Small plane makes emergency landing in Calabasas landfill

A small plane that lost power during a twilight training flight made an emergency landing Thursday evening at a landfill in Calabasas, authorities said.

Neither the student pilot of the Piper Arrow nor the flight instructor was injured, said Michael Pittman, supervising dispatcher for the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

The plane glided into the landfill in a hilly area north of the Ventura Freeway about 6:15 p.m., he said.

“That’s the pilot I want to have if anything goes wrong,” Pittman said of the tricky landing.

The unidentified flight instructor and the student, who was receiving training for a commercial license, took off from Santa Monica Airport, said Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor.

Authorities said the FAA and National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the incident.

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Comments

[Elaine Pate]

A pilot going for a commercial rating is not a "Student Pilot". If he's flying an Arrow, which is generally a high-performance, complex (has retractable landing gear) aircraft, he is probably a high-hour certificated pilot with a private rating. The pilot was a "student" only in a sense that he was studying for a commercial rating. Well done on that landing, pilot!