A man was using a metal detector on one of Florida’s beaches when a once-in-a-lifetime find … found him.
Miami Herald reports Joseph Cook looked up to see a small plane come down “with a thud” on the sand. He captured the moment on video and later shared it to TikTok. Thankfully, the pilot was OK and managed to crawl out of the small, yellow aircraft.
Cook asked the pilot if he was OK, to which the man responded, “I lost my engine.” The pilot also apparently told Cook he aimed the craft toward the water to avoid hitting any pedestrians.
“That meant me,” Cook shrugged, who said he probably won’t walk on the beach the same way ever again.
Apparently the plane was on a mission to survey damage from Hurricane Nicole, but the engine failed near St. Augustine. Police confirmed the pilot was uninjured, but the plane was a different story.
The mangled hunk of metal was dragged off the beach later that evening.
As for Cook, he’s already capitalizing off the joke that he had his biggest find to date. He has since posted to TikTok that he “found my first airplane metal detecting” and joked it “needs a little work.”