The pilot credited with saving the lives of 10 passengers on board a small plane after it crash landed about 50 nautical miles off the east coast of Florida told CBS News he lost both engines, all communication and avionics in the lead-up to the crash.

"Basically, lost my navigation, all radios — flying over 25 years and I've never seen anything like that," said Ian Nixon, the 43-year-old Bahamian pilot and father of three, who has already returned to Nassau following the ordeal. "I did my best. I had a lot of stuff going on in the aircraft — just trying to get that under control."

The Bahamian government arranged transportation home after he received treatment for minor injuries at Holmes Regional Medical Center in Melbourne, Florida, he said. 

The pilot said he tried to radio for help when he noticed issues with the Beechcraft King Air 300: first losing one engine, then the second.

"I wasn't able to reach anybody on the radio for a while. I tried to call Freeport, [Bahamas]; I tried to call Miami radio," he said. "I don't know if they were hearing me, but I didn't get a response."

All 11 people on board were taken to Florida hospital, with three suffering minor injuries, after being rescued by the 920th Rescue Wing, an elite U.S. Air Force unit specifically trained to carry out search and rescue efforts. Nixon and the passengers floated on a life raft for hours, not knowing if their beacon had turned on as designed during the crash and thus unaware anyone was even looking for them.

While on the life raft, battling rough weather, Nixon remembers declaring, "In the next 10 minutes a plane is going to come. And then one of the passengers said, 'Hold on, did I hear something?'"  

Moments later, a U.S. Air Force plane had spotted them, Nixon said.

Nixon, who has been a pilot since he was 18, said the chartered flight had departed the BahaMarsh Harbour in the Bahamas en route to Freeport, Grand Bahama, on Tuesday morning on a chartered aircraft.

The flight is only supposed to last about 20 minutes, but after losing both engines and avionics, Nixon was forced to fly as far as he could and then crash land in the water. 

"Once I hit the water my first thought was, 'We didn't die.' That's one of the things I remembered. We didn't die, let's get down," he said.

Nixon reflected on his thoughts in the wake of what the Air Force called a "pretty miraculous" crash landing.

"Just have faith, keep praying and care about one another — always tell your family you love them," he said.

The Bahamas Aircraft Accident Investigation Authority said in statement that since it happened outside territorial waters it would not be conducting the investigation, but it had notified relevant authorities.

"At this stage, the AAIA will not speculate on the cause," the agency added. "Any such matters will fall within the scope of the official investigation conducted by the appropriate investigating authority once determined."