Remember the movie ‘Sully’? The movie was inspired from a real life story of a pilot who had the presence of mind to land a passenger aircraft in a river and save many lives. In an incident that came close,a pilot operating a World War 1 era aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing on a beach, much to the amusement of the people there. The plane had lost its power and the pilot was out of options. Luckily Zac Rockey,the pilot and Trudi Spiller, the only passenger along with the onlookers were not hurt.
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video courtsey: The Guardian
The pilot Zac Rockey had taken off in the aircraft with his friend from Branscombe, in Devon to take part in a function marking the 100th anniversary of the end of World War 1 at Bodmin Airfield. THe trouble was felt along the return journey and Rockey realised that the air craft was losing power. The engines failed and the other options in the cockpit malfunctioned and Rockey was left with no choice but to land it somewhere. They soon realised that there only realistic chance of landing was on a Jacob’s Ladder Beach in Sidmouth, Devon
Rockey felt that the beach option wasn’t the safest as the aircraft could have “even flipped on the stones” but it was all he got at that point and considering there were people around to help him if something had gone wrong, he decided to land on beach. He also added that the scenery around was nice to land something like that. His friend, Trudi Spiller said that she was slightly frightened but had faith in her friends’ skill. “I had absolute faith in Zac that he would land it” was her exact words. Sidmouth coastguards helped to tow the plane away from the shore.
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