This aircraft had been upgraded with 295hp GO-480 Lycoming engines, reversible pitch props and a water rudder, and at one time held the FIA world speed record for it's weight class amphibian over a set distance. On 12th May 1998 it was badly damaged when it landed on a hard runway at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport, OH., with it's undercarriage retracted. It is said to have since been repaired and is still current on the USCAR, but the latest online photo that I could find was dated 2012.

A conversion by Arthur Stifel of Aeromar at Miami of a McKinnon Super Widgeon by installing Lycoming GO-480-B1D engines with reversing propellers. Neither turboprop nor turbocharged despite the name. Stifel set a now retired speed record in this aircraft in 1982. It also appeared in the British movie Firepower (1979).