 | This articleneeds additional citations forverification. Please helpimprove this article byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Engine department" – news ·newspapers ·books ·scholar ·JSTOR(September 2025) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Anengine department orengineering department is an organizational unit aboard aship that is responsible for the operation, maintenance, and repair of thepropulsion systems and the support systems for crew, passengers, and cargo.[1] These include theship engine,fuel oil,lubrication,waterdistillation,separation process,lighting,air conditioning, andrefrigeration.
The engine department emerged with the arrival of marine engines for propulsion, largely during the later half of the 19th century. Due to advances in marine technology during the 20th century, the engine department aboardmerchant ships is considered equally important as thedeck department, since trained engine officers are required to handle the machinery on a ship.[citation needed]
The engine department takes care of the engine room aboard a ship. Rotations vary depending on the vessel or company. Whoever is on a rotation has to stand watch to look over the engine and its components. There are different crew members for watch rotation.[2]
Typically, a ship's engine department is run by theengine officers but staffed with other occupational specialties of the seafarer's trade like:
In order to be awatch officer and have the license for it, there are 3 basic requirements and they are age, seagoing service, and education/training onstcw's.[3] Some basic USCG stcw requirements go further into seagoing service, approved trainings such as; engine resource management, gas/steam turbine plants, control systems, etc., and finally the competencies which include "Evidence of Standard of competence".[4]
Defunct positions within the engine department include thefireman, who was a rating responsible for shoveling coal into the boiler furnaces ofsteam engines, and thecoal trimmer, a rating that loaded coal in the bunkers and transported the coal from the bunkers to the firemen.
Nowadays, due to the increase inautomation on merchant vessels, and the increase in the unattended machinery spaces (UMS) aboard them, the number of seafaring engine officers has decreased drastically on board merchant ships. Today, the engine department usually consists of the following number of engine officers and ratings:[citation needed]
Additionally, many vessels also carry a specific type of engine officer known as anelectro-technical officer.
