On a January afternoon in 2017, a sport pilot, 61, flew his amateur-built Buccaneer amphibian from the Orlando, Florida, area to Blue Springs State Park in Orange City to meet a friend and camp there beside the Suwanee River. The two-seat airplane, powered by a pylon-mounted 80 hp Rotax, had been built in 1992; the pilot had purchased it from the builder nine months prior.
The pilot, who had not visited the area before, flew up and down the river for some time looking for his friend. When he located him—just arriving—he landed northward on a straight segment of the 100-yard-wide river and tied up at a boat dock. Learning that his friend was about to go downstream on a paddleboard to hunt for a dog’s life jacket that had fallen into the water earlier in the day, the pilot said that he would help in the search after he had unloaded his gear from the airplane.
