---
title: "Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operator, Surface Mining"
description: "Operate or tend machinery at surface mining site, equipped with scoops, shovels, or buckets to excavate and load loose materials."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operator-surface-mining"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operator, Surface Mining

**Category:** Construction and Extraction · **SOC code:** 47-5022 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 47-5022.00

Operate or tend machinery at surface mining site, equipped with scoops, shovels, or buckets to excavate and load loose materials.

Also advertised as: Backhoe Operator; Dragline Oiler; Dragline Operator; Equipment Operator; Excavator Operator; Heavy Equipment Operator; Loader Operator; Pit Operator.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $57,430 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $27.61/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $41,600 to $82,400, with the middle half between $47,890 and $65,730
- **Total US employment:** 34,480
- **Typical entry education:** High school
- **Preparation required:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +1.0% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 2,400 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 67/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 34,480 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $41,600 |
| 25th | $47,890 |
| 50th (median) | $57,430 |
| 75th | $65,730 |
| 90th | $82,400 |
| Mean (average) | $59,930 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| ND | $90,380 | $101,597 | 220 |
| IL | $80,600 | $80,634 | 1,310 |
| NJ | $80,310 | $73,811 | 740 |
| WY | $78,230 | $84,399 | 420 |
| NM | $76,350 | $82,798 | 270 |
| MA | $76,070 | $71,929 | 280 |
| AK | $74,680 | $72,959 | 140 |
| CA | $74,500 | $67,287 | 790 |
| MT | $65,850 | $69,576 | 150 |
| CT | $65,710 | $63,421 | 280 |
| WA | $64,270 | $60,058 | 640 |
| NV | $63,810 | $63,823 | 730 |
| IN | $61,910 | $66,335 | 1,530 |
| WV | $61,330 | $68,527 | 650 |
| OR | $61,280 | $59,287 | 310 |

35 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 50 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operator-surface-mining/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operator-surface-mining.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 34,700 in the 2025–2035 base year to 35,000 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 400 jobs, or +1.0%. Slower than average: 1.0% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 2,400 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** High school diploma or equivalent (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Little or no preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone 1-2: Very Little to Some Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** Less than 5 years.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Moderate-term on-the-job training.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| High School Diploma or the equivalent (such as a GED) | 71.1% |
| Less than a High School Diploma | 23.2% |
| Post-Secondary Certificate | 5.7% |

## What the work involves

- Move levers, depress foot pedals, and turn dials to operate power machinery, such as power shovels, stripping shovels, scraper loaders, or backhoes.
- Set up or inspect equipment prior to operation.
- Receive written or oral instructions regarding material movement or excavation.
- Observe hand signals, grade stakes, or other markings when operating machines so that work can be performed to specifications.
- Become familiar with digging plans, machine capabilities and limitations, and efficient and safe digging procedures in a given application.
- Create or maintain inclines or ramps.
- Move materials over short distances, such as around a construction site, factory, or warehouse.
- Operate machinery to perform activities such as backfilling excavations, vibrating or breaking rock or concrete, or making winter roads.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Monitoring — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 2.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Operation and Control — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Operations Monitoring — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Equipment Selection — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Equipment Maintenance — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Mechanical — importance 3.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Building and Construction — importance 3.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Public Safety and Security — importance 3.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 2.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Design — importance 2.4 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Control Precision — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Multilimb Coordination — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Depth Perception — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Manual Dexterity — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reaction Time — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Arm-Hand Steadiness — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Realistic (R), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| R — Realistic | 7.00 |
| C — Conventional | 3.55 |
| I — Investigative | 2.40 |
| A — Artistic | 1.00 |
| S — Social | 1.00 |
| E — Enterprising | 1.00 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ISTJ | 87.9 |
| ISTP | 78.8 |
| ISFJ | 71.7 |
| ESTJ | 70.2 |
| INTJ | 67.5 |

Best-fitting types: ISTJ.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Operating Engineer and Other Construction Equipment Operator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/operating-engineer-and-other-construction-equipment-operator) — median $59,850
- [Construction Laborer](https://nuecareer.com/careers/construction-laborer) — median $47,120
- [Hoist and Winch Operator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/hoist-and-winch-operator) — median $56,450
- [Continuous Mining Machine Operator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/continuous-mining-machine-operator) — median $61,810
- [Mobile Heavy Equipment Mechanic, Except Engines](https://nuecareer.com/careers/mobile-heavy-equipment-mechanic) — median $65,510
- [Crane and Tower Operator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/crane-and-tower-operator) — median $68,080
- [Industrial Truck and Tractor Operator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/industrial-truck-and-tractor-operator) — median $46,420
- [Loading and Moving Machine Operator, Underground Mining](https://nuecareer.com/careers/loading-and-moving-machine-operator-underground-mining) — median $74,500
- [Pile Driver Operator](https://nuecareer.com/careers/pile-driver-operator) — median $73,300
- [Earth Driller, Except Oil and Gas](https://nuecareer.com/careers/earth-driller) — median $60,190

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operator-surface-mining