A twenty-four year pilot is being hailed a hero in landing his stricken two-seater light aircraft on a golf course in the south of France.
The Safari Flying owned plane with Registration No. F- JDPG, lost power and with the fast-thinking pilot landing on the fifth fairway of the Sainte Maxime Golf Club on the French Riviera. Safari Flying is located at nearby Frejus.
On board the plane was two people, the pilot and his grandmother, who the pilot was taking for a joy flight.
The young pilot managed to land the aircraft, avoiding any trees that line the fairways, and also bring it to a halt without any damage to the plane or the fairways of the golf club. The plane was then moved to a safe area beside the fifth tee, and also tied to supports embedded in the grown to protect it from flipping over in any windgusts.
GREAT STORY .. With young pilot hailed a hero, safely lands stricken small plane #flyingsafari onto 🇫🇷 ⛳️Sainte Maxime @GolfsBluegreen @ffgolf #frenchriviera #cotedazur #southoffrance #saintemaxime 👏👍
Read – https://t.co/kSUkEzg5t6 pic.twitter.com/fsg5DLOFuf
— 💯Golf ⛳️ News & Science (@TOURMISS) April 17, 2022
It was fortunate for the occupants as the golf course, and designed by renowned designer Peter Harradine who also designed the National course at Abu Dhabi that from 2006 to 2021 hosted the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship on the DP World Tour schedule, is carved out of the slopes of the hillside. As well, there are many houses all about the golf course that
The light plane still sits beside the fifth tee with the problem now how to remove the ‘temporary hazard’ from the course, given access certainly does not allow for large trucks. Some suggestions have been that it may be lifted out by helicopter. Anyway, while it stays on the golf course it certainly has generated much interest among those playing golf.
And, of course, it’s not the first time a distressed plane has landed on a golf course. It happens all over the world, but not always with a safe ending. Seven-years ago in March 2015, Harrison ‘Indiana Jones’ Ford was lucky to escape alive, and also no take other lives, when his also all-yellow light 1942 single-engine plane crashed on the nine-hole Penmar GC course at Venice in suburban San Monica, California
Ford’s plane missed the seventh green in regulation and clipped a tree at the back of the green, and in landing tooks some huge divots in coming to rest near on the eight hole.
Luckily for the 72-year-old Ford, there was a doctor playing in one of the groups who rushed to offer the Hollywood legend assistance. Ford was intending to land at nearby Santa Monica. He suffered moderate injuries but that same could not be said for his plane.
GolfByTourMiss played the Penmar course during a Genesis Invitational week and you can read out story on the golf course and ‘Indian’s’ triple-bogey landing
