Duck boat tragedy creates concerns for Wilmington boat tours

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — A deadly duck boat accident is raising questions about how safe tour boats are in the Cape Fear.

After a severe thunderstorm led to the deaths of 17 people riding on a tour boat in Missouri, one Wilmington tour boat captain is speaking out.

“If there’s any doubt, we just don’t go out,” said Wilmington Water Tours owner and Captain Doug Springer.

“The two big things that we really look for is lightning and wind, and then, you know, you really have to pay attention to visibility as well,” said Springer.

Springer uses high tech gear to avoid bad weather.

“We use NOAA as a source, we watch it on an hourly minute-by-minute basis, we have radar, we have weather radar on the boat,” said Springer.

Coast Guard spokesman Kip Wadlow says while they do warn boaters of bad weather, they cannot force them to go to shore.

“The last thing we want is for somebody to be injured, when possibly they could’ve stayed in port and, you know, protected themselves, their crew, and their passengers,” said Wadlow.

Another thing the Coast Guard does is annual and random inspections.

According to reports, the duck boat that sank in Missouri had documented equipment failures in the past.

Springer says that isn’t the case with his tour boat.

“Our catamaran was the first multi-hull vessel to go through all the coast guard requirements after an accident in Baltimore many years ago. And they were on board every week as we were building and constructing this boat. So I would say this particular boat is definitely one of the safest boats in the US right now,” he said.

We will continue to post updates on this story and more information becomes available.