Dredge Operators
Operate dredge to remove sand, gravel, or other materials in order to excavate and maintain navigable channels in waterways.
1,040 people do this job in the US. $49,640 a year.
of the working time. Estimate.
- 0%
- 0%
- 100%
Measured, from Anthropic's usage data (2025). Counts help on part of a task.
On the chosen pace and reliability. Estimate.
Share of the working time within reach, now to 2030
What each choice means: , , , , . Every pace starts from .
At this date and pace, models finish tasks up to 4.4 h long four times in five.
How far this has come
With GPT-4, measured in March 2023, 0% of this job's working time was within reach at . With Claude 3.7 Sonnet, measured in February 2025, 0%. With Claude Mythos Preview (early), measured in April 2026, 0%. Today's estimate: 0%.
A backcast: today's task data with the best model METR had measured by each date. It shows how fast the models have moved, not what anyone forecast at the time.
The tasks
Sorted by . 6 tasks from .
| Task | Kind | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Direct or assist workers placing shore anchors and cables, laying additional pipes from dredges to shore, and pumping water from pontoons.Done daily by most who do it. | 28% | 1.3 h25 min to 3.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Move levers to position dredges for excavation, to engage hydraulic pumps, to raise and lower suction booms, and to control rotation of cutterheads.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 27% | 17 min8 min to 38 min | Stays with people | |
| Start power winches that draw in or let out cables to change positions of dredges, or pull in and let out cables manually.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 23% | 17 min4 min to 38 min | Stays with people | |
| Pump water to clear machinery pipelines.Done daily by most who do it. | 11% | 25 min13 min to 50 min | Stays with people | |
| Lower anchor poles to verify depths of excavations, using winches, or scan depth gauges to determine depths of excavations.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 9% | 13 min4 min to 25 min | Stays with people | |
| Start and stop engines to operate equipment.Done daily by most who do it. | 2% | 4 min2 min to 13 min | Stays with people |
Within reach, per task: the share of the task's time whose instances are short enough for a model to finish at the chosen date, pace and reliability. Half by: the date half of that time comes within reach.
Jobs that share skills with this one
From O*NET's related occupations. Within reach now and by the end of 2028, long-run pace, four in five.
- Hoist and Winch Operators0% now, 0% by 2028
- Operating Engineers and Other Construction Equipment Operators9% now, 9% by 2028
- Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining10% now, 10% by 2028
- Rotary Drill Operators, Oil and Gas5% now, 5% by 2028
- Helpers--Extraction Workers0% now, 0% by 2028
- Continuous Mining Machine Operators0% now, 0% by 2028
Where this job works
The industry groups that employ the most of it (BLS, May 2025).
Where the most of these jobs are
The metro areas with the most people in it (BLS, May 2025).