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- Help build and maintain boats and other marine equipment like oil rigs
- You'll need excellent practical skills, and in some roles may need to learn to dive
- With further training and study, progress to become a marine engineer
You'll design, build, service and repair boats and ships, using a range of engineering skills, like welding, mechanical and electrical maintenance, and electronic equipment installation. You might also perform maintenance on offshore platforms, drilling machinery and equipment.
DAY-TO-DAY DUTIES
- Fault-finding and repairing electronic, hydraulic and mechanical equipment on boats and ships
- Helping to design and develop new marine equipment
- Providing engineering support on board a dive support vessel
- Refurbishing older craft with new navigation and communications systems
- Using underwater craft like remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) to inspect undersea pipelines
- Supervising a team of craftspeople in a ship or boatyard
- Maintaining weapons systems, radar and sonar on board Royal Navy warships
DAY-TO-DAY ENVIRONMENT
Your workplace could range from an office, shipyard or port, to working at sea (possibly underwater), installing and servicing equipment in all weather conditions.
You'll need
For this role, you'll need knowledge of maths, engineering science and technology, and physics; design skills; good initiative; complex problem-solving skills; the ability to use, repair and maintain machines and tools; and thinking and reasoning skills.
You could do a foundation degree in marine engineering or marine technology.
You could take a college course for this job, such as a Level 2 Diploma in Mechanical Engineering, Level 2 Diploma in Fabrication and Welding Engineering Technology, Level 3 Diploma in Marine Engineering, or Level 3 Diploma in Marine Construction and Maintenance.
You could get this job through a marine engineer advanced apprenticeship.
You can train as an engineering technician with the Merchant Navy or Royal Navy, then move into the commercial marine industry after you leave.
You'll also need IT skills and a knowledge of computer-aided design and manufacturing (CAD/CAM).
CAREER PROSPECTS
With experience, you could move into a supervisory role or engineering project management work. You could specialise in a particular area, like boat design, specialist equipment sales and support or marine insurance.