A Sea Tow vessel has attached a line to a small-engine plane that crash-landed off the coast of Boca Raton on Saturday morning. Police said the plane's only occupant, the female pilot, showed no signs of injury but was taken to a local hospital as a precaution. Photos by Jerry Lower/The Coastal Star
By Rich Pollack
A small-engine plane with only a pilot on board crash-landed into the Atlantic Ocean about 50 feet off the coast of Boca Raton on Saturday morning -- in front of the Marbella condominium a few blocks south of Palmetto Park Road.
Boca Raton police reported there were no injuries.
The plane had left Southwest Florida International Airport in Fort Myers and was enroute to Bimini in the Bahamas when it dropped into the ocean around 9:50 a.m., according to Scott Kohut, deputy director of the Boca Raton Airport Authority.
Kohut said that the pilot had been cleared by air traffic controllers to divert course and make an emergency landing at Boca Raton Airport but landed in the ocean instead, at about 9:50 a.m.
Lifeguards from Boca Raton Ocean Rescue were able to reach the pilot and get her out of the water with no reported injuries before she was taken to Boca Raton Regional Hospital as a precaution.
Another view of the partially submerged plane.
Kohut said that the airport has a standing agreement with the city for emergency responses and that a plan would have been implemented had the aircraft made it to the airport.
He said the Federal Aviation Administration is investigating the incident and that normal operations at the Boca Raton airport were not impacted. The Boca Raton Police Department’s marine unit, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission all had a presence at the site following the crash-landing.
An eyewitness posting on Facebook said she noticed the plane was “so low,” saying the pilot “must have known he was going down and got over the water.”
Others at the scene told The Coastal Star it appeared the plane’s right engine had died.
A Sea Tow vessel that arrived in response to the crash had attached a line to the disabled plane.
Larry Barszewski and Jerry Lower contributed to this story.
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