amphibion crash Lake Sammamish WA today, PIX

[Dave Krall CFII]

For a millisecond I thought the story was about me, then I saw the pilot was too old to be me. Whew, close one! Way cool little amphibion:

http://www.king5.com/localnews/stories/NW_062409WAB_small_plane_lake_sammamish-JM.1e0d2de.html

 

[Pi1otguy]

Police say he's an avid radio controlled model airplane pilot who has built his own models planes in years past, and based on the performance of his model float planes, Weston redesigned his life size float plane to correct the problems/performance associated with the model planes.

Seems like a sound design philosophy, but I can't help thinking that scaling up a model imposes design/build issues. Basically something about forces, mass, & area don't scale up linearly. (ex. A chair built to 2x dimensions will be 2x high, seat 4, & weigh 8 times more)

 

[Stevel]

Missed a credential there

82 year old student sport pilot seaplane test pilot with 30 hours. I'm hoping that this is bad reporting, and not bad ADM.
________
CHEVROLET CHEVETTE

 

[Dave Krall CFII]

Re: Missed a credential there

82 year old student sport pilot seaplane test pilot with 30 hours. I'm hoping that this is bad reporting, and not bad ADM.

At that old age, does a pilot really have much time for things like a lot of training hours, ratings, or experience before conducting test flights?

 

[Skip Miller]

Sounds like he water-looped it. Glad he is OK.

-Skip