Apply hand or foot brakes and move levers to lock hoists or winches.

“Apply hand or foot brakes and move levers to lock hoists or winches.” is a supplemental task performed by Hoist and Winch Operators. Among the occupation's 13 rated tasks, workers place it 12th by importance (#2 most important). About 48% of workers say it is relevant to their job.

This is a single occupation-specific task statement from O*NET. The figures below describe how central the task is to the job and what independent studies measure about AI and this kind of work — not a prediction that the task will be automated.

Work activities this task rolls up to

O*NET groups concrete tasks into broader work activities shared across many occupations.

• Operate lifting or moving equipment. in Controlling Machines and Processes

AI exposure

The OpenAI / Eloundou “GPTs are GPTs” study rates this task E0. No direct exposure — current language models give little or no time savings on this task.

Exposure measures whether a model could meaningfully speed the task up — it is an estimate of overlap with model capabilities, not a measure of whether the work will be done by software. The study's intermediate score (β) for this task is 0.00. Automation potential label: T0.

Other tasks in this occupation

• Move levers, pedals, and throttles to stop, start, and regulate speeds of hoist or winch drums in response to hand, bell, buzzer, telephone, loud-speaker, or whistle signals, or by observing dial indicators or cable marks. · importance 4.6
• Start engines of hoists or winches and use levers and pedals to wind or unwind cable on drums. · importance 4.5
• Observe equipment gauges and indicators and hand signals of other workers to verify load positions or depths. · importance 4.4
• Operate compressed air, diesel, electric, gasoline, or steam-driven hoists or winches to control movement of cableways, cages, derricks, draglines, loaders, railcars, or skips. · importance 4.3
• Oil winch drums so that cables will wind smoothly. · importance 4.3
• Move or reposition hoists, winches, loads and materials, manually or using equipment and machines such as trucks, cars, and hand trucks. · importance 4.1
• Climb ladders to position and set up vehicle-mounted derricks. · importance 4.1
• Select loads or materials according to weight and size specifications. · importance 4.1
• Repair, maintain, and adjust equipment, using hand tools. · importance 4.0
• Signal and assist other workers loading or unloading materials. · importance 3.9
• Tend auxiliary equipment, such as jacks, slings, cables, or stop blocks, to facilitate moving items or materials for further processing. · importance 3.9
• Attach, fasten, and disconnect cables or lines to loads, materials, and equipment, using hand tools. · importance 3.7

See all tasks on the Hoist and Winch Operators page.

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.

• O*NET 30.3 U.S. Department of Labor / National Center for O*NET Development
• “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130 OpenAI / academic

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

@misc{singulariki-task-4987,
  title  = {Apply hand or foot brakes and move levers to lock hoists or winches.},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/tasks/task-4987}
}