GREENE – Quick-thinking Sabattus Pond neighbors pulled a father and son from the water Thursday after their float plane flipped while trying to land.

Pilot Shawn Moody, 49, and son James, 18, both of Gorham, were rescued from Sabattus Pond and treated for minor injuries Thursday afternoon. Despite a cut to his forehead, Shawn Moody said he felt fine and was waiting to see what would happen to his plane, an Adventurer Amphibian single-engine, kit-built aircraft.

The two flew out from Indian Pond in Greenville Thursday morning headed for home, when they got caught in an afternoon rainstorm.

“We thought we should land for a little while and just ride out the rain, but we didn’t have our landing gear out all the way,” Moody said. “It’s just one of those things, I guess.”

Mike Wells of Barnard Cove in Greene was standing on his porch when he saw the plane coming in for a landing.

“Planes are no big deal,” Wells said. “We see them coming in all the time. I stepped out on the porch and saw this one coming in to land and just as it hit the water, it did a nosedive and flipped over.”

Wells called his wife and had her call 911 and roust neighbor Dick Mecervier. The two men got into a pontoon boat and rode out to the plane.

“We tossed a rope with a life preserver on it to them, but they wanted to stay with the plane,” Mecervier said. “They tied a rope to it and we began trying to pull it to Nason’s Beach.”

Wells and Mecervier eventually persuaded the Moodys to climb into the boat, then took them back to shore for medical treatment.