Bloomberg revealed a probe was started in 2015 regarding data center equipment run by Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Apple may have been subject to surveillance from the Chinese government via a tiny microchip inserted during the equipment manufacturing process at factories run by subcontractors in China. The chips were used for gathering intellectual property and trade secrets from American companies and may have been introduced by a Silicon Valley company called Super Micro. Though Apple, AWS and Super Micro deny knowledge of the claims or investigation, a probe that started 3 years ago is still open.
In early 2015, Amazon was looking to expand their web streaming services and began working with Elemental Technologies, based in Oregon. Elemental, which has government contracts, made software for compressing massive video files and formatting them for different devices. Its technology has been used to communicate with the International Space Station and funnel drone footage to the Central Intelligence Agency.
The chips were discovered after AWS hired a third-party security company to scrutinize Elemental’s products. The company examined the servers that customers installed in their networks to handle the video compression. Testers found tiny microchips, not much bigger than a grain of rice, nested on the servers’ motherboards that weren’t part of the boards’ original design. Amazon reported the findings to the US authorities. These servers were assembled for Elemental by Super Micro, who has their servers assembled by manufacturing subcontractors in China.
During the top-secret probe, investigators determined that the chips allowed the attackers to create a doorway into any network that included the altered machines. This kind of tampering is especially hard to accomplish because it means developing a deep understanding of a product’s design, manipulating components at the factory, and ensuring that the doctored devices made it through the global logistics chain to the desired location.
Investigators found that the tampered products eventually affected almost 30 companies, including a major bank, government contractors, and Apple Inc. Apple had planned to order more than 30,000 of its servers in two years for a new global network of data centers. Three senior insiders at Apple say that they also found malicious chips on Super Micro motherboards. Apple severed ties with Super Micro in 2016 for what they officially described as unrelated reasons.
Amazon, Apple and Super Micro deny any knowledge of planted chips though six current and former senior national security officials have detailed the discovery of the chips and the government’s investigation. One government official says China’s goal was long-term access to high-value corporate secrets and sensitive government networks. No consumer data is known to have been stolen.
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The Dallas Mavericks and the basketball team’s owner Mark Cuban were sanctioned by the NBA after an independent investigation substantiated a number of allegations against men within the organization. The findings include improper conduct in the workplace and domestic violence. Mark Cuban publicly apologized and said he will pay $10 million to women’s organizations as part of an agreement with the NBA. Cuban agreed to the $10 million payment as well as staffing and leadership changes.
The sanction came after a months-long investigation into accusations against several employees, including the former team president and chief executive, Terdema Ussery. The investigation arose from an article in Sports Illustrated in February that exposed a workplace filled with problems for female employees. The article said Ussery had engaged in “various acts of inappropriate conduct toward women,” and that Earl Sneed, a former writer for the team’s official website, had faced numerous allegations of domestic violence.
Although Cuban did not face accusations of misconduct, the employees who were mistreated suggested the harassment had gone on for years and that he must have known about it and had done little to prevent it. The investigation included information gathered from more than 200 interviews with current and former Mavericks employees. Ussery was found to have engaged in improper workplace conduct toward 15 female employees, including touching them and making inappropriate comments. Sneed had committed two acts of domestic violence, including one against a co-worker. Cuban was made aware of the episode but did not fire him. Ussery had already resigned from the team in 2015 to take a position with Under Amour. Shortly after the Sports Illustrated article, Sneed announced he would be leaving the team and then deleted his Twitter account.
The investigation also found that Chris Hyde, a longtime senior account executive, had made inappropriate comments toward women, viewed pornography on his workplace computer and made unsolicited sexual advances toward co-workers. Even after Cuban warned Hyde about looking at pornography at the office, Hyde’s inappropriate behavior continued for years.
In a statement, the league announced that the money from Cuban would be donated to a variety of organizations chosen by an advisory council of Mavericks executives, including Cuban, as well as several N.B.A. officials. The inquiry, conducted by independent investigators overseen by the league, also recommended that the Mavericks hire more women, including in leadership positions, and create a formal process for employees to report misconduct. The N.B.A. ordered the Mavericks to file quarterly reports on its progress in those areas, and to begin workplace training for all staff members, including Cuban, 60, who acquired a majority stake of the Mavericks in 2000.
“The findings of the independent investigation are disturbing and heartbreaking,” Commissioner Adam Silver said in a statement, “and no employee in the N.B.A., or any workplace for that matter, should be subject to the type of working environment described in the report.”
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Enfield, CT Police have made a second arrest in connection with the death of 16-year-old Justin Brady, who was fatally stabbed during a fight with another teen outside an Enfield home late Sunday evening. Police have charged 20-year-old Michael Joseph Cerrato, who lives at the home where Brady was killed, with hindering prosecution in connection with the murder. On September 11th, an 18-year-old Hartford teen identified as Shyheim “Trey” Adams was charged with manslaughter in the first degree and is being held on $1 million bail. The most profound question is why no one called 911 sooner.
Shortly after midnight on September 10th, Enfield Police responded to calls of several teens standing around someone laying on the ground. In one call, a neighbor tells the dispatcher that some of the teens kept going in and out of the house next door. Officers found Brady bleeding from multiple stab wounds, clinging to life in a front yard near 15 Hoover Lane. Brady, who was a junior at Enfield High School, where he played football and basketball, was rushed to the hospital where he was later pronounced dead.
Michael Cerrato’s father, the Enfield Assistant Town Attorney, Mark Cerrato, who lives at 15 Hoover Lane where the killing took place, was placed on indefinite paid leave pending the investigation. Mark Cerrato told police he went to bed around 11pm just after telling his son, his son’s girlfriend and a friend he knows as “Trey” to keep the noise down as they were playing video games. In his first interview, Cerrato told police he was awakened shortly after by a knock at the door and a “tall kid was at the door holding 2 phones in his hand saying that his friend needed a doctor and asked Mark if he could bring him.” Cerrato told police he tried to use one of the phones but couldn’t dial because it was locked. In his second interview he told police that he was awakened when he heard the garage door open and saw his son taking his Toyota Rav4. Police searched the home and removed blood stained clothing found in the basement and a knife that was hidden under a mattress in a bedroom.
Police said Brady and Adams had been arguing on social media throughout the day and eventually met outside the Hoover Lane residence to fight. In initial interviews, Michael Cerrato claimed he didn’t see anything and left the house around 11pm. He later admitted that Trey and Brady had been arguing over the phone and thru Snapchat. Trey left the room to take a call and returned saying Brady was on his way over to fight. Cerrato stated that he didn’t believe Trey because he lies a lot and that Justin Brady had previously called him out on it. Cerrato said Brady arrived 15 minutes later and they went outside. Brady and Trey were in the street yelling at each other when Brady hit Trey in the chest. They were wrestling and ended up on the ground. Cerrato says that he heard Brady yell “he’s cutting me” and witnessed his friend stabbing Brady fast from about 10 feet away. Trey took a step back and Justin looked down and was covered in blood, yelling to call 911. Trey ran inside the house and Cerrato followed and saw him washing his hands. Cerrato, who never called 911, says the knife came from inside his home but he did not know Trey had it until the stabbing occurred. Cerrato and his girlfriend left in his father’s SUV and dropped Trey off in Hartford.
Another witness says that after the fight he went into the house through the garage and witnessed Trey and Mike in a room, Trey was changing his pants and Mike kept saying “we gotta get out of here”. The witness went back outside to check on Justin and that Tre, Mike and his girlfriend came out saying to get Justin out of there. After they left the witness started banging on the front door of the home for help after he saw Mike’s father close the garage door. He says Mike’s father came to the door and when he asked for help, Cerrato’s father told him “I don’t know what to tell you.” He says Cerrato’s father started to call 911 but stopped halfway thru. Thirty minutes had elapsed between the time the trio left the scene and officers arrived and found Brady.
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A Pennsylvania a grand jury report revealed how more than 300 Catholic priests sexually abused over 1,000 children and possibly thousands more over seven decades and that the church leadership covered up the abuse. The report chronicles how the church used an array of tactics to conceal the abuse, including lying to the community about why a priest was removed from the parish, transferring pedophile priests rather than firing them, and locking abuse complaints away in a “secret archive.”
The report also details how priests raped young girls and boys, including one priest who raped a young girl in the hospital after she had her tonsils out. Another priest impregnated a young girl and then arranged for her to have an abortion. One priest who had been repeatedly accused of child abuse asked for—and received—a letter of recommendation to work at Disneyland.
Attorney General Josh Shapiro said “Today, the most comprehensive report on child sexual abuse within the church ever produced in our country was released,” Attorney General Josh Shapiro said. “Pennsylvanians can finally learn the extent of sexual abuse in these dioceses. For the first time, we can all begin to understand the systematic cover up by church leaders that followed. The abuse scarred every diocese. The cover up was sophisticated. The church protected the institution at all costs.” “The term ‘secret archives’ is not my term. It is how the church officials themselves refer to the troves of documents sitting in filing cabinets, just feet from the bishops’ desks. In each diocese, the bishops had the key to the secret archives, which contained both allegations and admissions of the abuse and the cover-up.”
The 884-page document, two years in the making, exposed the predators and the efforts of their bishops to protect them. Several clergy abuse victims who had testified before the grand jury attended Shapiro’s news conference and at least one of them could be seen breaking down in tears.
In a statement issued Thursday—two days after the grand jury delivered its report—Vatican spokesperson Greg Burke described the abuses as criminal and morally reprehensible. “There are two words that can express the feelings faced with these horrible crimes: shame and sorrow. The Holy See treats very seriously the work of the grand jury and the report it has produced. The Holy See condemns unequivocally the sexual abuse of minors. The abuses described in the report are criminal and morally reprehensible. The acts were betrayals of trust that robbed survivors of their dignity and, in many cases, also their faith. The church must learn hard lessons from the past, and there should be accountability for both abusers and those who permitted abuse to occur.”
The Vatican told victims Pope Francis “is on their side” and promised action to “root out this tragic horror.” The statement came just months after the pope said he mishandled a Vatican investigation into widespread sexual abuses by clergy in Chile, and less than two months after a Vatican court sentenced the church’s former ambassador to Washington, D.C., to five years in prison on a child pornography charge.
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An advocacy group, JOCO United- has recently launched by friends and supporters of the parents of a suicidal teen killed by police during a welfare check. On Jan. 20, 2018, police were dispatched to the home of 17 year old John Albers at about 5:35 p.m. on a report that he was home alone and suicidal. Albers had no criminal history but a history of mental health issues, was shot as he was backing the family’s minivan down the driveway by one of the first Overland Park officers to arrive at the home, Clayton Jenison. Jenison resigned shortly after the shooting for personal reasons. A month later, after a multi-jurisdictional investigation, Johnson County District Attorney Steve Howe concluded the officer reasonably feared for his life, deeming the shooting justified. Dashcam footage was released and shown at the press conference when Howe announced that no charges would be filed.
Howe and Overland Park Police Chief Frank Donchez said they thought the officer’s actions were not unreasonable and that investigators could not determine if Albers was killed by the first two shots or the subsequent shots. The release of the video touched off intense debate among the public, especially parents wondering whether calling the police for help with mental health issues was even a safe option. The video shows two different dashcam recordings of the shooting and begins with the view of a police vehicle as it drives toward the Albers home. The Albers home comes into view and the family minivan is backing out of the garage into the driveway with Albers at the wheel. Overland Park Police Officer Clayton Jenison stands to the rear of the van and shouts “Stop!” As the van continues, Jenison fires two shots at it. The van pauses and then continues backing down the driveway past the police officer, making a U-turn in reverse back toward the house. The officer shouts “Stop the car!” as another police vehicle pulls up to the entrance of the driveway. Officer Jenison shoots at the van 11 more times and another officer runs toward the driveway. One of the officers shouts “Shots fired! Shots fired! ” The van rolls forward into the street and one of the officers shouts “Stop! Stop, John, stop the car!” The van rolls across the street into a neighbor’s front yard as other officers run to the van. One officer calls for medical assistance “Shots fired, He’s down, we need medical ASAP.” An officer talks to Albers. “John, John, John, John. God damn it! Glove up, glove up!” The officer continues talking to Albers. “John, are you all right? Ah, (expletive).
Another video, taken from a dash cam in a vehicle parked on the opposite side of the Albers home, begins before the shooting. It shows the first two officers arrive first and walk up to the house. One officer walks back down the driveway while Officer Jenison stays at the front of the house. Jenison walks into the driveway as the garage door opens. The van starts backing out of the garage toward the officer. The officer shouts “Stop!” three times while stepping backward down the driveway and into the grass. Officer Jenison pulls his gun, firing twice and the van briefly stops in the driveway. The van continues backing down the driveway and the officer steps to his right to avoid the van. The van makes a U-Turn in reverse into the yard as another police vehicle pulls into the driveway. Officer Jenison shouts “Stop the car!” and fires 11 more times at the van as it backs up through the yard toward the house. As other officers run toward the van two officers walk away. “Hey, deep breaths, man,” one officer says to Officer Jenison. “Deep breaths. “Come here, buddy, come over here,” one officer says. Jenison, who sounds obviously shaken says “I thought he was going to run me over, man.” Another officer answers, “I know.”
Many people were disturbed by the shooting and by the district attorney’s findings, said Mark Schmid of Overland Park, who helped found JOCO United. “We want to bridge the divide standing between us and the city’s police and political leaders so we can work together.” One goal is to improve how officers respond to people with mental illness or are in mental distress. Steve and Sheila Albers told news outlets “People from all walks of life were devastated and shaken by such a senseless act and the exceedingly poor response.” Sheila Albers filed a lawsuit in April, suing the officer who shot her son and the city of Overland Park. The court documents state that the officer “acted recklessly and deliberately” when he shot and killed Albers, who may not have known police were at his home and was “simply backing his mom’s minivan out of the family garage, Aavehicle passing a police officer does not give that officer an ongoing license to kill an unthreatening citizen.” The lawsuit is pending.
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The father of a missing 3-year-old who was arrested at a New Mexico compound linked to “extremist Muslims” was training children to commit school shootings. Prosecutors allege Siraj Ibn Wahhaj, 39, was conducting weapons training on the compound, where 11 children were found hungry and living in squalor. Wahhaj, who is being held without bail, is the son of a Brooklyn imam, also named Siraj Wahhaj, who was named by prosecutors as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. His father, who heads Masjid At-Taqwa mosque, was also a character witness in the trial for Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, the notorious “blind sheikh” who was convicted in 1995 of plotting terror attacks in the U.S.
Authorities raided the compound after a months-long investigating into the disappearance of Abdul-ghani Wahhaj, a boy with severe medical issues who went missing from Georgia in December. Wahhaj told the missing boy’s mother that he wanted to perform an “exorcism” on his then-3-year-old son because he was “possessed by the devil.” The child reportedly suffered from seizures and couldn’t walk. The child’s remains were found on the property but authorities have not confirmed a cause of death.
The compound was located near the Colorado border shielded by old tires, wooden pallets and other debris. Upon authorities’ arrival, Wahhaj was “heavily armed with an AR15 rifle, five loaded 30 round magazines, and four loaded pistols, including one in his pocket when he was taken down,” Taos County Sheriff Jerry Hogrefe said. Lucas Morton, Jany Leveille, 35, Hujrah Wahhaj, 38, and Subhannah Wahhaj, 35, were also arrested on the property and all face child abuse charges.
The search at the compound came amid a two-month investigation that included the FBI. Hogrefe said federal agents surveilled the area a few weeks ago but did not find probable cause to search the property. That changed when Georgia detectives forwarded a message to the sheriff that he said initially had been sent to a third party, saying: “We are starving and need food and water.”
The sheriff said the children, ages 1 to 15, “looked like third world country refugees not only with no food or fresh water, but with no shoes, personal hygiene and basically dirty rags for clothing.” Jason Badger, who owned the property where the compound was built, said he and his wife had pressed authorities to remove the group after becoming concerned about the children. The group had built the compound on their acreage instead of a neighboring tract owned by Lucas Morton, one of the men arrested during the raid.
Documents filed in 8th District Court in Taos County quoted the foster parent of one of the 11 children as having told investigators that Siraj Ibn Wahhaj, was conducting weapons training at the squalid compound. According to the document, Wahhaj “had trained the foster parent’s child in the use of an assault rifle in preparation for future school shootings.” The foster parent’s accusations have not been verified and are still under investigation.
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Federal Judge Dolly Gee has ordered the transfer of all children out of the Shiloh Residential Treatment Center in Manvel, Texas, due to allegations of widespread abuse in the immigrant detention center. Judge Gee condemned the detention center for injecting children with psychotropic drugs without their parents’ consent, imprisoning some children in overly restrictive confinement and prohibiting the children from making private phone calls. She also explicitly ordered that the detention center must obtain permission from a legal guardian before giving any psychotropic drugs to detained children.
A pending class-action lawsuit alleges immigrant children housed at the Shiloh Treatment Center were held down and forcibly injected with drugs, rendering them unable to walk, afraid of people and wanting to sleep constantly. Court documents allege troubling practices in which children claim they were tackled and injected and forced to take pills identified as vitamins that made them dizzy and drowsy.
U.S. District Judge Dolly Gee found conditions at the nonprofit Shiloh Treatment Center, in violation of a 1997 settlement, called Flores vs. Reno, requiring immigration officials to place detained minors “in the least restrictive setting appropriate to (each Class Member’s) age and special needs.” Gee ordered that all children involved in the suit be removed from the Shiloh facility “unless a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist” determines that a particular child “poses a risk of harm to self or others.” She also ordered the government to seek consent before giving psychotropic drugs to any detained migrant child. Without consent, the facility may administer such a drug only in an emergency or under a court order, she said.
The Shiloh Residential Treatment Center in Manvel, Texas, was founded in 1995 by Clay Dean Hill. In 2013, the resettlement agency began funding the shelter, sending it more than $26 million in grants over five years to house migrant children. The company that operates the facility south of Houston has a history of problems, including deaths of children in its custody and allegations children were systematically drugged with psychotropic medications. The children were allegedly drugged with pills and injections at the residential treatment center.
The center, a mobile home complex-turned-child care center, is licensed to serve kids ages 3 to 17, is run by the Office of Refugee Resettlement and the office is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The center has been cited eight times for by Texas inspectors in the last three years. Some of the infractions include overdue background check renewals for staff, children being able to get into medication and go to the restroom with it, and children who were inadequately supervised due to staff members being distracted on their cellphones.
Children have continued to be placed there despite the center being plagued with serious accusations for years. In 2001, Stephanie Duffield, 16, died after being restrained by staff. Following her death, Shiloh was found to be “in compliance” with state requirements, according to the refugee resettlement office. Children have died at two other programs affiliated with Clay Hill, Behavior Training Research Inc. and the now-closed Daystar Residential Inc. Between 1993 and 2010, three children died after being restrained at those facilities. In 2002, Latasha Bush, 15, died from asphyxia. Eight years later, Michael Keith Owens, 16, died after being restrained inside a closet. Both deaths were ruled homicides. In most cases, the children were hogtied. Beyond these deaths, there were reports of sexual abuse and staff making developmentally disabled girls fight for snacks.
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Satellite images show North Korea has taken the first steps toward its commitment to nuclear disarmament. Images show they have begun dismantling a missile-engine test site, fulfilling one of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s promises during the historic summit in Singapore in June. The site is believed to play a role in North Korea’s development of liquid-fuel engines, although it’s unclear how much the site’s facilities were still being used.
Images published by a leading think-tank on North Korea show activity at the Sohae Satellite Launching Station, located among dense forest and hills close the northern border with China. Workers are believed to be dismantling a building used to assemble space-launch vehicles and a nearby rocket engine test stand used to develop liquid-fuel engines for ballistic missiles and space-launch vehicles, the 38 North think-tank said.
The work started at some point in the past two weeks, after the last visit to North Korea by the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo. White House officials have stated that the trip made by Pompeo to Pyongyang went “as bad as it could have”. Jenny Town, the managing editor of 38 North, which is based at the Stimson Center in Washington DC, said the work at Sohae could be an important move to keep negotiations going. “Since these facilities are believed to have played an important role in the development of technologies for the North’s intercontinental ballistic missile program, these efforts represent a significant confidence-building measure on the part of North Korea,” 38 North said in a report.
South Korean officials have also said they detected dismantlement activities at the site, though didn’t specify the exact nature of the activities. The South Korean foreign minister, Kang Kyung-wha, at a briefing in London, said its reports suggested North Korea was preparing for disarmament in return for a lifting of economic sanctions. The satellite image analysis leaves it unclear whether North Korea planned to demolish the entire Sohae site, which has been vital to its space program. Other important facilities such as fuel bunkers, a main assembly building and the gantry tower appear untouched.
Senior US officials called on Mr Kim to act on his promise to give up his nuclear weapons and said the world, including China and Russia, must continue to enforce sanctions until he does so. The US State Department issued an advisory together with the departments of Treasury and Homeland Security alerting businesses to North Korea’s sanctions-evasion tactics. It said they should “implement effective due diligence policies, procedures, and internal controls to ensure compliance with applicable legal requirements across their entire supply chains.”
While the images are encouraging, experts urge caution until the North completely abandons the area. “If North Korea goes further and dismantle the entire Sohae site, that would meaningfully reduce the country’s long-range missile capability by eliminating a facility where it could fire multiple ICBMs in succession,” said Lee Choon Geun, a missile expert at South Korea’s Science and Technology Policy Institute. He added, however, that while the first steps in dismantling the site are important, in reality, Pyongyang is giving up little as it appears the country is content with the current long-range weapons in its possession.
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Violent protests erupted in Chicago after police officers shot and killed a 37-year-old African-American man on the South Side of Chicago. Harith Augustus was a well-known barber and the father of a 5-year-old daughter. Hundreds took to the streets to protest his killing. Protesters and police clashed with protestors throwing rocks and bottles, some filled with urine at officers. Four people were arrested, several officers were treated for minor injuries and two patrol cars were damaged.
The day after the protests, police released a 30 second clip with no sound of an officer’s body-cam footage. Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson said it was the quickest he had ever ordered such video released and that he hoped to dispel rumors Harith Augustus, 37, was unarmed. He also said he hoped making the 30-second clip public would prevent another violent confrontation between residents and officers. “The community needs some answers and they need them now, we can’t have another night like last night.” Mr Johnson told reporters. He said Mr Augustus’s family was in favor of releasing the video for the same reason.
The edited clip of body camera video shows at least three officers approaching Augustus as he is talking to another officer outside a store in the city’s South Shore neighborhood. The first officer points at his waistband and Augustus backs away while reaching into his back pocket. As Augustus pulls his wallet from his pocket, three officers try to grab his arms. Augustus tries to get away, backing into a police cruiser as his shirt flies up, showing the gun. The footage pauses and zooms in on the weapon, which police spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said was done to ensure a semi-automatic handgun in its holster and two bullet magazines tucked into Mr Augustus’s waist could be seen clearly.
Augustus then runs into the street as a police SUV drives up. He spins away from the SUV and darts between the SUV and the police cruiser as he reaches towards his waist. At that point, an officer opens fire, hitting Augustus multiple times. Augustus did not fire his weapon and the footage does not show him pulling the gun out of its holster. Police also released a 50-second, slow-motion clip showing Augustus reaching towards his waist. It was not clear if he was going for the weapon but it does appear he was grabbing for something at his waist.
Records show Augustus had a legal permit to carry a firearm and no recent arrest history. Augustus was known in the Grand Crossing neighborhood as “Snoop” — worked at a barbershop and had a five-year-old daughter. A police spokesman said more videos will be released within 60 days but declined to say how many different angles exist or whether any of the officers’ cameras captured audio.
While the snippet of video released seems to have calmed some tensions, some pointed out that Augustus, a quiet man with only a few minor arrests from years ago, appeared to be trying to show the officers some sort of identification during the street stop, possible his firearm permit. Experts on use of force have focused on how Augustus tried to evade arrest, twisting away from officers and fleeing into the street with his right hand hovering near his holstered gun. The Civilian Office of Police Accountability, the city agency that investigates police-involved shootings, will try to determine if the officers followed policy and if any training issues need to be addressed.
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On July 19th, seventeen people died after a Missouri duck boat capsized and sunk on Table Rock Lake in Branson, Missouri. The boat, with 31 people aboard, sank around 7pm Thursday evening after it left for a ride on the lake that was hit by a thunderstorm generating near-hurricane strength winds. Witnesses captured video of two of the Ride the Ducks vessels being tossed around by waves as they struggled to make it back to land, only one made it back safely. One video shows water from the waves entering the craft before it capsized (rolled over onto its side) and then sank below the waves. It is believed the boat sunk in 40 feet of water, rolling as it sank, before landing on its wheels in 80-feet-deep lake water.
Duck boats are amphibious vehicles equipped with wheels and propellers that can be driven on roadways or on water. With a push of a lever, the vehicle can switch from being wheel-driven to relying instead on the rear-mounted propeller. Originally built to transport troops during WWII, they are now popular in many tourist areas with large bodies of water. The 17 victims in the tragedy ranged in age from 1 to 76 years with nine victims from the same family. None of the victims were wearing life jackets when found. There were life jackets on the boat but passengers weren’t required to wear them.
The National Transportation Safety Board recorded wind readings of 73 mph which were estimated to cause waves that rose to around 4 feet, with a possibility of 6-foot crests. An investigation into the cause of the tragedy and why the Ride the Ducks boat entered the lake despite severe thunderstorm warnings for the area. Branson is about 200 miles from Kansas City, and is considered a major family vacation destination. The town was under a severe thunderstorm warning issued about half an hour before the boat capsized.
Tia Coleman and 10 of her relatives were on a family vacation from Indiana. Her husband, her three children and five other members of her family died in the accident. Their names were: Angela, 45; Arya, 1; Belinda, 69; Ervin, 76; Evan, 7; Glenn, 40; Horace, 70; Maxwell, 2; and Reece, 9. Only Tia and her 13 year old nephew Donovan survived when the boat sank. The other victims included the driver of the duck boat, Robert Williams, 73; Steve Smith, a retired teacher from Osceola, Arkansas, and his teenage son, Lance; William and Janice Bright, a married couple from Higginsville, Missouri; William Asher and his partner, Rosemarie Hamann from Missouri; and Leslie Dennison from Illinois.
Tia Coleman, one of the 14 survivors, said passengers were told there was a storm coming before the trip and that they would alter their route to tour the lake before the storm hit. During an emotional interview from her hospital bed she said that the captain mentioned the life jackets before they went on the lake but said, “you won’t need them so we didn’t grab them, nobody did.”
She described the amphibious vessel being hit by waves and taking on some water. She said that immediately after a large wave went over the vessel, they were plunged under water where she couldn’t see or hear anything but felt her head hitting the top of the craft. Passengers were unable to make an immediate escape as the craft sank because the sides of the craft are windows with a canopy top. Once the canopy top gave way, some were able to swim to the surface as the craft continued to sink in the murky later water.
Vacationers and employees of a nearby dining showboat immediately began throwing life preservers, and life rafts into the water. Others jumped in and pulled people out of the water. Several people nearby with medical training tried unsuccessfully to revive unresponsive victims. Rescuers searched late into the night for survivors before calling it off due to poor visibility. The searching resumed the next morning until the remaining victims were found.
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