Beach Landings in Texas

[Brady]

I'm wondering if anyone has landed on the beach or along the Laguna Madre on the Gulf coast of Texas.

I took a two-day trip earlier this week, left Shreveport, LA and picked up the Gulf coast at Galveston and followed it down to South Padre. I was tempted to land on the beach, but unsure what the implications would be. Much of the shore, especially south of Corpus Christi is marked as a National Park Service area, so it probably wouldn't be a great idea to land in those areas. However, there is quite a lot of area, north or Corpus and near the south tip of Padre Island that are not marked off as National Park on the sectional. There were are also vast expanses of sand flats on the Laguna Madre side of Padre that run for miles without the sign of another human being. This area was tempting too, but I don't know how to judge the firmness of the sand in those areas.

Landing on the beach looks like a no-brainer, the sand is packed down from car traffic and would clearly support the weight of the plane in most areas, but I have no idea if it's okay to land there. I'm also concerned that if I landed in a really remote location, that some other plane would fly by, see me, assume I had made a forced landing, and initiate a search and rescue.

I wanted to camp out on the beach or along the Laguna, but ended up pitching a tent next to the parking ramp at Mid Valley Airport near Harlingen. Boring...

Does anyone have any experience or thoughts on this subject?

Brady

[TimHicks]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Although I've never done it, several taildragger pilots from my home drome regularly go to the Chandeleur Islands for camping and fishing. They fly Taylorcrafts, Champs or Luscombes. Here's a photo of my hangarmate's TCraft on the beach. These islands are very remote. No human residents. Only accesible by boat or taildragger (although I used to know this crazy old coot who flew a 172 there all the time to take tourists fishing). The islands are about 40 miles off of the coast of Louisiana and Mississippi. Very good fishing. Make sure you know the tides before you go.

[crispy critter]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

I want to know more about these islands,time of year best to fish,and what that guy was using for bait.

[Brady]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Tim,

Thanks for the tip.

I found those Islands on the New Orleans sectional. Looks like its a string of barrier islands starting about 20 nm south of Biloxi and stretching to the south for another 25 miles.

Ditto on Crispy's comment...any additional details on "when and how" from your buddy would be appreciated.

Brady

[TimHicks]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Below is the tongue-in-cheek pirep that came with the pictures. For those not familiar with fishing in this area, "Specs and reds" are speckled trout and redfish.


"This is T-craft 36060 with a PIREP. N36060 is a BC12D located at Chandelier Island altidude 3.5 inches MSL . Winds out of the east at 15. Visibility 1-2 feet on west side and 12-20 feet on the east side of the island with occational moderate specs and reds. Some wake turbulence has been spotted aft of the reds. Weeds aloft at 3, 6, and 9 inches. NOTAMS, airmen should be equipped with topwater plugs and gold spoons. Birds diving in the viscinity of the airport. VASI lights on runway 18-36 permanently out of service."

[Mark Julicher]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Padre Island is a National Seashore, Matagorda Island is a National Wildlife Refuge.

With permission, you can land on Matagorda Island at the old air base. It is shown as a private airport. I have no clue if permission is often given, but you have to figure that there is some restriction due to the wildlife refuge status.


I have not found anything written about Padre, but as a protected barrier island have a hunch planes are not welcome although locals sometimes see planes at those places.

I'm still looking for the defiinitive word. You can drive a car on many Texas beaches, but I don'w know how that translates to planes.

[AKTcrafter]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Hello everyone. I tried to attach a photo of a friends $50,000 Cessna 170 that became a $1,500 as is/where is C-170 after a screwed up beach landing here in Alaska. Unfortunately, the file size was too big to attach here and I don't know how to change the size of the photo. Baeches can be tricky or extremely easy places to land. A downsloping beach with an off shore breeze makes it pretty challenging to keep it straight. Also the softness of the beaches can be difficult to judge but it's been my experience that the farther you go from the water's edge the softer the sand gets. The waves and other water action tend to compact the sand making it sometimes as firm as pavement. That being said, however, larger more course grains of sand can still be very soft close to the water's edge. Thatwas the case when my friend landed his 8.50X6.00 equipped 170 on a soft beach just as the tide started to rise. The result of that fiasco was a uninsured C-170 that was completely submerged on its back and filled with about 12 " of course beach sand. The T-Craft is pretty light but with little tires you can still stand it on the nose or even end up on your back when landing in soft sand. I had a set of 24"x12" GarAero tires on my last Tcraft and with those tires I could pretty safely zip around even on soft "sand dune" type of sand that I wouldn't have even tried with the smaller tires. If anyone can tell me how to reduce the size of a jpg file I'll post a picture of the partilly submerged 170 for anyone who'd be interested.

[David Price]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

AKTcrafter,
Do not know much about jpg. myself either. BUT, I do know the sound of ,
24"x12" on my last t-craft "
Question; do you still have an STC or other paper work for thoes tires?
If so,.......looking forward to more fun.

"LOVE AIR"

[Brady]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Mark,

Understand about the National Seashore at Padre and the Wildlife Refuge on Matagorda.

There's a lot of area outside of those so designated that look like they have potential to be interesting places to land. North of Corpus Christi, there's San Jose Island. Also, the southern 20 miles of Padre isn't marked as National Seashore, and much of the area around the Laguna Madre, especially those areas that are shaded as "Non-Perennial Lake" are acutally vast sand flats, more than a mile wide in some places.

I want to fly back down there again and base out of Port Mansfield (looks like a cool little fishing town with an airport and campground right next to the town), do some fishing, and perhaps check out some of those areas on foot to see what the firmness of the sand is like.

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Roger,

Your story about the C-170 is a good cautionary tail.

I want to educate myself a bit before I go diving in. My F-19 has 8.50 tires and a big Scott tailwheel. On decent sand, I think it would work out real well. Especially on the Laguna Madre side of Padre Island, if the sand is firm enough, the airplane would be "hollywood" for getting into remote places where you could than wade out and fish for speckled trout and redfish.

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Tim,

Any idea which part of the Chandeleur Islands your friends use for fishing and camping. They stretch for about 25 miles on the map. I need to fly there soon and check it out. I also want to get down that way anyway and fill up a cooler with shrimp.

Cheers,
Brady

[Robert Lees]

Re: Beach Landings in Texas

Here's the photo that AKTcrafter wanted to post of the 170 on the beach.
I think a picture speaks a thousand words!