When perplexed motorists on Auckland’s Whangaparāoa Peninsula were greeted by a man on the side of the road in his togs waving them down, they couldn’t have known they were about to make him into a viral sensation.
Little Manly man Duncan Kukard has become an international hit after standing in a flooded gutter, inviting passing drivers to drench him in ditch water.
Kukard said when he uploaded the video filmed by his daughter, he had no idea that it would end up getting 17 million views: “People must be really bored.”
He had been helping with a swim camp at Little Manly Beach and was about to get into dry clothes when his kids saw the puddle.
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“One of the guys said they’d always wanted to splash a pedestrian by driving through a puddle, so we thought let’s give someone that experience.”
Kukard said some of the motorists driving by looked at him as if he was crazy, but others took their chance.
Duncan Kukard/Supplied
Duncan Kukard and his mates had just been for a swim and decided to make the best use of the warm, wet weather.
Asked if he was concerned by the water quality of road runoff, Kukard said it “wouldn’t kill him”, but he definitely had a shower when he got home.
Kukard is a swimwear retailer, but insists that the roadside splash session was not an attempt at testing new products.
“It was just in the spirit of trying out crazy things. We had just been swimming for hours in a thunderstorm, anyway.”
He received messages from international news media asking for permission to use the video in stories.
“There’s nothing like footage of your pale luminous skin being splashed around the world.”
Kukard said he was happy as long as “it gave people a laugh”.
Duncan Kukard/Supplied
Whoever coined the phrase “dull as ditch water” didn’t have the zest for life that Duncan Kukard has.
