There are ways to make duck boats safer

Duck boats can be fun to ride. Amphibious vehicles with a history that goes back to the D-Day landing in World War II, they draw tourists for sightseeing trips that glide effortlessly from land into water like, well, ducks.

But they can also be deadly, as tragically proven last week in a raging storm on Table Rock Lake in Branson, Missouri, where 17 people, including nine members of one family, drowned.

Duck boat operators — and the federal agencies supposed to regulate and oversee them — have had plenty of warnings about the dangers after other fatal accidents.

The deadliest, until now, occurred nearly 20 years ago, when the Miss Majestic sank in just about a minute on a Arkansas lake, killing 13, including three children. The National Transportation Safety Board investigated and, in a 2002 report, warned of the boats’ inherent dangers and recommended numerous safety fixes.

The key was that operators provide “reserve buoyancy” for the boats, which are “vulnerable to rapid swamping and sinking.” Survivors of the Miss Majestic said the boat sank so swiftly, there wasn’t time for passengers to escape.

The Coast Guard, which regulates the boats’ water operations, did not agree with the recommendation and instead offered alternative approaches to making duck boats stable and preventing passengers from being trapped in a sinking vessel.

After last week’s disaster, former NTSB Chairman Jim Hall said the boats should be banned. But more than 100 were operating early this year and short of banning them, these common sense steps by operators and regulators might have prevented the tragedy and could go a long way to preventing future ones:

On the day of the accident, a severe thunderstorm watch for southwest Missouri, including Table Rock Lake, was issued at 11:20 a.m. The first “severe thunderstorm warning,” meaning a storm was imminent, came at 6:32 p.m., and authorities got their first report of the sinking boat about half an hour later. It’s unclear precisely when the boat went into the water. But in a era when weather radar is available on every smartphone, it’s inexcusable for operators, who hold passengers’ safety in their hands, to be taken by surprise by severe storms.

One survivor said that while crew members pointed out where the life jackets were, they said there was no need to put them on. Talk about asking for trouble. Life jackets should be mandated, which would require another change long sought by the NTSB. If the canopy creates a hazard, roll it back when the boat’s in the water. The NTSB warned in 2002 that canopies can trap passengers, which could also happen when they are wearing life jackets and float to the top of the water in an accident. The answer is to fix the dual problems.

Watch the weather. Mandate life preservers. Improve buoyancy.

The 1999 sinking showed how vulnerable duck boats are when they take on water. The Coast Guard in its final report concluded that had the boat “been fitted with watertight compartmentation or flotation materials,” it would not have sunk or it would have gone down slowly enough for passengers to escape. Those changes, if not already required, should be implemented immediately.

Some of those with responsibility for duck boats — including Ripley Entertainment, which owns the Branson location of Ride the Ducks, and the Passenger Vessel Association, which has operators as members — were ducking safety questions Monday.

But someone will have to answer for the 17 tourists who went out for a fun ride Thursday and never came back.