That truly is an amazing story with a very happy ending for you. Your beautiful Kitfox unfortunately was sacrificed, but certainly proved its crashworthiness. I hope you find a replacement soon.

Flying floats for decades down rivers really makes me appreciate, and seriously think about what happened to you. So thank you for your willingness to share your experience with all of us. I'm sure it's not easy to talk about.

For those that may not know, it is pretty much impossible to see wires across rivers, or wires out to islands from a lake shore. If I don't know the area well I traditionally will fly at a minimum of 200 ft above the water as around here even big power lines are lower than that. On rivers I know, if I desire to scud run a river I do that with my floats only a foot or two off the surface as that keeps me under even the lowest power lines (being no taller than the bigger pleasure boats on the river). I also try to not fly down the middle of the river as the lines are lowest there. And I consider the 10ft to 200 ft area above the surface as a NO-FLY ZONE, and really try to adhere to that rule even on rivers I think I know well (power companies don't call to tell me they just installed a new cable...). Flying rivers is a great time, but a guy really can't be careful enough. And I have never encountered a zip line in all my years. That possibility, along with deep mountain passes adds a whole new level of caution to deal with

... And then there is my friend that took his buddy out for a ride in his just Cessna 185 during a half time break of a Super Bowl game that everyone in the area was watching because their team was playing. He thought it would be fun to show his friend a 150 mph buzz job down on the deck of the local river that seperated the neighborhood. But as he buzzed over a small county bridge he heard a loud snap! He had hit the main power line feeding all the neighbors houses (and even worse, all of the local bars) on both sides of the river, causing everyone in the area to lose power for the rest of the day!! I think his entire neighborhood is still mad at him

Oh, and he had just bought the plane and hadn't yet figured out that those funny things on the landing gear were cable cutters ( apparently used by power company pilots flying a lot near power lines). They for sure were worth their weight that day. He hates me telling that story as he says he has since gave up flying down rivers. But that story is a good reminder for all of us when we are being tempted to have a little more fun than we probably should...