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Bob Tur -- a legendary news helicopter pilot who captured the Reginald Denny beating that triggered the L.A. Riots, the O.J. Simpson slow-speed chase and countless of other seminal news events -- is in the midst of a transgender procedure that will make him a woman.

Tur was on TMZ Live Wednesday ... and explained he always felt he was a woman trapped in a man's body. He's currently in the early stages of the procedure, has been receiving hormone injections and says he's already "thinking like a woman." When the procedure is done, he says Bob Tur will be "dead" and he will become Zoe.

Tur -- whose daughter Katy is a star reporter on "NBC Nightly News" -- did say something troubling. He says he doesn't believe women can make the same quick, decisive decisions like men when piloting an aircraft.