Duck boat, two bodies recovered
Coeur d'Alene Press | UPDATED 15 years, 5 months AGO
<p>An amphibious craft is salvaged from the Delaware River in Philadelphia on Friday. The sightseeing boat that stalled in the Delaware River was knocked over by an oncoming barge Wednesday, spilling 37 people overboard and leaving two passengers unaccounted for. Their bodies were found on Friday.</p>
PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Two days after a barge crashed into a stopped tourist boat, leaving two Hungarian tourists missing, authorities retrieved two bodies from the Delaware River, including a girl identified as one of the victims. Identification of the second body was pending.
The body of a girl later identified as 16-year-old Dora Schwendtner was spotted by a crew on a fishing boat before dawn Friday about two miles downriver from the site of Wednesday's crash.
The second body was retrieved later in the day, after a barge brought in to help to lift the duck boat off the river's bottom was moved.
Authorities could not immediately confirm whether the body was that of Szabolcs Prem, 20, the other missing Hungarian tourist.
The six-wheeled duck boat, carrying 35 passengers and two crew, was struck by the barge on Wednesday around 2:40 p.m.
The tourist boat's crew told investigators they shut off the engine after white smoke that smelled like burning rubber came out of the hood.
It was stopped five to 10 minutes before the crash.
Crew members said they told passengers to put on life jackets just before the barge struck the boat.
Within seconds it capsized and sank, though all but two people were rescued without serious injury.
On Friday, pulling the bodies and the amphibious boat from the water closed the recovery efforts that attracted scores of onlookers to the river's banks and caused the Delaware River to be closed to pleasure boats.
Now, investigators are left with several questions: How did the crash happen? What caused the duck boat to spew smoke? Did its skipper let other vessels know? Did the captain and crew of the tug pushing the empty barge know - or should they have known - the duck boat was idle in the water, its anchor deployed?
The NTSB spent Friday interviewing the two crew members and 16 passengers on the duck boat.
"They told amazing stories of heroism," said NTSB member Robert Sumwalt. "One young man said he gave his life jacket to someone else, then he swam to shore."
Interviews with the five crew on the tug were scheduled for Saturday.
The federal crew expected to remain in Philadelphia about a week longer, but will continue their probe in Washington.
One issue to be examined is whether the tug boat was able to see the duck boat in the water because of any blind spot, an issue known to tug boat pilots.