What I mean is, does the government issue licenses or endorsements for things like:
Trains
Cruise ships
Tanks
Loaders
Basically any really specific vehicles, or it simply a train on the job sort of deal?
I would assume you do for a train, but I don’t know. I believe to run a cruise ship (specifically if it’s a charter), you’d need a Captain’s license. I don’t think you’d need one to drive a tank, but you’d probably be trained by the armed forces. As for a loader, if you’re talking about construction equipment, you could buy it and ride it around private property without anyone batting an eye. If you’re doing it in a work environment, OSHA and/or your employer’s insurance may require some type of certification, but that’s more of a CYA type thing.
I would also wager that you’d need a regular driver’s license to take any of these things out on the road.
FTR, some of this is just stuff I’ve heard along the way, some of this could very well be wrong and some of it I’m guessing based on what I know about other things.
Having said all that, the government does issue maritime licenses but does not, so far as I know, issue any type of license to operate heavy machinery.
Well for loaders and me it was just a matter of, “Here sit down. This does this, and this does this.” “Now don’t screw up and let’s get to work”. Pretty small loaders but if you have some coordination and basic skills in driving you pick it up. there was no licensing…
I have several certifications for different types of fork lifts and man lifts. but these are from private certification bodies, not licenses issued by the govt.
mc
If it’s going to be driven on public roads and highways would seem to be the criteria for licence plates. We have a couple of vehicles that have farm plates on them. They can go on our property, I assume it would be illegal to take them on the highway. To drive heavy equipment or semis you have to have a different kind of drivers lisc.here in Arkansas. It’s called a CDL, or commercial drivers lisc.
If you’re going to drive it on the public roads, the vehicle needs to conform to whatever laws regulate on-road vehicles (including but by no means limited to being registered, and having a licence plate), and you yourself need to have a driver’s licence for the appropriate class of vehicle. In a private place, this is a matter between you and the owner of the place.
Ships masters, unsurprisingly, need masters’ certificates; I assume, but I don’t know, that there are tiers of certificates for different types of vessels. Operating very small vessels for personal use probably doesn’t require a certificate. It’s possible that in some waters the law may require liability insurance and the insurers may require certification, even if the law doesn’t directly require certification.
I don’t know about train drivers. This may depend on where the railway is, and what the regulatory regime in that place is. If the railway company owns both the track and the rolling stock, it’s possible that they train and certify their own drivers.
Ships under US flag if large enough licensed deck and engineering officers. They are licensed by the US Coast Guard. There will be at least 4 deck and 4 engineering officers.
I think the tonnage for unlimited is 5,000 tons a 3rd mate, a 2nd mate, a 1st mate, and a master.
For ships with over 6.000 horsepower a 3rd Assistant Engineer, a 2nd Assistant Engineer, a 1st Assistant Engineer, and a Chief Engineer.
To get a thirds license A sailor has to sail in the different unlicensed positions for a minimum of 3 years or attend a Maritime Academy for at least 3 years. At the end of the 3 years the sailor has to take and pass a through 3rds test. It is a hard test. I started mine on Monday at 8 AM to 4 in the afternoon, and finished Friday about 3:00 PM.
To be eligible to take the 2nds test a third has to have sailed as a 3rd for 365 days.
To be eligible to take the 1sts test a 2nd has to have sailed as a 2nd for 365 days.
To be eligible to take the masters test a 1st has to have sailed as a 1st for 365 days.
For the deck officers each day sailing on a cruise ship only counts as a half day.
I do not know of any cruise ships under US flag.
Ships that are smaller than the unlimited level may have fewer officers and restricted licenses.
US military drivers get training on individual vehicles. The vehicles a soldier is authorized to operate are added to the military driving license. Also things like HAZMAT endorsements, winter driving, tanker, … You might be checked out to drive a HUMVEE but driving an M977 HEMTT is not authorized until you get the training and have the vehicle added to your license.
AR 600-55 is the US Army regulation. Here’s an old copy (pdf) http://8tharmy.korea.army.mil/safety/Toolbox/resources/Publications/AR600_55.pdf
For trains, there isn’t actually a printed license, but one train company records the fact you passed, and you can verify that to a new employer by reference to the trainer or the company you did it with (you’d be using their train as its expensive to take your own train out just to do a week long practical test.)
Intriguing that there is a specific body that issues licenses for cranes, and not all the hydraulic machines such as fork lifts, scissor lifts, and so on.
Possibly apocryphal but I heard of someone who worked in maintenance / the motor pool and thus needed to move all the vehicles at the base. IIRC they needed a supplemental license as there were too many endorsements to fit.
Brian
I would not be surprised. I’ve seen mechanics with tons of different vehicles on their military license.
Yep, I have a certification to drive “industrial lift trucks” from my employer, but they also require that anyone doing so also have a valid driver’s license.
I do know that with planes the “lower level” airplanes only require a license to be able to fly pretty much all of them, with add-on certifications for tail wheel or high performance airplanes. On the “higher” levels, like Boeing 7x7’s or Airbus you get “type certified” for a particular model of them. So for example all pilots for Southwest Airlines have to be type certified for the Boeing 737.
If Arkansas works like Pennsylvania, it would actually be legal to take them on the highway to move between properties owned by the registrant of the vehicle, or on roads adjoining your farm. I suspect most states work this way as a matter of practicality. I remember during haying season, practically every farmer in existence was on the highways shuttling unlicensed trucks and tractors with hay wagons back and forth between fields and barns (before the days of the big round bales).
All jet aircraft require a type rating. And all planes over 12,500 pounds do too, regardless of engines.
People ask me about this a lot. I fly chartered jets (just got my third type rating) and many people assume I could fly any Boeing or Airbus. I tell them I wouldn’t even know how to start the engines in most other planes.
Well I can tell you that on the 737-NG all of the APU and engine start-up stuff is on the overhead panel, so you can start by just reading switch labels and go from there. What!? Isn’t that enough? I must have spent an hour in the simulator figuring that shit out with the instructor and now you say you an’t start the damn thing?
As a general rule, I would say that a license of appropriate class is required to drive any vehicle that is street legal. Many specialty vehicles are not street legal, and would require a special permit to operate on a public road, but from that point, once that permit is in hand, the machine can be operated by any person deemed competent to do to in its usual environment.
In other words, if a specialty vehicle is authorized to operate on the road, so is the competent usual operator of such a vehicle.
In the U.S., the minimum standards for locomotive engineers are established by federal regulation at 49 C.F.R. §240, but the actual “licensure” is up to the railroads that employ the engineer. Engineers on “plant railroads” (that is, those that operate solely within a contiguous plot of private land, such as at a factor, do not require certification under federal law at all. I’m not sure if state law would require certification in those cases.
The driving force for certification of drivers of plant and commercial machines is insurance. If there is an accident, the first question would be “what training has the driver had?” I expect that few employers would take a driver on without some evidence that they were trained to drive the machine
I was on a riverboat casino (back in the days when riverboat casinos actually floated on rivers) and saw the licenses for the master and the engineers posted.
Both the Coast Guard and individual states require commercial ships to have safety inspections.
This article about privately owned tanks doesn’t seem to list any tank specific licenses. Interestingly enough, although tanks are almost never street legal, that seems to be more due to local policing than specific regulations.