One of Australias top pilots died on the 7th.Dec.07. Col Pay was 75 and was testing a water scoop on an Air Tractor 802 when it crashed into a lake.

It's not uncommon for pilots to water ski their crop sprayers on dams etc. and apparently this lead to an idea to use this as the basis to scoop up water for fire bombing operations.

Col had some sort of skies on the wheels to help but somehow something dug in.

Col Pay was famous here for restoring and flying warbirds and had a Mustang,Spitfire,KittyHawk, ect. which delighted crowds at airshows.

His experence covered 50 years of mostly crop-dusting, all "hands-on", and he would tackle anything.

I think he might of been in an aircraft made in Mn called the "FireBoss". An airtractor fitted with ampibs nd used for fire suppression. www.firebossllc.com

Nah, these were "skis" fitted somehow, appx. 3 feet long, quite flat except for the tip, and slightly above the bottom of the tyre. I've seen something similar for landing on snow.

As the wreck came up, one was facing the wrong way, but that could have happened during the crash, or even the recovery.

Heart attack, hit too hard, mechanical failure, we'll know when the reports are finished.