ickle black box
The point of my post was that after reading the press reports of the aircraft being sensationally blasted out of the sky or 'shot down' plus the above contributions, I was very surprised to see that the aircraft was intact with no obvious structural deformation that could be seen in the CNN photograph. The flaps were set, the floats still attached and the prop blades and wings show no sign of uncontrolled contact with the surface of the earth. In other words, the aircraft landed on the river then sank.
Correct me if I am wrong, but 'shot down' would imply that the aircraft departed from controlled flight before reaching the ground. That clearly wasn't the case here. The pilot, Kevin Donaldson, was said to be wounded in both legs and he obviously did a great job in putting it down in one piece. To say that the aircraft was shot down does not give him credit for getting the survivors and the aircraft safely back to earth
I am not trying to trivialise the loss of two lives, but I don't think it should be sensationalised either.