I grew up flying a homebuilt Taylorcraft. There is no way I would have gotten out of that plane at that altitude. Those things will glide forever and can land on almost nothing. One of the biggest problems they have for new pilots is that they really want to just float and you end up using far more runway than you actually need.

It's possible he's just a new pilot and panicked when the engine went out and would have rather relied on his skill as a skydiver rather than his skill as a pilot. But even the plane looks like it circled and tried to land in the river without him.

Just bad all the way around. At the very least he needs to lose his license.