There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a freight engineer. For example, did you know that they make an average of $26.72 an hour? That's $55,585 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow -2% and produce -1,500 job opportunities across the U.S.

What Does a Freight Engineer Do

There are certain skills that many freight engineers have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed communication skills, customer-service skills and hand-eye coordination.

How To Become a Freight Engineer

If you're interested in becoming a freight engineer, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 50.0% of freight engineers have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 0.0% of freight engineers have master's degrees. Even though some freight engineers have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.

Average Salary for a Freight Engineer

Freight Engineers in America make an average salary of $55,585 per year or $27 per hour. The top 10 percent makes over $76,000 per year, while the bottom 10 percent under $40,000 per year.
Average Freight Engineer Salary
$55,585 Yearly
$26.72 hourly

What Am I Worth?

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Roles and Types of Freight Engineer

There are several types of freight engineer, including:

Engineer

Role:

Engineers design and develop new products in a variety of different industries. They might be mechanical or software engineers or create electric machinery, design chemical or geotechnical processes, or help to structure civil or management disciplines. Whatever the case may be, engineers are involved in creating the diverse technologies that facilitate the processes of our lives in different areas. Combining creative thinking with the principles of mathematics and science using a wide range of technical skills, engineers work on the design, manufacturing, installation, and maintenance of various products from machines, vehicles, buildings, and roads to software or social processes serving consumers, businesses, and societies.

Engineers are creative thinkers and brilliant problem solvers. They excel at mathematical, scientific, and mechanical analysis. They follow plans and blueprints with a strong focus, yet remain flexible and work well under pressure.

Engineers develop systems for solving various problems as members of a team. They know that a single component is worthless without their counterparts, so they have to be great communicators, as well, to be successful at their job.

  • Average Salary: $92,077
  • Degree: Bachelor's Degree

Train Engineer

Role:

As a child, were you fascinated with toy cars? How about toy trains? Some people never outgrew their love and fascination with trains. Some people choose to build a career in it! Are you curious about careers that will let you work closely with locomotives? Well, one such profession is a train engineer! Train engineers operate trains, ensuring that they arrive safely to their destination.

There are various paths to becoming a trained engineer, but they all start with getting a high school diploma and completing the required training program. Then, they often start as brake operators, train conductors, or switch operators. Based on their skill and competence, they get promoted.

Train engineers are also responsible for checking the train and ensuring that all parts are working well. They are also alert at all times for any possible emergency. If you want to be a train engineer, you need to show responsibility. You should know how to monitor different diagnostics on a train. You should also be quick on your feet and make decisions on the go.

  • Average Salary: $82,531
  • Degree: Bachelor's Degree

States With The Most Freight Engineer Jobs

Number Of Freight Engineer Jobs By State

RankStateNumber of JobsAverage Salary
1California2,048$57,951
2Texas963$49,105
3New York744$68,801
4Virginia700$57,824
5Florida657$52,511
6Pennsylvania626$68,692
7Illinois527$57,187
8Washington509$68,568
9Georgia491$45,447
10Maryland471$59,681
11New Jersey445$66,983
12Massachusetts422$64,024
13Ohio418$47,434
14Michigan395$59,938
15Colorado362$52,731
16North Carolina357$49,671
17Oregon299$58,609
18Arizona282$43,651
19Indiana257$41,576
20Minnesota239$61,429
21Tennessee194$50,886
22Alabama192$54,715
23Missouri184$52,242
24Utah174$58,904
25Wisconsin171$42,648
26Connecticut155$72,401
27South Carolina148$43,919
28Louisiana109$49,376
29Oklahoma106$44,002
30Iowa103$55,680
31Kansas91$53,112
32Kentucky91$42,437
33Arkansas88$37,906
34Delaware80$69,679
35Idaho77$41,667
36New Hampshire75$70,773
37Nebraska75$58,604
38Nevada72$61,128
39Mississippi55$58,083
40Maine51$73,749
41New Mexico50$39,502
42Rhode Island43$72,715
43West Virginia34$59,422
44Alaska33$70,178
45Hawaii33$41,815
46Vermont32$60,373
47Montana32$44,315
48Wyoming27$57,884
49South Dakota19$44,119
50North Dakota14$57,610

Freight Engineer Education

Freight Engineer Majors

Freight Engineer Degrees

Bachelors

50.0 %

High School Diploma

20.0 %

Associate

20.0 %

Top Skills For a Freight Engineer

The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 42.4% of freight engineers listed safety rules on their resume, but soft skills such as communication skills and customer-service skills are important as well.

Freight Engineer diversity

Freight Engineer Gender Distribution

Male
Male
88%
Female
Female
12%

After extensive research and analysis, Zippia's data science team found that:

  • Among freight engineers, 12.0% of them are women, while 88.0% are men.

  • The most common race/ethnicity among freight engineers is White, which makes up 70.1% of all freight engineers.

Online Courses For Freight Engineer That You May Like

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1. Setting the Stage for Success: An Eye on Safety Culture and Teamwork (Patient Safety II)

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Safety culture is a facet of organizational culture that captures attitudes, beliefs, perceptions, and values about safety. A culture of safety is essential in high reliability organizations and is a critical mechanism for the delivery of safe and high-quality care. It requires a strong commitment from leadership and staff. In this course, a safe culture is promoted through the use of identifying and reporting patient safety hazards, accountability and transparency, involvement with patients...

2. Junos Routing, Operations, and Maintenance

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In this course, we will explain basic routing concepts including routing policy, routing and forwarding tables, routing instances, and Junos OS routing configuration basics. This course will also explain the concepts and configuration basics of user authentication, the various types of interfaces found on network devices, archiving configurations, configuring and analyzing system logging and tracing, and configuring SNMP for collecting and organizing information about managed devices. Other...

3. Freight Broker Training

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4.6
(1,515)

Learn How To Become A Freight Broker...

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Top Freight Engineer Employers

Most Common Employers For Freight Engineer

RankCompanyAverage SalaryHourly RateJob Openings
1GE Capital$115,952$55.751
2C.R. England$76,348$36.711
3HDR$74,092$35.621
4Millis Transfer$72,806$35.001
5Genesee & Wyoming$69,906$33.611
6Cypress Truck Lines$69,098$33.221
7BNSF Railway$68,930$33.144
8Pride Transport$68,552$32.962
9James H Clark & Son$68,072$32.731
10Black Box$66,660$32.052