Glassy-Water Landing in a Seaplane

The true title is "Meditation: Glassy With A Chance Of Riffles," but "Glassy-Water Landing in a Seaplane" seems somewhat clearer.

In any case, landing a seaplane on glassy-smooth water gives the pilot a lot to contemplate, because it's very difficult to know the airplane's height above the surface. In this landing, I was aiming for the one small patch of riffles I could find on the miles-wide James River, east of Hopewell, VA, where I live.

The standard procedure for glassy-water landings is to clear a last visual reference--you'll see it (a duck blind) near the beginning of this video--by less than 50 feet (15 m) while descending at about 100 feet per minute. Don't think about landing; continue flying until you see spray.

I landed just past the riffles, then taxied on the step, making a left turn toward my house. The spray in the video came when I let the airplane come off the step and into displacement mode. A little later I lowered the wheels, before taxiing up on the beach.

The camera was attached to the left float strut of my SeaRey, a two-place amphibious seaplane that I built from a kit by Progressive Aerodyne.

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• seaplane
• amphibian
• searey
• water
• glassy
• glassy-water
• landing