Duck tours, or DUKW tours, are tours that take place on purpose-built amphibious tour buses or military surplus DUKWs and LARC-Vs. Duck tours are primarily offered as tourist attractions in harbor, river and lake cities.
Origin
The first "duck tour" company was started in 1946 by Mel Flath and Bob Unger in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin. Flath's company has changed ownership since, but it is still in operation under the name Original Wisconsin Ducks. His family continues to operate a duck company called the Dells Army Ducks in the Wisconsin Dells Area.
Regional
DUKWs operated by Boston Duck Tours have been used at least five times since 2004 for "rolling rallies" to celebrate sports championships by New England-based local pro sports teams. The Boston Celtics celebrated their 2008 championship, the New England Patriots celebrated their championships (including February 2017) and the Boston Red Sox celebrated their 2004, 2007, and 2013 World Series victories with a parade of 17 DUKWs carrying members of the team over land and across the Charles River. The Boston Bruins also celebrated their 2011 Stanley Cup title with a duck boat parade.
The Seafair Pirates in Seattle use a DUKW "Moby Duck" modified to look like a Spanish Galleon as their primary means of amphibious transport.
Liverpool's 'Yellow Duckmarine' tours (as at June 2013) had 4 DUKWs, of which one saw service in the D-day landings. These are no longer operating due to the liquidation of the company.
London's "London Duck Tours limited", currently owns 13 vessels of which multiple saw action in D-day. They are currently the only company currently operating DUKWs in the UK
Viking Splash Tours in Dublin operate 6 Dukws in Dublin City using a Viking theme as a basis for the tour encouraging passengers to wear Viking helmets and 'raid' the city by roaring at 'the Celts'.
There was also a Duck offering rides at Instow in Devon. It was built on Jersey in 1998 and operated as a ferry taking passengers to Elizabeth Castle until 2006. The operator in Jersey had three â€" the other two have gone to Krakow and Berlin.
Almost all have since been repainted, and given modern diesel engines and some have enclosed tops, making them more resemble conventional buses. Others are warm-weather only, open-air vehicles, with an optional canopy. Most require a bus-type Public Service Vehicle license and a passenger-use boat license.
In Australia at the Rainforestation Nature Park at Kuranda in Queensland a fleet of DUKWs are used to take visitors through a typical rain forest environment. The DUKWs travel along a tight twisty track through the forest before entering a small lake where their amphibious capabilities are demonstrated.
Incidents
Fatal incidents
In 1999 a DUKW sank in Hot Springs, Arkansas, killing 13 of the 20 people on board.
On June 23, 2002, the Lady Duck, a custom-built vehicle converted from a Ford F-350 pickup truck, sank while a cruise on the Ottawa River in Ontario, Canada. Six passengers, the driver, and the tour guide escaped, but four passengers were trapped under the sunken vehicle's canopy and drowned. A review found problems with regulating such vehicles and defects in the makeshift design and the emergency procedures.
On July 7, 2010, a regulated and modern Ride the Ducks amphibious bus (based on the original design), was disabled by an engine fire and later run over by a barge on the Delaware River in Philadelphia. The operator of the tug pushing the barge was on his personal cell phone. Before the accident the Ride The Ducks captain made numerous calls to the tug to get the tug to change course. Those calls were heard and rebroadcast by other vessels, but there was no response from the operator of the tug. Thirty-three passengers and two crew members were quickly recovered, but two passengers, a 20-year-old man and a 16-year-old girl, both part of a tour group from Hungary, were killed. The NTSB determined that the probable cause of the accident was the Tugboat mate's (responsible for driving the tug at the time) inattention to his duties. The tugboat mate was sentenced to 366 days in federal prison.
On May 8, 2015, a Ride the Ducks boat struck and killed a woman crossing the street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania's Chinatown section. Witnesses at the scene say that the woman was distracted by her handheld tablet device and walked into the street against the red light and was struck while in the boat's front center blind spot. The incident is still being investigated.
On September 24, 2015, a Ride the Ducks vehicle in Seattle, Washington crashed into a charter bus on the Aurora Bridge, killing five passengers on the bus, critically injuring eight, and seriously injuring eight more.
On April 29, 2016, in Boston, Massachusetts, a 29-year-old woman was killed after the motor scooter she was operating collided with a Duck Boat, as both vehicles turned onto Beacon Street adjacent to the Boston Common.
Non-fatal incidents
In 2010 a bearing collapsed on a DUKW belonging to The Yellow Duckmarine which resulted in four passengers, including an 80-year-old person, being taken to hospital with injuries.
On 11 October 2011 a motorcyclist was critically injured after a Seattle 'Ride The Ducks' vehicle hit and dragged him at a red light. Ride The Ducks has been involved in two other collisions in recent years, in December 2010 and June 2011, when different Duck drivers rear-ended passenger vehicles at Third Avenue and Pike Street and at Aurora Avenue North and Denny Way. No one was injured, but both Duck drivers told officers they didn’t see the cars because of the height of their own vehicles, according to the collision reports.
On 30 March 2013 a duck boat of The Yellow Duckmarine in Liverpool sank in the city's Salthouse Dock during a tour. All passengers were safely transferred to a pontoon before the vehicle began to sink. In June 2013 another duck boat, operated by the same company, sank in the Albert Dock as it came to the end of a tour of Liverpool. Passengers were forced to jump into the water as the vehicle rapidly took on water. Some were rescued by vessels while others swam to the side of the dock. Out of the 31 people on board, 27 were treated in hospital for minor injuries. The incident resulted in the Maritime and Coastguard Agency withdrawing all safety certificates for the craft owned by Pearlwild and their entering administration. Pearlwild are also under investigation by the North West Traffic Commissioner over the operation of the Duckmarines during 2012.
On 29 September 2013 a duck boat on the River Thames in London caught fire. Thirty people were rescued, a number of them after having jumped into the River Thames to escape the fire. An investigation by the Marine Accident Investigation Branch determined that the fire had been caused by ignition of additional buoyancy foam added to the DUKW following the Liverpool incident, due to obstruction of airflow within the mechanical compartments and friction between the foam and moving parts.
Trademark
The phrase "duck tour" and the duck cartoon have been deemed generic and not trademark-able by the First Circuit in the United States.
References
