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Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters vs Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining

Side-by-side · O*NET · BLS · AI-exposure research · Anthropic Economic Index

A factual, source-backed comparison of Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters and Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining on the dimensions both occupations carry. Every figure is a position within an independent published dataset — not a verdict on which job is better, safer, or more “future-proof.”

Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining
Median pay · BLS OEWS
$59,110
$52,550
Employment · BLS OEWS
5,680
34,210
AI exposure (percentile) · task overlap, not automation
6th pct
30th pct

At a glance

Dimension Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining
Median pay $59,110 $52,550
Employment 5,680 34,210
Employment outlook (2024–34) · BLS projection Declining (-0.9%) Declining (-0.4%)
Annual openings · BLS projection 500 3,100
Typical education · O*NET Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not. Usually requires a high school diploma or GED, though some occupations may not.
AI exposure · published exposure studies Low · 6th pct Low · 30th pct
Global GenAI gradient · ILO ISCO-08 · via crosswalk — —
Observed AI use · Anthropic Economic Index — —
Mostly remote-capable · Dingel–Neiman — —

Pay and employment are BLS OEWS estimates; outlook and openings are BLS 2024–2034 projections; AI exposure and observed-use figures come from separate research and reflect exposure and usage, not predictions that either job will disappear. Compare like with like.

Skills

Shared: Problem Sensitivity, Manual Dexterity, Near Vision, Active Listening, Oral Comprehension, Arm-Hand Steadiness, Monitoring, Oral Expression, Finger Dexterity, Multilimb Coordination, Reaction Time, Critical Thinking, Judgment and Decision Making, Operations Monitoring, Operation and Control, Control Precision, Speaking, Complex Problem Solving, Time Management, Depth Perception, Far Vision, Speech Recognition, Reading Comprehension.

Specific to Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters

  • Public Safety and Security
  • Law and Government
  • Deductive Reasoning
  • Inductive Reasoning
  • Information Ordering
  • Mathematics
  • Visual Color Discrimination
  • Selective Attention

Specific to Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining

  • Response Orientation
  • Rate Control
  • Spatial Orientation
  • Auditory Attention
  • Peripheral Vision
  • Hearing Sensitivity
  • Mechanical
  • Building and Construction

Knowledge, skills & abilities O*NET rates as important for each occupation. “Shared” are common to both; the columns list what is distinctive to each (top by the order O*NET surfaces).

Tools & technology

Shared: Spreadsheet software , Office suite software , Electronic mail software , Presentation software , Word processing software .

Specific to Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters

Specific to Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining

Full profiles

This page is a summary. See the complete source-backed profile for Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters or Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining — tasks, the full skill graph, tools, work context, preparation, wages by percentile, industries, AI exposure and the AI work map.

More comparisons

Related occupations you can place side by side on the same sourced scale.

Sources for this page

Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.

Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

Cite this page
Plain

Singulariki. "Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters vs Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining." Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Built from O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; BLS Employment Projections 2024–2034; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27); Microsoft “Working with AI” working-with-ai; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130. Accessed June 7, 2026. https://singulariki.com/compare/explosives-workers-ordnance-handling-experts-and-blasters-vs-excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operators-surface-mining

APA

Singulariki. (2026). Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters vs Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining. Singulariki: a source-backed encyclopedia of work. Retrieved June 7, 2026, from https://singulariki.com/compare/explosives-workers-ordnance-handling-experts-and-blasters-vs-excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operators-surface-mining

BibTeX 
@misc{singulariki-explosives-workers-ordnance-handling-experts-and-blasters-vs-excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operators-surface-mining,
  title  = {Explosives Workers, Ordnance Handling Experts, and Blasters vs Excavating and Loading Machine and Dragline Operators, Surface Mining},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024; BLS Employment Projections 2024–2034; Anthropic Economic Index v4 (2026-01-15) + v2 (2025-03-27); Microsoft “Working with AI” working-with-ai; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/compare/explosives-workers-ordnance-handling-experts-and-blasters-vs-excavating-and-loading-machine-and-dragline-operators-surface-mining}
}

Citations name the underlying public dataset releases — they reflect what this page is built from, not just the URL.