AI exposure: Crane and Tower Operators
Operate mechanical boom and cable or tower and cable equipment to lift and move materials, machines, or products in many directions.
Reading this score
computedAt 12.0% of weighted task load, Crane and Tower Operators sits at the 18th percentile, below the point where a job's centre of gravity has moved. 79.3% of what this role does is untouched, meaning current systems cannot produce that work at all, whatever the commercial incentive.
What holds the line here is embodiment. Across this occupation's 11 tasks it averages 2.50 out of 3, the highest of the five friction dimensions. In plain terms, the work has to happen in physical space. A language model cannot move matter. Until the robotics to do this work is both good enough and cheap enough to deploy widely, capability in software does not reach it.
The most exposed thing this job does is Review daily work or delivery schedules to determine orders, sequences of deliveries, or..., at 50.0%. The least is Direct truck drivers backing vehicles into loading bays and cover, uncover, or secure loads for..., at 0.0%. A gap of 50.0% between two parts of the same job is the reason this index publishes at task level. An occupation-wide number would have hidden both.
Within transportation and material moving occupations, this one is less exposed than the median of 24.3% across the group's 52 roles, with 41 scoring higher. Being in an exposed family does not make a particular job exposed, and the reverse holds too.
What would move this score. Of 11 tasks, 3 are currently banded exposed, 0 assisted and 8 untouched. For that distribution to shift materially would take robotics cheap and reliable enough to deploy at scale, not a better language model. The score is re-computed every quarter against a fresh capability reference, and the change is published rather than quietly applied.
Where the score comes from
judgedEvery task is scored through the standardised work activities it maps to. These are this occupation’s averages on the six rubric dimensions. Capability is what AI can do; the other five are what stands in the way.
| Dimension | Mean | Scale |
|---|---|---|
| Capability | 0.91 | 0-4 |
| Embodiment | 2.50 | 0-3 |
| Presence | 0.73 | 0-3 |
| Accountability | 0.80 | 0-3 |
| Context | 1.29 | 0-3 |
| Verification cost | 1.45 | 0-3 |
Task by task
11 tasks, O*NET 31.0| Task | Exposed | Assisted | Untouched | Importance | Band |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Review daily work or delivery schedules to determine orders, sequences of deliveries, or special loading instructions. | 50.0% | 25.0% | 25.0% | 3.82 | exposed |
| Determine load weights and check them against lifting capacities to prevent overload. | 33.3% | 16.7% | 50.0% | 4.51 | exposed |
| Direct helpers engaged in placing blocking or outrigging under cranes. | 30.0% | 20.0% | 50.0% | 4.61 | exposed |
| Inspect crane site conditions to determine ground stability. | 10.0% | 15.0% | 75.0% | 4.76 | untouched |
| Inspect bundle packaging for conformance to regulations or customer requirements, and remove and batch packaging tickets. | 10.0% | 15.0% | 75.0% | 3.70 | untouched |
| Inspect cables or grappling devices for wear and install or replace cables, as needed. | 6.2% | 6.2% | 87.5% | 4.44 | untouched |
| Inspect and adjust crane mechanisms or lifting accessories to prevent malfunctions or damage. | 5.8% | 6.7% | 87.5% | 4.61 | untouched |
| Move levers, depress foot pedals, or turn dials to operate cranes, cherry pickers, electromagnets, or other moving equipment for lifting, moving, or placing loads. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.77 | untouched |
| Clean, lubricate, and maintain mechanisms such as cables, pulleys, or grappling devices, making repairs, as necessary. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.45 | untouched |
| Load or unload bundles from trucks, or move containers to storage bins, using moving equipment. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 3.92 | untouched |
| Direct truck drivers backing vehicles into loading bays and cover, uncover, or secure loads for delivery. | 0.0% | 0.0% | 100.0% | 4.31 | untouched |
Task text and importance ratings sourced from O*NET 31.0. Shares computed. The occupation score is the importance-weighted mean.
Occupations either side of this one
The four closest scores in the same occupational family, then the four closest anywhere in the index.
Read this carefully. Exposure is not displacement. A high score means current AI systems can produce this work, not that anyone will stop paying a person to do it. Adoption depends on economics, regulation and inertia that this index deliberately does not model. How the score is built.
What this means in practice
Most of this work is not reachable by current systems, so the immediate pressure is on the administrative edges of the role rather than its core: the scheduling, the reporting, the written records. That is where time is recovered.