SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
posted by
martyb
on Thursday July 26 2018, @08:01AM
from the if-it-walks-like-a-duck,-sinks-like-a-duck,-oh,-wait... dept.
from the if-it-walks-like-a-duck,-sinks-like-a-duck,-oh,-wait... dept.
The Los Angeles Times reports:
The duck boat that sank in a Missouri lake last week, killing 17 people, was built based on a design by a self-taught entrepreneur who had no engineering training, according to court records reviewed by the Los Angeles Times.
The designer, entrepreneur Robert McDowell, completed only two years of college and had no background, training or certification in mechanics when he came up with the design for "stretch" duck boats more than two decades ago, according to a lawsuit filed over a roadway disaster in Seattle involving a similar duck boat in 2015.
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
Duck Boat in Missouri Disaster was Designed by Entrepreneur With no Engineering Training
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 69 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
belief, n:
Something you do not believe.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @10:48AM (19 children)
If vessels based on his designs have been in use for 20 years, then trying to pass the blame on to the duck-boat designer is ridiculous. This accident is a horrible tragedy, but find your scapegoat somewhere else.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday July 26 2018, @11:34AM (8 children)
Agreed, the boat operators had plenty of history and knowledge of the vessel and its characteristics.
I've taken tourist rides in converted freight train cars with seats made of 2x10 lumber, I'm sure there was a certain lack of pedigree in the designer's background, but the tour operator wasn't barreling us down 30 degree inclines at 70 miles per hour - they were operating their vehicle in a safe manner for its design, condition and environment. I'd expect engineering degrees from someone designing a 70mph roller coaster, but not a tour train that tops out at 20mph, and usually operates closer to 7mph.
The rough waters of the lake during that storm would have been a problem to any tour boat, if the tour boat was designed like a North Atlantic life-pod for a cruise ship - nobody would take the tour. It's first up to the captain, and second up to the tour company who hires the captain, to operate their vessels in a safe manner.
I am a little surprised that so many people failed to put on personal floatation and ride the storm out on their vests - that, and getting caught by the weather, would seem to fall on the captain.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Weasley on Thursday July 26 2018, @02:45PM (4 children)
What good does a personal flotation device do if you're trapped in the boat? At least I assume that must be the case. Could there have been that many people on the boat that can't swim?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @03:29PM (1 child)
From what I've seen, many (most? all?) of the victims fall into a particular demographic of people who aren't good at swimming.
Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Fatal Unintentional Drowning Among Persons Aged ≤29 Years — United States, 1999–2010 [cdc.gov]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @10:27PM
I thought their afros would help them float?
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @04:15PM
It's one thing to swim in calm water, but quite another to do so during a storm. Yes, if you were trapped under the boat you'd be screwed, but if you weren't a life jacket would help even a good swimmer. You really want all the help you can get.
Admittedly, most of my experience is on the great lakes and not smaller ones... but a good captain is supposed to ensure that everyone on board gets their life jackets ready at the first sign of bad weather. I don't mean when the waves start to get bad, I mean when you first notice a storm on a horizon or hear about it over the radio. The winds and chop show up before the actual storm does, and if you aren't ready you might not have the chance to get ready depending on the strength of the storm.
Saying "nah, we don't need it" is how you end up with these people in the water and all the life jackets in the boat. Not a good situation, and they probably wouldn't have made it worse had they been worn.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Thursday July 26 2018, @04:32PM
There's a video online of the whole ordeal - I haven't seen it, but from what I've heard it took quite a while between when it was obvious there was a serious problem and when the boat started going down.
Even if you can't swim, a PFD will float you face up. A great captain wouldn't have been caught out by the storm. An adequate captain would have recognized he was screwed and gotten everyone into their PFDs before it started getting bad.
Now, if people don't heed the call to abandon ship, there's not much a captain can do, but when it started looking bad enough to go down, I'd have gotten out a rope and told the strongest swimmers to take the end and swim away from the boat, and had the floaters jump in after them. But, not every disaster story goes well, and just because you've been a captain for 16 years doesn't mean you're not capable of panic.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @04:40PM
Actually, the first question to ask is: Why was the boat on the water during the storm?
Where I live, all the boats are required to leave the lake in case of storm warning. And in modern times, it's not exactly that storms catch you by surprise. There's always a sufficient warning period to get off the lake.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @10:05PM (1 child)
> I'd expect engineering degrees from someone designing a 70mph roller coaster
And you might be disappointed. I've read a personally published memoir by a leading roller coaster designer (published by photocopy) who designed a number of large rides for Disney, Six Flags, etc. Don't think he has any degrees at all. It includes his engineering calculations which stop at simple particle physics (like calculating accelerations for turns of different radii and speed). Nothing but the most basic of stress calculations, no fatigue calculations or experiments. If these rides were reliable it's because they were wildly overbuilt (not a bad thing, but not what I expected to be reading).
This guy's career was in the 60s-80s, things may have changed in the amusement ride business since then?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday July 27 2018, @12:25AM
Well, when I say degrees, I'd rather have actual practical knowledge than degrees any day. I know far too many engineers who essentially purchased their degrees and can't explain much less perform an integral to save their lives.
I knew an engineer with zero college who did metalwork design, knew his cad inside and out, could calculate a load with the best of 'em. That was in the '90s, I think the may have been the last of his kind - so many degreed engineers out of work who can get the job first, especially in big corporations which demand such things.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by deadstick on Thursday July 26 2018, @12:11PM (2 children)
We drove unsafe auto designs for a helluva lot longer than that. As for personal flotation devices: those would have worked splendidly in the original WW2 DUKW's. But put an enclosure over the boat, and you have a deathtrap for anyone who hasn't been trained to use them effectively.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @02:48PM (1 child)
We did, but a lot of that had to do with the fact that the engineering necessary to make them safer hadn't been developed yet. The biggest things have been highly advanced technology like ABS and ESC which greatly reduce the likelihood of a vehicle tipping over or going out of the intended path of travel while braking.
A lot of those deaths are also unrelated to the technology, for much of that time it wasn't illegal to drink and drive and there wasn't much of an effort to inform people about how dangerous it was until sometime in the '80s. Also, it wasn't until sometime in the '80s that it become legally required to wear a seat belt.
Also, unlike the ducks there just wasn't a particularly viable alternative for longer trips back then and even in town, having horses has it's own set of logistical issues.
(Score: 2) by deadstick on Friday July 27 2018, @01:42AM
The best thing one can say about 50's cars is that horses are positively lethal in comparison. I doubt there's any more dangerous "vehicle" that's ever been used for routine personal transportation.
One of my mom's childhood memories was of a man lying dead with a horseshoe print on his face...
(Score: 2) by mobydisk on Thursday July 26 2018, @12:53PM (3 children)
Both Wikipedia and the LA times article say they are military surplus. So why are they crediting some random guy as the "designer." Did this person design the logo? Or come-up with the idea of them being tour boats?
(Score: 5, Informative) by Immerman on Thursday July 26 2018, @01:54PM (1 child)
Read more carefully - these were modified "stretch" duck boats whose hull had been lengthened to carry more passengers, as well as having a canopy added to trap passengers inside if it capsized.
(Score: 2) by mobydisk on Thursday July 26 2018, @03:21PM
Yes, you are right. It is quite clear from the article that these are different boats.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 26 2018, @02:31PM
I'm assuming this line in the summary is why:
he came up with the design for "stretch" duck boats
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Thursday July 26 2018, @04:25PM (1 child)
People can easily do horribly unsafe things and use horribly unsafe machinery for long periods of time without injury or death... until an injury or death occurs.
Some questions [calpoly.edu] that we might ask about equipment to which we will briefly entrust our lives (adapted from the linked article):
I would submit that the question "How many 20-year periods have happened where we got away without consequences" is similar to the "What's the failure rate" question, and as I understand it, the 20-year safety record isn't great, as demonstrated by the previous incidents [people.com] with the equipment:
Further, the six questions above are adapted from an article on a piece of equipment with a much better safety record than the Duck Boats in question--only three deaths and three injuries, ever--that's now literally a textbook example of how poor design and relying on the attitude underlying your post leads to dead people who needn't have died: The THERAC-25. The linked article about it, above, is fittingly entitled "Death and Denial." The article was written in 2001 about events from the mid to late 80's. The point you are trying to make is late to the party.
In short, you are entitled to your opinion, and I appreciate your sharing it, but I disagree, and offer the foregoing in support of my position.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday July 26 2018, @07:37PM
The duck boats are much safer that Therac-25 based on the number of "riders" vs. number of deaths or serious injuries. It's even worse for the Therac if you compare serious injuries or deaths while in normal operation. Duck boats don't normally operate in storms with 80 MPH winds.
That's not to say there can't be improvements, there can always be improvements.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday July 26 2018, @07:17PM
Especially given:
This strikes me as a lawyer playing pin the suit on the donkey.