DUCK BOAT OPERATOR WAS WARNED.
A private inspector says he warned the company operating duck boats on a Missouri lake about design flaws putting the watercraft at greater risk of sinking, less than a year before the accident that killed 17 people during a sudden storm.
Steve Paul, owner of the Test Drive Technologies inspection service in St. Louis, said he issued a written report for the company in August 2017. It explained why the boats’ engines — and pumps that remove water from their hulls — might fail in inclement weather.
He also told The Associated Press that the tourist boats’ canopies make them hard to escape when they sink — a concern raised by regulators after a similar sinking in Arkansas killed 13 people in 1999.
A similar warning came from a former chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), who said duck boats aren’t designed for commercial recreational use.
James Hall said Saturday that the boat’s design makes the Second World War era vessels prone to the kind of accidents that led to the sinking of a duck boat Thursday on a Missouri lake.
Hall said the amphibious vessel should be banned from such use. He said he doesn’t believe there’s a way to make them safe, particularly in bad weather.
A memorial service was held Sunday afternoon at the College of the Ozarks, near Table Rock Lake, where the duck boat sank Thursday,
The accident also is raising questions about whether storm warnings in the area went unheeded and whether any agency can keep boaters off the water when inclement weather approaches.
“If you have the information that you could have rough waters or a storm coming, why ever put a boat on that water?” Paul said.
A witness’ video of the duck boat just before it capsized suggests that its flexible plastic windows might have been closed and could have trapped passengers as the hybrid boat-truck went down. It does not show passengers jumping clear.
“The biggest problem with a duck when it sinks is that canopy,” Paul said. “That canopy becomes what I’ll call a people catcher, and people can’t get out.”
Nine of the people who died were part of one Indiana family. Online fundraisers have raised nearly US$400,000 for their funeral expenses.
Two GoFundMe campaigns are underway for the Coleman family, who lost three generations in the duck boat accident.
GoFundMe spokeswoman Katherine Cichy says it’s verified one campaign that’s raising money. Ingrid Coleman Douglas tells The Indianapolis Star a second campaign is also legitimate.
Others killed were from Missouri, Arkansas and Illinois.
Since 1999, duck boats have been linked to the deaths of more than 40 people, with a troubled safety record on the road and water alike.
Their height can obscure cars, pedestrians or bicycles from a driver’s view, and maintenance problems can be severe.
Paul said he won’t know until the boat is recovered from the lake whether it’s one of the two dozen he inspected for Ripley Entertainment in August 2017.
The U.S. Coast Guard said the boat that sank was built in 1944 and had passed an inspection in February, The Kansas City Star reported. But Paul said the boat would have been heavily modified to make it longer so that only part of it dates to the Second World War. He said it would still have the design flaw he identified in his report.
He declined to share a copy of his report with The Associated Press but said he said he is willing to make it available to authorities.
“I’m sure eventually it will be subpoenaed,” he said.
Paul said the duck boats he inspected — which the company had just purchased or repaired — vented exhaust from the motor out front and below the water line.
He said in rough conditions, water could get into the exhaust system, and then into the motor, cutting it off. With the motor off, he said, its pump for removing water from the hull would not operate.