A quick Google translation of the accompanying article.
According to the first elements of the investigation, the pilot of the water bomber who died in the crash of his aircraft Friday at 5:20 pm trying to extinguish the fire of Générac "lost its bearings". "The pilot, who was in a descending phase, entered a column of very thick smoke and hit the treetops," said a source close to the AFP investigation. "It's a problem of estimating the pilot who has entered a very dark cloud and lost his bearings," she continued.
Fleet Manager Tracker was right over him and witnessed the accident, the minister said. The victim, in his fifties and father of two, was an experienced man who had flown "a Mirage 2000," Castaner said.
An investigation was opened under the authority of the prosecutor's office and entrusted to the gendarmerie research section of Nimes, as well as on the side of the Accident Investigation Bureau.
Such accidents are extremely rare. The last similar tragedy dates back to 2005, with the fall of a Canadair at sea, with his pilot and his co-pilot, at Calvi in Haute-Corse.
https://www.laprovence.com/actu/en-d...perimente.html