It was actually the other way round. Both were into shallow rising ground, but South Wales was daytime PPL, Blackpool was nighttime student + instructor.
I was commenting on
I think a CFIT at any speed above Vs (60kt) is going to be fatal
I can only suggest that my comment was justified in the light of evidence.
A while ago I had some correspondence with an ex military pilot whose view was that – in a failure above a cloud layer situation – you should glide as fast as possible, for the maximum options below the cloud. Arguable too.
I believe that. When I was taking a low-flying course earlier this year, the instructor demonstrated that a C172 with simulated power failure starting from even a rather low cruise speed (100 kt) has enough kinetic energy to make a complete 180 without losing altitude and rolling out on final approach speed!
Obviously when flying at 150 feet AGL you don’t have many options if the engine fails, but you can at least make sure that you crash into the wind which can make a big difference for survivability.
Having a good idea of the lie of the terrain before takeoff is also a good idea. Biggin 21, for example, has houses to the left, an escarpment straight ahead, but a lovely clear agricultural valley to the right.
How did you find the synthetic vision Timothy? I have only seen pictures and articles, and I have wondered whether the synthetic vision element is distracting or whether it detracts from the instrument scan.
