In wake of Missouri tragedy, local boating talks safety
Duck boats can travel on land or in the water. Safety advocates have complained that there is no standard set of safety requirements for the vehicles, and after a tragedy like the one in Branson, we look here on the Central Coast where much of our local tourism involves boating in the ocean or the Elkhorn Slough.
The accident in Branson is a tragedy that could happen anywhere in the world, but tour vessels here in the Monterey Bay tell us they go through every possible precaution they can to keep their passengers safe.
Touring companies like Sea Goddess Whale Watching in Moss Landing have been taking tourists out to the Pacific Ocean to see all kinds of sea life for years. They take almost 90 passengers out to sea three times a day, seven days a week, and say they skip no steps in making sure every passenger is safe.
Besides the normal checks in the morning to make sure the boat is in perfect shape, they keep a constant eye on weather forecasts before heading out on an expedition. They hate having to cancel a tour, but will if need be for safety reasons.
“If it’s too windy for us to get off the dock safely, that’s a no go. If it’s too choppy out there, especially on a passenger vessel, there’s a lot of seas that I run in with commercial boats that, you know, you just go, but when you have passengers on board, anything that’s really choppy or just too windy, we’re just not gonna take off,” said Sea Goddess Whale Watching Captian Julia O’Hern.
They say they’ll also provide rain checks if they get out into the open water and start experiencing bad weather. We was told there’s also a great relationship between the coast guard and all captains from different whale watching companies who are always trying to communicate with one another about the weather and even spots where the most whales might be found that day.
Captain Julia of the Sea Goddess told me she’s from the Midwest and has seen how winds can pick up massive speed out of nowhere. She says luckily, that’s not as common out on the ocean, but extreme caution is always used no matter what.
