Belite Aircraft founder James Wiebe flew the new Sealite Amphibious ultralight off the water for the first time on Wednesday. He also landed safely. Not once, but five times.
The Sealite has flown before, but not off the water. “I never left ‘ground’ effect; we already knew the Sealite flies fine, and I didn’t want to push my non-trained seaplane skills,” said Wiebe after the successful first water flight. “The conditions were hot, high density altitude, little wind, flat surface on the small pond — and the Belite Sealite performed really well anyway.”
See more images from the first water flight at the Belite’s Flickr or Facebook page.
And does the same go for those scaliwags Orvil and Wilber?
Really? Testing a plane on floats, but not using a pilot trained and/or rated for floats? Really??? Wonder why we have such a bad reputation with Experimental Amateur Built aircraft and a higher accident rate? Look no further.
Sorry for beating up on you, Belite, and congratulations on getting your float version off the water. But, what a terrible example to set.
Touche Jeff, And if Orv and Wilbur had a test pilot available, I’m sure they would have used him.