This sort of thing happens fairly often. There was one near the Cairngorms, Scotland, some years ago. Flying on into a whiteout.
Peter wrote:
This sort of thing happens fairly often.
And if it goes well, the hero pilot will show his “remarkable achievement” on YouTube. I watched the video quicky by jumping over the more boring bits, however I wondered if the controller’s description of the weather conditions as “level 2 to level 3 precip” is some kind of standard in the US (never heard that before)?
His only hope was to land on the interstate, before he was forced below 500’.
The Cairngorms accident Peter mentions was an intended trans-Atlantic crossing but encountered severe turbulence over the Cairngorms. He was in contact with Inverness Radar, with RAF Lossiemouth also available, and was beyond the mountains, but he turned back, and hit them. He had apparently flown across the Atlantic before.
Yeah, the levels are a US thing. I remember them from my PPL written in the 90s. Level 1 to 5 on the VIP (Video Integrated Processor) if memory serves.
Surprising info at the very end:
Most surprising of all is that one-third of all pilots caught in VFR into IMC accidents actually hold instrument ratings
I can understand (the logic of it) that a VFR pilot gets caught in IMC. But what makes an IFR pilot willfully letting himself getting caught VFR in IMC ?
A video worth seeing
Yes quite a few IR holders have killed themselves flying VFR. It’s a frequent topic as to why the hell they did that.
One big reason avoidance of the 2000kg+ IFR charges. That IMHO led directly to the death of a former “hangar mate” of mine, N2195B, and his family, and probably many others flying piston twins. N2195B could have had the 1999kg STC but didn’t.
Another is that flying low down, say 2000ft, can help to get you through really nasty wx, whereas flying through it high up (say FL100+, as is usually necessary to get a flight plan accepted by Eurocontrol) is likely to be much more hazardous (icing, and generally serious convective wx in IMC is not a great idea)
Another one is unwillingness to use oxygen. Maybe 50% of IR holders don’t use oxygen, so they stick to FL100 or so around Europe. That puts you right into IMC if there is any wx around. And a lot of Eurocontrol routes need oxygen e.g. around the Nice (France) area.
However I am sure all such cases were not VMC at the time of the crash, despite the reports saying ritually that VMC conditions prevailed.
I think the accident patterns for instrument capable pilots and non-instrument cpable pilots differ – the instrument capable pilot is less likely to lose control outright, and hence the typical accident is CFIT, while the non- instrument pilot is more likely to come to grief bu losing control maneuvering.
Flying low, below cloud, I need 500 feet between me and the cloud. Cloud base is not flat. Unless low level visibility is good, you cannot see what conditions ahead are. I find the VMC limits incomprehensible in practice. See a white house against brown moorland, or lower cloud against cloud, at three nautical miles?
Flying in a narrow valley or canyon, in good visibility, there’s little opportunity to look inside. In poor vis there’d be none.
I’ve once flown into the sort of visibility he had, and continued flying VMC – along a long beach, which I had often walked, where I could land at any time. I had told Lossie Radar I was going to land on it, but came out into clearer air, and got home.
Cobalt wrote:
I think the accident patterns for instrument capable pilots and non-instrument cpable pilots differ – the instrument capable pilot is less likely to lose control outright, and hence the typical accident is CFIT, while the non- instrument pilot is more likely to come to grief bu losing control maneuvering.
Is that pure speculation, or do you have some statistics to back it up with?