How does “hours of service” rule affect LP gas situation?
Sometimes the propane transport trucks have to wait in line to load the LP gas at terminals in Kansas, Nebraska or other parts of Iowa or Minnesota or Illinois or wherever they go to get the LP gas. And it takes many hours on the road to haul the gas these long distances to Iowa. One of the limitations the trucking companies have is they run out of hours. The driver has to stop and rest every so often. By law, the driver has a certain limited number of hours he or she can drive each day. So the temporary, emergency step taken by the Iowa governor on November 7 will increase the number of hours truckers are allowed to drive as some of the hours they spend with the truck are actually spent sitting in line waiting to load the LP gas. Granting this temporary exemption to the law is up to the governor of each state. “At some of the gas terminals in Iowa, trucks are waiting in line for 10 to 12 hours to fill up with LP gas,” explains Northey. “By the time the truck actually gets loaded, the
