Hollywood legend Harrison Ford is “battered, but ok” after the plane he was piloting crash-landed on a golf course, his son has said.
The 72-year-old actor, who starred in blockbusters including the Indiana Jones and Star Wars movies, was the only occupant of the single-engine plane when it came down on the green on Penmar Golf Course in the Venice area of Los Angeles on Thursday.
The actor’s son Ben said his father is “incredibly strong” and thanked the public for their good wishes.
“At the hospital. Dad is ok. Battered, but ok! He is every bit the man you would think he is. He is an incredibly strong man,” he wrote on Twitter.
“Thank you all for your thoughts and good vibes for my dad.”
Initial reports said the pilot was critically injured but Patrick Butler of the city’s Fire Department (LAFD), who would not officially identify Ford due to privacy restrictions, later said he suffered moderate injuries.
Speaking from the scene of the crash he said: “He suffered basically some moderate trauma and he was alert and conscious and paramedics from LAFD transported the patient to the local area hospital.”
In a recording on the website LiveATC.net a man, believed to be Ford, is heard to say “engine failure, immediate return”.
The crash is understood to have happened shortly after the plane took off.
Ford is an avid pilot, and last year became a lifelong member of a Shropshire flying club.
The actor was in the area while working on JJ Abrams’ Star Wars Episode VII and called the club to rent a plane while there.
Bob Pooler, the club’s chief instructor, said he took a test flight with the big screen legend before signing him up as a lifelong member.
Mr Pooler said he later delivered a plane from Sleap Airfield, near Wem, to Denham, close to Pinewood Studios.
Describing the plane’s occupant as “an experienced pilot”, air crash investigator Patrick Jones told a press conference the vintage aircraft had clipped the top of a tree on an attempted return to the runway at Santa Monica airport before landing on the golf course.
Asked about Ford’s condition, he said: “We believe that he is going to survive.”