SAN DIEGO (KGTV) – Emergency crews responded to reports of a small plane that landed near the water on Mission Beach late Tuesday morning.
San Diego Police, per information provided by San Diego Lifeguards, said a Cessna landed on the beach at around 11:30 a.m. just west of Tower 16, near the 700 block of Jersey Court and north of Belmont Park.
According to lifeguards, the aircraft first landed in the water, but it was moved to the sand as of 11:45 a.m.
San Diego Fire-Rescue officials said the pilot and his daughter — the only two occupants on the plane — were not injured.
An ABC 10News reporter spoke to the pilot, Victor Schneider, about the emergency landing on the beach.
He says he and his daughter were flying from Oceanside to Point Loma for a quick day trip. Prior to the flight, Schneider says he did his routine checks of the oil, gears and more before taking off. He says the engine died on him midair.
Schneider has decades of flying experience, and he says pilots are trained to land on the damp, harder section of sand in the case of an emergency near the ocean. There's a possibility of flipping over when landing on the softer sand, per Schneider.
His daughter joked that this was the smoothest landing he's ever had.
Schneider says the plane slid 200 feet before coming to a complete stop after hitting the sand. At around 2 p.m., first responders started towing the plane off the beach.
