Entry & progression
Every AMSA engineer certificate carries a kind of propulsion power on its face. MO72 s8. "Any power, any area" is true only for the kind printed on your certificate — and your sea service has to be on that kind too.
This is not a footnote. It is a hard limit written on the certificate, and it travels all the way up the ladder. An Engineer Class 1 (Motor) is chief engineer on anything, anywhere — that is a diesel ship. Put that same holder in the machinery space of a steam turbine LNG carrier and the certificate says nothing at all.
The service follows the kind
MO72 does not just stamp the kind on the certificate. It requires specified portions of your qualifying sea service to have been performed on vessels using propulsion of the kind to which the certificate relates. The figures run through the whole ladder:
| Certificate | Service on propulsion of the kind |
|---|---|
| Engineer Watchkeeper | at least 16 weeks of the qualifying sea service |
| Engineer Class 2 | at least 9 months of the 12 (from Engineer Watchkeeper) |
| Engineer Class 1 | at least 12 months on vessels ≥3000 kW of the kind |
So the kind is not chosen at the end and printed on. It is accumulated. Sixteen weeks of the entry-level sea service must be on the kind of propulsion you intend to be certificated for, and if you have not got them, you do not have the certificate you thought you had.
What this means in practice
Almost every yacht afloat is a motor vessel — medium-speed four-stroke diesels, or diesel-electric. The kind you want is Motor. Steam only becomes relevant if you intend to work steam turbine tonnage, which in practice means LNG carriers and some older ships. Steam and Motor covers both, and is the certificate that keeps every door open.
CAUTION — Diesel-electric, gas turbine, dual-fuel — not confirmed MO72 names three kinds of propulsion power: Motor, Steam, Steam and Motor. How AMSA classifies a diesel-electric plant, a gas turbine, or a dual-fuel engine against those three was not confirmed for this course. A diesel-electric yacht is still burning diesel in a reciprocating engine, which suggests Motor — but that is an inference, not a source. Ask AMSA in writing before you accrue two years of sea service on the assumption.
The domestic sideways door
An Engineer Watchkeeper (Motor) — or the steam-and-motor variant — may work as a Marine Engine Driver Grade 1 near coastal under the domestic system. That is a real and useful equivalence: it gives you chief engineer on an inboard vessel <1500 kW and second engineer <3000 kW, near-coastal, without sitting the domestic ladder.
Note what that equivalence is not. It is a permission to work, not a certificate credit. The domestic and international systems remain two separate Acts and two separate ladders, and the traffic between them is one-way more often than crew expect.
Choose the kind early. It is the one line on the certificate you cannot fix later with more sea time on the wrong ship.