Plane makes emergency landing on Miami Interstate

Some drivers making their morning commute Thursday along Miami’s Interstate 595 were joined on the road by a plane in an emergency landing.

According to CBS Miami, the pilot of a small plane had been rerouted from the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, and was on his way back above Miami at around 9 a.m. when the plane ran out of fuel. Scott Richmond had no choice to but to put the plane down on I-595.

“In between your prayers, which you always get in there first, is you want to make sure you clear traffic,” said Richmond. “… You always pick out pavement whenever possible as opposed to turf and then you pick out the widest stretch of pavement that you can and then you do everything you can number one to miss power lines. That’s the biggest fear you have.”

Richmond was able to land the plane with just clipping one car on the Interstate as he landed in the safety lane of the westbound lanes of the interstate.

While seeing a plane land on a stretch of pavement normally reserved for cars and other wheeled vehicles, a Florida Highway Patrol trooper said it really isn’t that uncommon.

“I think we’ve had one on just about every roadway except 595,” Sgt. Mark Wysocky told CBS. “This is the first one on I-595 and the first one that’s actually struck a vehicle and it’s amazing that more vehicles weren’t hit at 8:45 on a rush hour.”

The emergency landing caused traffic delays on the interstate, but the plane was later towed off the highway after federal investigators were on the scene.