NDT operator certification: Part 6. Work Experience

As usual I will begin with a brief review of the Certification document status at the time of going to press. There have been no further changes to the documents since last month. However, the discussions to bring together EN 4179 and NAS 410 continue; there is also a proposal up for consideration in the next review of ISO 9712 which considers 'recertification without re-examination' - a sort of perpetual renewal for NDT Certificates; this may, in turn, be adopted by EN 473 in due course. The effect of this would be to make the employer's role in respect of the operator's authorisation to work much more important, as he would need to closely review the last time that the candidate was actually examined on practical samples to ensure he (the employer) was confident about the technician's continuing competence. That said, let us move on to this month's subject - Work Experience. This article will review the different attitudes towards Work Experience by the major documents - SNT-TC-1A and associated employer-based standards, EN 4179, NAS 410 and the Central Certification Programmes EN473/PCN/ISO9712.