Iowa Government
If you’ve been watching the news, you know that Iowa has a new law regarding cellphone usage. It now requires hands free operation while driving. Included in the law is an exemption for radio operators who are licensed by the FCC. Please operate your radio carefully, pay attention to your driving and surroundings.
We all benefited from the actions of Alan WBØOAV who have been following this bill for several years. His work with the legislature resulted in the exemption.
Thank You!
SITUATIONAL AWARENESS!
As a complete aside to this new law, I can’t help but add the Situational Awareness topic. In my professional life at Collins Aerospace (the current name), I worked on aircraft safety. I was part of an SAE committee that wrote the guidelines for aircraft certification. Much of what we did was technical analysis of the aircraft systems, but a very significant part of the big picture was constantly asking ourselves “What would the pilot do in this situation?”
Occasionally, a small plane crashes because the pilot is focused on one thing (like changing a channel on your radio), but losing the situational awareness (what is going on around me or in the adjacent lane). As we (myself included) age, this mental issue becomes a bigger problem. So I encourage all of you to be careful when driving and operating a radio. Having this exemption will keep you from getting a ticket while using the microphone, but be good responsible courteous drivers. Please pull off the road for a moment if you need to tune your radio, just like the law instructs drivers who are using their phones to text.