School-bus DUKW (Missouri)

This school-bus DUKW was a home-made conversion found by a motorcycle traveller in a workshop yard along a county road in Missouri and written up on his travel website. Its builder, Charles, a 92-year-old panel beater by trade, had bought the DUKW, driven it home and given people rides in it, but wanted to make it more comfortable.

He cut the top off a school bus by walking around it with a petrol cut-off saw, lifted it onto the DUKW with a gin pole and welded it down; the remains of the bus stood alongside. The GMC engine was still in place and Charles insisted the vehicle ran, but it had never been in the water because its propeller was missing and he had never found a replacement.

Charles had once sold it for $5,000 and received a deposit, but the buyer never collected it; after the buyer's death his attorney told Charles to keep it.