Audio captures moment Massachusetts teen pilot on her first solo flight miraculously lands a plane without any landing gear
Published on Sep 16, 2025 at 4:38 PM (UTC+4)
by Daisy Edwards
Last updated on Sep 16, 2025 at 4:39 PM (UTC+4)
Edited by
Kate Bain
This heart-stopping audio captured the moment a Massachusetts teen miraculously landed a plane without any landing gear on her first solo flight.
Maggie Taraska, a 17-year-old student pilot from Beverly, Massachusetts, went out on her first solo flight on September 9, 2018.
Her plan was a solo cross-country flight from Beverly Regional Airport to Portland, Maine.
But disaster struck almost immediately.
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Massachusetts teen pilot lands a plane without any landing gear
After 60 hours of flying, this 17-year-old teen pilot, Maggie Taraska, was ready to fly her single-engine Piper PA-28 airplane cross-country from Beverly Regional Airport to Portland, Maine.
This was an exciting moment for Taraska, because it was her first solo flight and her instructor, John Singleton, believed she was ready.
But very shortly after she took off, disaster struck when the right main wheel of her single-engine Piper PA-28 fell off.
Knowing that she now didn’t have sufficient landing gear, she began to panic and realized that she had to make an emergency landing in her little Piper plane.
In audio released from her flight, you can hear Maggie’s wobbly, panicked voice radioing in to the tower.
The incredible audio reveals the entire episode, including the calm response from the Air Traffic Controller who helped guide her down safely.
Her instructor came to the rescue
Air Traffic Control contacted John Singleton, Maggie’s instructor, who calmly talked her through the procedure of doing an emergency landing.
“Maggie, this is John. How are you doing?” Singleton asked the teen pilot.
“I’m OK,” she said.
“OK, you’re doing a great job flying the airplane,” Singleton replied. “Keep doing what you’re doing. We’re going to take our time here. We’ve got plenty of time. You have plenty of fuel. We’ve got plenty of daylight.”
“So just try to relax, and you always heard me say, ‘Go back to basics,’ so we’re going to work the basics here as much as possible, OK?”
Maggie managed to crash land in a field and walk away from the emergency landing completely unscathed, and she was celebrated for her bravery in such a stressful situation.
Her instructor was also celebrated for keeping a calm head and managing to walk Maggie through the emergency landing.
The audio alone has our heart racing, so we can only imagine what the teenager was feeling.
Great work, Maggie!
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Daisy Edwards is a Content Writer at supercarblondie.com. Daisy has more than five years’ experience as a qualified journalist, having graduated with a History and Journalism degree from Goldsmiths, University of London and a dissertation in vintage electric vehicles. Daisy specializes in writing about cars, EVs, tech and luxury lifestyle. When she's not writing, she's at a country music concert or working on one of her many unfinished craft projects.
