NTSB releases initial review of duck boat video recording system
The National Transportation Safety Board released its initial review on Friday of the digital video recorder system recovered from last week’s deadly sinking of DUKW “Stretch Boat 7” near Branson.
Initial Review of Duck Boat Digital Video Recorder
System Completed: https://t.co/uRo6bT9ZOM
— NTSB_Newsroom (@NTSB_Newsroom) July 27, 2018
According to the NTSB, 29 passengers and two crew members were onboard the “Ride The Ducks” amphibious vehicle when it sank during a storm on Table Rock Lake on July 19.
One crew member and 16 passengers were killed.
The NTSB said recorded media on an SD card and a removable hard drive from the vehicle’s digital video recorder camera system was recovered by divers before the duck boat was removed from the bottom of the lake on Monday.
All of the recovered files were sent to the NTSB laboratory in Washington, D.C.
The vehicle’s digital video recorder recorded five channels of video that included four outward facing and one inward facing camera. The audio was also recorded.
The boat’s captain and driver boarded the empty duck boat at 6:27 p.m., according to the timeline. At 6:29, the captain “made a verbal reference to looking at the weather radar prior to the trip.” The Storm Prediction Center had warned of a storm the day before, and storm had reached a town just 30 miles north of the lake at that time.
The National Weather Service issued a severe thunderstorm warning at 6:32 p.m. One minute later, according to the NTSB, the boat took off from the terminal to the lake.
The boat arrived at the lake at 6:50, the timeline said, and the captain briefed the 29 passengers about the location of life jackets and emergency exits. A source told CNN last Sunday that none of the victims were wearing life jackets.
At 6:55 p.m., the duck boat entered the water, 23 minutes after the NWS’ severe storm warning. The captain allowed children to sit in the driver’s seat.
“The water appeared calm at this time,” the NTSB said in its timeline.
ABC 17 Stormtrack Chief Meteorologist Sharon Ray said by that time, the storm had made it to Indian Point, just north of the boat’s location. The storm carried winds of nearly 60 miles per hour, and made it to the lake itself minutes later.
The NTSB said video shows whitecaps forming on the water seconds after 7 p.m. The captain took his place behind the wheel at this time, and even made a comment on the storm. The timeline notes two times when the captain used a handheld radio, but said the audio of those calls were “currently unintelligible.”
The inward-facing video stops at 7:08:27, with the boat still above water.
An NTSB recorder group made up of several experts plans to meet at NTSB headquarters to validate the recordings and to create a detailed account of what happened to the vehicle.
The U.S. Coast Guard, Missouri State Highway Patrol, Ride the Ducks, Branson and the National Weather Service are all helping the NTSB.
Click on this link to view the NTSB’s initial review of the vehicle’s digital recording system.
