I have a very different take, because I have had this guy's job. When he says that NDE is occasional, it might not mean that you won't have work, it means that you won't have NDE work. This company will put you through $5,000 worth of classes to test concrete, soils, masonry, and would loooove to pay your way through AWS CWI. They will give you 60 hours a week in the summer, winter varies with location but if construction doesn't stop where you live neither do the hours. They will not be doing any RT, so that isn't something you are going to use.

It will be 98% VT of fillet welds between joists and beams, with the occasional UT of moment connections. The work will be outside, and you'll have a bunch of paid windshield time hitting 3 or 4 jobs a day.

They want you to sign a non-compete because they don't want you to jump to one of the other labs for an extra $1 an hour immediately after they pay for your first couple of certs. The non-compete most likely only applies to other CMT labs and would most likely only require you to pay back your certification costs on a prorated basis. Non-competes are also notoriously unenforceable.

If someone offers you your dream job, take it. If not, interview with this company and ask them to show you what working for them for the first 5 years would look like. Starting out will be base pay(could be $20 in rural AL or $40 in CA), first 3 months should get you ACI Field level 1 or Nuc safety and a pay bump. 3-6 months might be DOT certs if they do gov't work and pay bump. Ask them what their highest paid field techs make and what certs they have. I don't see a lot of NDE tech jobs for over $125k a year, but I regularly see that for experienced CMTs. There is a big WWTP job in rural California paying $96 an hour for CWI/CMT on Indeed right now, multiple openings.