#.it should be mandatory in order to gain a recreational ship licence..as has been in commercial industry for years
My God what a thought!! The very idea makes my blood run cold. Having spent a lifetime in communications there are few things in life that I dislike more than radios.
I don't have one and will not have one. The first thing that was taken off one of the boats I bought was the radio. Chucked it straight into the bin and immediately felt better.
The way to sort out all of the procedural crap of how to communicate via radio would be to ban voice and bring back morse code.
And I wish that boaties who love radio would operate with headsets rather than having the speakers blare garbage for hours on end. A few trips to the Pin have been ruined by incessant chatter coming from other boats speakers. Why a radio is used in calm water is beyond me. How much trouble can you get into at the Pin? If the boat is sinking then couldn't they just leap overboard and swim for a few metres and then walk?- it's shallow enough.
I had better stop. This could run on for hours without even touching on the subject of self reliance and those dreadful rescue organisations who are so keen to see us all captured in the net of safety.