Christmas Miracle: 4 Survive Miami Plane Crash On Public Beach

MIAMI BEACH, FL — A single-engine plane with four people aboard crashed on a public beach near Miami on Christmas Eve day. The aircraft went down steps away from holiday sunbathers, who were trying to soak up the Florida sunshine ahead of the Christmas holiday.

No one was injured even though the plane could be seen resting upside down in shallow water near Lifeguard Tower 7 at Haulover Park beach.

Subscribe to Miami Patch's free email news alerts and newsletters

"Luckily everybody walked away," explained Marcel Lopez of Miami-Dade Ocean Rescue, who said the plane crashed around 1:38 p.m. Monday.

Fortunately, the beach was not crowded at the time. The temperature was in the low 7os.

"They were coming from North-South," Lopez said. "They were flying really low looking for a safe place to land."

A German tourist used his cellphone to capture video of the plane moments before it crashed. Benjamin Reppin of Berlin shared his video with Patch and said the plane was making sputtering sounds before it went down.

Emie Guindon of Quebec said she told her family to wave to the pilot as he flew close to the water.

"We thought he just wanted to say, 'hi,'" she told Patch.

Mahfuzur Rahman, who is training to be a pilot in Boston, said the plane sounded like it was experiencing engine problems.

His friend, Sharmine Chowdhury, was swimming at the time.

"We were swimming in the water, and we saw the plane really close," she said.

Jorge Cianca of New York won't soon forget the crash.

"It was like stalling or something, like it ran out of fuel," he explained. "All this water got shot up into the sky, like 10 or 15 feet."

Video courtesy Benjamin Reppin. Photo by Paul Scicchitano.