The Region - News from Feb. 17, 1987

An Army helicopter on a training mission was forced to make an emergency landing on a Santa Barbara beach after colliding with a pelican. None of the aircraft’s crew of four was injured. The copter was on a training flight from Point Mugu Naval Air Station near Oxnard when it hit a pelican, losing part of a rotor blade and damaging three others. The aircraft made a safe landing near a new hotel complex owned by actor Fess Parker at Sand Beach. The pelican wasn’t so lucky. “The last the pilots reported (seeing) was a whole herd of feathers,” a Navy spokesman said.