Duck boat tour vehicle and tour bus collide in Seattle

[restorefreedom]

Source: KSNV Seattle



Duck Boat Tour vehicle and Tour Bus collide in Seattle

SEATTLE, WA (KSNV News3LV) -- There has been a collision on the Aurora Avenue Bridge between a bus and a duck tour vehicle.

It happened at approximately 11:15 a.m. The bridge is now closed.

Seattle Fire Department confirms that two people have died and 9 others are in critical condition following the crash.

This is a developing story, please check back for updates.





Read more: http://www.news3lv.com/content/news/story/Duck-Boat-Tour-vehicle-and-Tour-Bus-collide/1xINl6nGCk64duNZeF-nAA.cspx

[Sanity Claws]

1. That is awful

[gateley]

2. I keep switching to local coverage --

On the CBS affiliate, the reporter was really shaken. The folks in the studio were saying she's been through it all so you know if it affected her that way it's devastating.

The only way to get on that bridge is from Aurora Ave and they said people were stopping but not getting out of the way of the emergency vehicles trying to get there. Wow.

[restorefreedom]

3. thats horrible

i hope they can get everyone out of there.

rip victims

[gateley]

5. I think they've gotten everyone. At one point the news was saying they'd heard

from Seattle Fire that all those on the vehicles had been brought to Harbourview (trauma hospital) but we were all watching (viewers and reporters) a fire unit going in through the front of the Duck bus with a back board. Didn't see if someone was extracted or not. Seems it's up to the doctors now.

[restorefreedom]

8. keeping fingers crossed. nt

[AtheistCrusader]

7. The city is vapor-locked now. 99 is a main artery. The Chinese President has been in and out and

around. It's lunch-time rush hour. And the sheer volume of emergency vehicles beating feet through the heart of downtown is mind-boggling. There was an emergency vehicle every 30 seconds on some arterials. Once you disrupt the carefully timed flow of traffic, pretty soon, there's nowhere to GO to get out of the way. I saw people driving up on the sidewalk to get out of the way. Yeoman's effort there.

Sadly, not everyone knows what to do, so not everyone manages to get out of the way.

[gateley]

10. Yeah, even when traffic is pretty okay, it's pretty bad.

I'm feeling for people who are on the road. Were you affected?

[AtheistCrusader]

14. No, I wasn't directly affected besides the traffic. I actually feel a little guilty.

I was on an adventure/touring motorcycle, so I was able to boogety-scoot on out of there. I can go anywhere but up a vertical wall. It's really the only way to get around downtown mid-day. Certainly the only thing with a manual transmission you want to be in, on these damn hills. Everyone in cars was probably vexed to see me disappear. I can turn 180 degrees inside the bike's own length. There's no stopping it.



I get the need for media coverage, but the flock of reporters at the receiving entrance had a distinctly vulture-ish voyeur distasteful feel to me. I wanted them to back off, give the victims some space.

[Matariki]

19. Yeah, getting home tonight

is going to suck.

What a tragic accident

[ismnotwasm]

4. We just heard two people were killed--this is horrible

Terrifying

[AtheistCrusader]

6. Saw the parade of ambulances coming in to HarborView Med center.

Not good. Not good at all.

[ismnotwasm]

9. Now 4 dead and 9 critically injured

[gateley]

12. Oh, I'm so sorry.

[AtheistCrusader]

15. It's a bad day.

I wonder if there's anything set up to start sending hot food to the hospital for the staff. Going to be a long night for them.

Fortunately, Harborview is, bar none, the best.

[gateley]

11. Where are you?

[AtheistCrusader]

13. I was picking something up across the street from the main bay of Harborview.

When I came in, they were rolling EVERYTHING out. When I went to leave, they were coming back.

[gateley]

16. That must have been hard for you -- emotional.

[AtheistCrusader]

17. Honestly.

I started looking around at the buildings, looking for smoke. It looked like that level of an event.

I'm glad it wasn't, but still, horrible.

[Matariki]

18. This is so awful

The photos on Twitter are heartrending.

That bus load of kids were international students on an orientation tour.

[jmowreader]

20. KIRO News in Seattle is reporting four have died

http://www.kirotv.com/news/news/ride-ducks-vehicle-collides-bus/nnm9N/

Turns out it's not a TOUR bus, although it is a bus. North Seattle College was taking international students to Safeco Field for a new-student orientation (why there, it does not say) in two buses, and one was involved in the wreck.

https://twitter.com/KIRO7Seattle/status/647178923462270976/photo/1 is a picture of it...the Duck hit the bus on its roadside, about halfway between the front and rear axles. The bus is more-or-less aligned in its lane (about as well as a bus could be if someone hit it with a seven-ton vehicle, that is), with the Duck angled into it at about a 30-degree angle. My first impression is, something on the Duck's front suspension broke and it pulled to the right and into the bus faster than the captain could catch it.

Ride the Ducks of Seattle's website (http://www.ridetheducksofseattle.com) has no mention of the incident. My bet: their lawyers told them the safest thing to say right now is No Thing. The "Vinnie's Blog" link is dead right now, which you'd expect.

[icymist]

21. Here's the photo that shows the severity of this crash:

http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/ride-the-ducks-vehicle-collides-with-bus-on-aurora-bridge/

[jmowreader]

22. Here's the direction-of-travel drawing

[Alkene]

23. ...

[davidpdx]

24. 4 Korean exchange students are dead