Small Aircraft; High Wing; 1 Eng; Fixed Gear
Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Multiengine; Flight Crew Flight Instructor; Flight Crew Commercial
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 20; Flight Crew Total 2100; Flight Crew Type 840
Distraction; Fatigue; Situational Awareness
Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Other / Unknown; Ground Event / Encounter Ground Strike - Aircraft; Inflight Event / Encounter Unstabilized Approach; Inflight Event / Encounter Loss Of Aircraft Control
Aircraft Aircraft Damaged
Environment - Non Weather Related; Procedure; Human Factors
During an off-airport landing on a gravel bar; I landed the airplane too fast and not properly configured (half flaps) for a short field landing.  The aircraft overran the available gravel; entered the river; and flipped over. The proximal cause of this was a last minute decision to convert what was supposed to be my second reconnaissance pass into a landing; without running a checklist or properly configuring the airplane.  An additional factor was not sticking to (and verbalizing) my plan to return for more fuel if I did not find a suitable landing site before reaching the end of my fuel budget. The root causes were that I had allowed myself to become mentally fatigued over the course of about 45 minutes looking for a suitable landing site; and also had allowed myself to become fixated on having to land in the immediate area (where we had seen caribou); without returning for more fuel.
A fatigued Glastar pilot attempted to land on an off airport gravel bar but overran the landing site; entered a river and flipped over after not configuring the aircraft for landing.