STARTLED beachgoers scattered as a pilot coolly landed a disabled Tiger Moth plane on sand at Thirteenth Beach at Barwon Heads yesterday.

Pilot Jack Boehm, 22, of Torquay's Tiger Moth World safely touched down with one passenger on board after the plane's engine abruptly lost up to three quarters of its power while cruising at 75 knots at 500 feet.

Witnesses described the landing as exemplary and praised his work as heroic.

They said his passenger, from Ballarat and on a sightseeing return trip from Torquay to Queenscliff, emerged white but laughing hysterically.

Mr Boehm, a pilot since he was 14, estimated the crisis lasted about 45 seconds.

"I wasn't able to maintain altitude and the beach was the only option, the challenge was trying to find a clear spot on a fairly busy beach," he said.

"I was able to level off at about 10 feet or so and I think people got the idea this wasn't run-of-the-mill stuff.

"The actual landing wasn't a problem. The problem was finding a patch."

Witnesses said between 50 and 100 beachgoers watched the drama.

"I heard someone screaming for us to get out of the way and turned around and saw it," Melbourne man Alex Keynes said.

"It missed my mother-in-law and three-year-old niece by about one metre.

"Overall, I'd say the pilot did a fantastic job to land it safely and not hit anyone, but I would like to know what their policy is about landing on the beach, because if that happened at somewhere like Torquay, where the beaches are much more crowded it could have been very dangerous."

Louis Cameron also witnessed the bizarre event.

"It was really strange. I was reading a book one minute and then I heard a noise and looked up and saw the plane," he said.

"It was pretty much a perfect landing.

"It was a surprising thing to see but it really wasn't that dramatic. People just hurried to get out of the way.

"It was a smooth landing, it just bounced a bit when it got on the rocks.

"The interesting thing now will be to see how they get it out of there."

The plane landed about 1.30pm, shortly before low tide, and a crew including a specialist engineer from Riddells Creek worked to mend the engine hoping to fly out before 9pm high tide.

Mr Boehm emphasised Tiger Moth World had an exemplary safety record and though the plane was over water, emergency landing was a possibility.

"We're always a safe distance from land so there's always an option," he said.

He said the company had sent a car to collect the passenger.

"He was having a good time, he thought he got good value for his money," he said.