![\"Grumman](\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/08\/Cropped-Duck-12-1024x630.jpg\" "\\"Cropped")
Grumman Duck Fuselage under going long-term restoration<\/p><\/div>\n
It has an interesting history and one time held the longest water-taxi record in the world! \u00a0It’s previous owner, Sam Poole, from Lake Alfred, FL was using it for hauling supplies up the Amazon when one day his left float hit a submerged log. \u00a0This careened him to the left where he found himself heading for, and then up, the riverbank. \u00a0He closed the throttle as he found himself climbing rather steeply up the side of the river! \u00a0As he began to slide backwards, he gunned the throttle to slow his tailslide back down to the river. \u00a0After inspecting the damage, he decided it was not safe to fly and began what became a 400 mile taxi down the Amazon! \u00a0Along the way, he picked up a couple of nuns that needed a ride but, as the river began to wander back and forth, he realized he would not have enough fuel. \u00a0He made some makeshift repairs and took-off with the nuns to complete the journey! \u00a0Later, after being repaired and working some more, The Duck ended back up at the headwaters on the Amazon in Leticia, Colombia. \u00a0Over time it became un-airworthy and began to languish. \u00a0Sam went back, took it apart, and brought it out onboard a cargo plane to Lake Alfred, FL. \u00a0I heard about it and stopped by one day on my way to look at property for Fantasy of Flight. \u00a0We struck a deal and I became a double-Duck owner!<\/p>\n
![\"Inverted](\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/08\/Cropped-Duck-21-1024x550.jpg\" "\\"Cropped")
Inverted Duck Hull being prepared for new Belly Skins<\/p><\/div>\n
I have actually been the largest owner of Ducks since the US Navy in WWII, owning four! \u00a0The first I purchased and flew in the early 1980’s, eventually donating it to the Weeks Air Museum. \u00a0We rebuilt it in Miami in the colors of the\u00a0Candy Clipper<\/em> and it is currently on display at Fantasy of Flight. \u00a0The second Duck is mentioned above and the third was acquired as part of the Tallmantz Collection in 1985 and starred in the movie Murphy’s War<\/em> with Peter O’Toole. \u00a0It later became\u00a0part of a trade to the US Air Force Museum for my P-35A Seversky. \u00a0\u00a0My fourth Duck was acquired from the San Diego Air & Space Museum and traded for the Grumman F3F Flying Barrel currently on display at Fantasy of Flight.<\/p>\n I love the Duck and have had a lot of fun flying them over the years. \u00a0One of my more memorable moments was flying the Candy Clipper over one weekend\u00a0to Cypress Gardens for a Hydroplane Race. \u00a0After talking to a couple of the skiers on the shoreline, we came up with a plan to to spruce up the show by letting them ski behind the Duck! \u00a0On our second pass, one actually kicked off his ski and began to barefoot in front of the somewhat stunned crowd!<\/p>\n Duck towing Skiers for Cypress Gardens Show!<\/p><\/div>\n If you want to see it fly, I will be splashing about during our upcoming first annual Last Big Splash<\/em> this September 26th and 27th. \u00a0Hope to see you there!<\/p>\n Kermit<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I recently got a picture update of my Grumman Duck project in Wichita, KS. \u00a0I’ve owned this aircraft since the mid-1980’s and it has been a avery slow back-burner project. It has an interesting history\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-grumman-duck","category-kermit-weeks","save-the-ducks"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2100"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2100\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Duck](\"https:\/\/www.fantasyofflight.com\/collection\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/08\/Duckskiers1.jpg\" "\\"Duckskiers\\"")