees a survey plot and a cubic-yard count, not you; the channel is either cut to grade or it isn't, and if you leave the job the next operator sits down on the same hull with the same DGPS setup — the 4 reflects that a superintendent knows which operators keep production up, and that's the whole of the relationship.", "judgment_accountability": "You decide swing speed, cut thickness and when to pull off a hard bottom or slack the wires before a passing wake, and you're the one who notices sand slurry going to water and shuts down before you burn a pump — real calls with money attached, but bounded by a dredging plan, a permitted template and a super on the radio, which is why 10 rather than the mid-teens of someone who owns the cut design." }, "rationale": "Dredge operators sit in a cab or wheelhouse running cutterheads, drag arms, winches and spud positioning while reading depth soundings and current — physical work on unstable water in weather no robot handles reliably today. But the screen-facing half of the job is exactly what automates: GPS/RTK dredge guidance, automated cut-profile following, tonnage and production logging, and semi-autonomous cutter suction control are already commercial and shrink the number of operators per hull. The modal worker is a crew member on a marine construction or sand-and-gravel job, credentialed for the vessel rather than personally licensed for the dredging decisions.", "outlook": "By the mid-2030s expect fewer operators per dredge as guidance and cut-following automate, with the surviving jobs going to credentialed levermen who can also maintain the plant and handle debris, congestion, and weather calls on the water.", "what_would_raise_it": { "levers": [ { "dimension": "liability_shield", "change": "USCG Subchapter M-style towing-vessel inspection logic extended to self-propelled and crewed dredge plant, or a Corps of Engineers contract clause requiring a named credentialed operator-in-charge to certify each shift's cut record and turbidity compliance under a 401/404 permit — personal signature on the dredging record rather than vessel-level credentialing", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 5 }, { "dimension": "judgment_accountability", "change": "Automation absorbing cut-profile following and production logging leaves the shift built around the non-routine calls: unexploded ordnance or utility-strike stop-work decisions, spud repositioning in unforecast current, pipeline/anchor conflicts with traffic, and endangered-species/turbidity shutdowns. Where an operator personally owns the stop-dredging call under an environmental window, this tier is what remains", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 4 }, { "dimension": "task_resistance", "change": "Genuine two-tier job: if RTK guidance and semi-autonomous cutter control take the steady-state cutting, the residual day is debris and hardpan response, pipeline/pontoon handling, breakdown diagnosis and severe-weather demobilization — tasks no commercial system executes", "plausibility": "already happening", "would_add": 3 }, { "dimension": "embodiment", "change": "Fleet mix shifting toward small hydraulic and mechanical plant on inland waterways, marinas and tailings ponds, where remote-operation retrofits are uneconomic and deck work is inseparable from the console", "plausibility": "plausible", "would_add": 2 } ], "ceiling_note": "No realistic trust-premium route: buyers are the Corps, ports and aggregate producers, who procure on cubic yards and schedule and have no reason to pay for a human at the console. With ~1,040 workers, remote operations centers running several hulls per operator cut headcount regardless of how high the per-seat judgment content goes." }, "adjudication": null, "employment_history": { "points": [ { "y": 2017, "emp": 1410, "wage": 43230 }, { "y": 2018, "emp": 1190, "wage": 45260 }, { "y": 2019, "emp": 1550, "wage": 47040 }, { "y": 2020, "emp": 1750, "wage": 49210 }, { "y": 2021, "emp": 1650, "wage": 46210 }, { "y": 2022, "emp": 940, "wage": 47090 }, { "y": 2023, "emp": 940, "wage": 50440 }, { "y": 2024, "emp": 1030, "wage": 48430 }, { "y": 2025, "emp": 1040, "wage": 49640 } ], "from": 2017, "to": 2025, "change_pct": -26.2, "comparable_from": 2019, "spans_soc_revision": true }, "pivots": [ { "slug": "refractory-materials-repairers-except-brickmasons", "title": "Refractory Materials Repairers, Except Brickmasons", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 65, "median_wage": 61290, "overlap": 86, "skills_to_close": [ "Repairing", "Equipment Maintenance" ] }, { "slug": "operating-engineers-and-other-construction-equipment-operators", "title": "Operating Engineers and Other Construction Equipment Operators", "verdict": "EXPOSED", "risk_resistance": 64, "median_wage": 59850, "overlap": 85, "skills_to_close": [ "Equipment Maintenance" ] }, { "slug": "crane-and-tower-operators", "title": "Crane and Tower Operators", "verdict": "SAFE", "risk_resistance": 67, "median_wage": 68080, "overlap": 85, "skills_to_close": [ "Installation", "Mathematics", "Reading Comprehension", "Writing" ] } ], "license": "https://cookedindex.com/terms" }