SEATTLE — The Missouri-based manufacturer of the amphibious Ride the Duck tour vehicle that crashed on Seattle’s Aurora Bridge last year, killing five people, has agreed to pay up to $1 million in civil fines for violating federal safety regulations, U.S. transportation officials announced Tuesday.
Ride the Ducks International, which built the Duck No. 6 that crashed in Seattle, entered into the federal consent order after admitting it failed to notify federal transportation regulators and issue a recall — as required — of its so-called “Stretch Duck” vehicles after discovering they potentially had defective front axles.
Instead, RTDI inspected and modified the affected vehicles it still owned and issued an October 2013 service bulletin notifying independently owned licensees and other customers that had bought other vehicles subject to the repairs.
Federal investigators later found the local Ride the Ducks of Seattle firm never made the recommended repair to Duck No. 6, which lost control when its axle broke off, then plowed into a bus chartered by North Seattle College, as the vehicles motored across the Aurora Bridge in opposite directions on Sept. 24, 2015.
