Plane Makes Emergency Landing on Golf Course

HOUSTON - A single-engine Cessna aircraft made an emergency landing Monday evening at the 11th hole of the Hermann Park Golf Course after the pilot said he ran out of fuel.

“I saw two fairways that were appropriate,” said Brandon Ford, who was flying from Lafayette, Louisiana to Columbus, Texas. “And there was only one guy on this one so I went over the top of him and landed here.”

That one guy was Craig Hanna, who said he was about to swing at his golf ball when he noticed the plane circling. Then it noiselessly descended onto the fairway he’d been playing.

“So I just kind of moved out toward the trees,” said Hanna, “and got out of the way. And sure enough, by now I can see that the propeller’s not turning and I’m like, ‘oh, man.’ But he sat it down right here in the fairway.”

Ford said he believed he had enough fuel for ninety more minutes in the air. He said Columbus would have been another 35 minutes. He was not hurt in the unscheduled landing.

The Houston Police Department secured the plane at the spot where it landed. An officer said Ford would not be cited, adding the FAA had been summoned to the scene to investigate and the aircraft would not be moved until then.

Hanna said the disruption probably cost him a stroke or two. “If I’d hit my shot,” he said, “I think I would have got it. It might have been a natural birdie!”