MISSOURI: Divers on Friday pulled the last bodies from the wreckage of a “duck boat” that sank a day earlier during a storm in a lake near a popular Missouri destination, killing 17 people in one of the deadliest US tourist incidents in years.
The World War Two-style amphibious vehicle was filled with 31 passengers including children when a microburst storm hit Table Rock Lake outside Branson, Missouri. A video of the incident showed it battered by waves.
Duck boats have been involved in a string of deadly incidents that have killed more than three dozen people across the United States over the past two decades, by drowning and in crashes on land.
Wendy Doucey, an office manager at the Stone County sheriff’s office, said divers on Friday morning recovered the last four bodies from the sunken duck boat, 80 feet (24 m) under water.
“It’s important that we find out for sure what events did occur,” Missouri Governor Michael Parson said at a Friday morning news conference. “Today it’s just still early.”
The incident began around 7 p.m. (0000 GMT) on Thursday after thunderstorms rolled through the area, when two duck boats were out on the lake, officials said. Both headed back to shore but only one made it.
“From what I understand there was life jackets in the duck,” Stone County Sheriff Doug Rader told the press conference. He declined to say whether passengers had been wearing them.
The National Transportation Safety Board and US Coast Guard are investigating, officials said. Rader noted that the boat’s captain survived the sinking but the driver did not.
Officials did not comment on the identities or ages of the other people who drowned.
