By Kristy Gilligan 

If you’re into boats, quite frankly you’re reading the wrong magazine. Or are you? Most aviators are not only blessed with the insatiable desire to fly aircraft, but also cars, tractors, kites, and yes, boats. So when a pilot decides to fly a boat, what do they fly, and how do they do it, and why? It’s a crazy world full of questions and I’m going to give you some answers.

Imagine a world where your runway is a big blue cushion and your hangar a jetty. Where every flying day is decorated with the glitter of sun on water, the sweet and salty scent of a sea breeze and the beauty of your aircraft reflected in an early morning lake. There’s the why.

No matter who you speak to, ‘freedom’ is the one word you will hear time and again when you speak to a seaplane enthusiast. They’re crazy about it. Rod Tyson, Australian distributor of the Ramphos Amphibious trike says, “it’s just freedom. Freedom from ridiculous costs and freedom to live on the water and park your aircraft on the water”. And president of the Seaplane Pilot’s Association, Rob Loneragan, says similarly, “it’s great not to be restricted to an airport. Land-based flying just seems so restrictive of your freedom once you land on water.”

Before you run out and strap a dingy to the bottom of your Cessna 182, you’ll be pleased to know that some clever people, with too much time on their hands, have already done the hard work. These days’ buoyant beauties are abundant on the market, in both the General Aviation and Recreational Aviation arena.

Seapanes fall into either the category of ‘float planes’ or ‘flying boats’. A float plane is a conventional aircraft design such as Cessna’s, the Storch and so on, that have been equipped with a floating undercarriage. A flying boat, like the SeaRey or in the old days the Catalina, land on their hull, and are specifically designed for water use. While at the same time, any of these aircraft may be amphibious, or also able to land on…land.

Float planes, or regular aircraft with a floating undercarriage have been popular in America for some time, but they got off to a bad start here in salty old Australia, where the salt water environments mixed with aluminum lead to some disastrous corrosion. Earlier development problems and lack of training did little to build confidence in seaplanes.

These days, GA float planes operate well with strict maintenance and upkeep, and developments in aircraft treatments. One downside is that all this fussing can make them rather expensive. Handling can also suffer. When you strap a couple of floats onto an aircraft you create a high centre of gravity. This can cause some decrease in lateral stability, making those nerve fraying crosswind landings even more difficult. Twin floats have to be purpose designed with proper mounts for the particular aircraft which they are used on. In other words, only buy floats made specifically for the aircraft. The correct angle of the floats to the wing and the placement in relation to the Centre of Gravity (CG) are quite critical for safety. Also, the addition of floats to an aircraft upsets its directional stability substantially and additional dorsal fin area is usually added aft, above or below the fuselage.

Although floats create drag and affect climb and cruising speeds they, in effect, fly themselves in the cruise, and don’t normally affect the load limits of the aircraft. Amongst many benefits, floats do allow you to nose right up to the shore and walk straight onto dry land, something near impossible to do in a flying boat unless it’s amphibious and can taxi onto land. Likewise, when departing you can turn the seaplane around, step straight onto the floats, start up and fly away.

With advances in composite building techniques and the integration of ideas stolen from boating technology, it is now easier and more affordable to avoid the costly conversion of a conventional aircraft and instead purchase a water specific craft with a floating, flying hull. By far the largest benefit is that you can now fly aircraft designed as much for the water as they are for the air, making water handling a lot easier and a lot more comfortable. With a lower CG the flying boat is easier to manoeuvre and, in most cases, faster in the cruise. Their is no doubt that floating hulls are more elegant and have less drag in flight. Adversely to benefits of the float plane, the floating hull requires you to wade ashore and is more dependant on a departure directly into the wind. This means you need to turn the whole aircraft around if the wind is ‘onshore’. Where deep shorelines are present, getting aboard can then become a little challenging without your surfboard.

Once the difficult decision has been made to go with flying boat or float plane, you can find yourself a training organisation and book in for your ‘floating hull endorsement’ for the flying boat category, or a ‘float-equipped endorsement’ for a float plane. Most will make this decision having chosen an aircraft to buy, since hire aircraft are a little scarce. In many cases you may even do this training with the manufacturer or kit distributor. The two endorsements take about the same time, around 5 to 10 hours of trying not to drown you and your instructor.

The outcome of an endorsement should be the mastering of liquid take offs and landings, water handling skills, environmental considerations and cockpit procedures. All this builds a solid foundation for you future enjoyment. Loneragan reinforces the importance of good training, “seaplanes are horribly unforgiving without proper training, and if you don’t get the right training, you simply won’t enjoy it.” Apart from needing the endorsement in your log book, you also need a skipper’s ticket, issued by the appropriate boating authority in your state. Your training organisation will help you to do so, although you’re on your own for the test!

The seaplane will first catch you out at engine start up when you begin fiddling around in the cockpit, head down and doing checks, as you would on the tarmac. It could come as a surprise to see you have already begun to taxi aimlessly around the lake, river or ocean. It’s a simple enough concept, without brakes, and a surface to apply them to, you can’t stay still. At the whim of the current and wind you will be blown about until you take control of the situation. As any blue water loving boaty would know, any time you are on the water, you need to be thinking 50 metres ahead of yourself at all times.

Engine run-up will take you on a scenic tour of the local surrounds, waving to the neighbors and moving through the various modes of taxi. Ploughing is the first stage. By applying power the aircraft shoves its way through the water, creating a large wake behind it. This is not overly effective for the purpose of getting anywhere, so the next stage is to get the aircraft ‘onto the step’ or beyond that big lump of water being pushed about and on top of the water to the point where the aircraft is moving easily at the ideal angle for the hull or floats. Only an instructor can teach you how to find this through practice, much like learning the various flying attitudes and feel of the aircraft in the air. This planning across the water can be maintained as a quick taxi, but will ultimately lead to take off. Even take off is something the seaplane prefers to do for itself (independent little buggers).

The same technique applies to getting the seaplane on the water. Just let it do it by itself. Alighting, as it’s known, is a matter of avoiding stalling onto the water, and avoiding touching down too fast. Stalling would mean the hull angle is too great, and the aircraft will pitch forward. Too fast and the nose will pitch down, which uncorrected can turn you into an unwilling submarine captain. Technique aside, water alighting has some perks over a runway landing as the water tells you what is going on in the air. If it’s turbulent lee of terrain, the water will show you, and the air over masses of water is generally more stable with this exception. Recreational seaplanes usually stay at home if it’s blowing over 15 knots, and for any seaplane, white caps on the water are a sure sign of imminent disaster.

Consideration of the surrounding environment is not just for safety or for greenies. While seaplanes do not generally pollute the water or make a lot of noise, they are very visible and tend to gather attention, and not just the friendly sticky nose at the jetty. Swimmers and boat users can be annoyed at a seaplane operating at their local swimming hole, so manners are a must. Most importantly, it’s recommended to avoid repetition, such as circuits, and carefully obey the regulations when operating as a water vessel.

Seaplanes do enjoy the benefit of many more places to perform the dreaded forced landing, especially over long stretches of open water, which can be comforting. It is still worth while, and mandatory, to carry the appropriate safety gear required for flights over water, and required for a boat on the water. Once on the water, the seaplane must also behave as a boat, obeying speed limitations and signs.

The Seaplane Pilots’ Association is responsible for looking after the interest of the seaplane pilot, and the community in general with respect to operations, awareness and promotion of the category. The association is represented by members in each state, and total membership is at around 250, according to President Rob Loneragan. Members enjoy regular fly-away events and continued representation before CASA, the various government departments and maritime authorities.

At the moment, there are several successful commercial seaplane operators in Australia, most taking advantage of the tourist trade in northern parts of the country. Joyflights, island transfers and other tourism make up most of the work. Sydney enjoys ample income with the convenience of the harbor, and island-hopping is great fun for those who can afford it in Queensland.

All said and done, seaplanes are an enjoyable and respected branch of aviation. They make many parts of the world accessible, for both leisure flying and charter operations, perform vital community services such as Search and Rescue and offer us aviators just another way to get airborne and practice this obsession which we love so much.