Direct rig crews in drilling and other activities, such as setting up rigs and completing or servicing wells.

“Direct rig crews in drilling and other activities, such as setting up rigs and completing or servicing wells.” is a core task performed by Rotary Drill Operators, Oil and Gas. Among the occupation's 22 rated tasks, workers place it 13th by importance (#10 most important). About 92% 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.

• Direct construction or extraction activities. in Guiding, Directing, and Motivating Subordinates

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: T1.

Other tasks in this occupation

• Train crews, and introduce procedures to make drill work more safe and effective. · importance 4.5
• Observe pressure gauge and move throttles and levers to control the speed of rotary tables, and to regulate pressure of tools at bottoms of boreholes. · importance 4.5
• Count sections of drill rod to determine depths of boreholes. · importance 4.4
• Push levers and brake pedals to control gasoline, diesel, electric, or steam draw works that lower and raise drill pipes and casings in and out of wells. · importance 4.4
• Connect sections of drill pipe, using hand tools and powered wrenches and tongs. · importance 4.4
• Maintain records of footage drilled, location and nature of strata penetrated, materials and tools used, services rendered, and time required. · importance 4.4
• Maintain and adjust machinery to ensure proper performance. · importance 4.3
• Start and examine operation of slush pumps to ensure circulation and consistency of drilling fluid or mud in well. · importance 4.3
• Locate and recover lost or broken bits, casings, and drill pipes from wells, using special tools. · importance 4.3
• Weigh clay, and mix with water and chemicals to make drilling mud. · importance 4.2
• Monitor progress of drilling operations, and select and change drill bits according to the nature of strata, using hand tools. · importance 4.2
• Repair or replace defective parts of machinery, such as rotary drill rigs, water trucks, air compressors, and pumps, using hand tools. · importance 4.1
• Cap wells with packers, or turn valves, to regulate outflow of oil from wells. · importance 4.1
• Clean and oil pulleys, blocks, and cables. · importance 4.0

See all tasks on the Rotary Drill Operators, Oil and Gas 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-8306,
  title  = {Direct rig crews in drilling and other activities, such as setting up rigs and completing or servicing wells.},
  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-8306}
}