Fri Dec 07, 2018 11:22 am
#1656162
The safe conduct of any flight seems to me to be based on the number of options available to the pilot in the event that something goes wrong.
The single biggest factor limiting options available to this flight was low level ice-bearing clouds. F215 predictions of ice are, in my experience, somewhat hit-and-miss, but on this occasion, the prediction was fairly clear. I suspect its accuracy would have become quickly visible to them had they attempted to climb through cloud.
This sole factor obliged the flight to be lower than comfortable, and certainly below any reasonable MSA.
Being below MSA isn't a problem unless you are unsure of position and/or no longer in VMC (however limited). At that point an accident becomes highly likely.
Looked at as an IFR flight, the conditions at Gloucester were well above minima for the approaches available, and the commander had both experience and an instrument qualification. But for the ice, it would have been a very undemanding flight.
For me then, the two points of interest from this are:
- the need for extreme caution where icing at low level is concerned. This consideration alone should arguably have stopped this flight at the planning stage.
- that it is perplexing that such an experienced individual should have found themselves unsure of position on a route that could readily have been conducted at low level - however inadvisable.
The single biggest factor limiting options available to this flight was low level ice-bearing clouds. F215 predictions of ice are, in my experience, somewhat hit-and-miss, but on this occasion, the prediction was fairly clear. I suspect its accuracy would have become quickly visible to them had they attempted to climb through cloud.
This sole factor obliged the flight to be lower than comfortable, and certainly below any reasonable MSA.
Being below MSA isn't a problem unless you are unsure of position and/or no longer in VMC (however limited). At that point an accident becomes highly likely.
Looked at as an IFR flight, the conditions at Gloucester were well above minima for the approaches available, and the commander had both experience and an instrument qualification. But for the ice, it would have been a very undemanding flight.
For me then, the two points of interest from this are:
- the need for extreme caution where icing at low level is concerned. This consideration alone should arguably have stopped this flight at the planning stage.
- that it is perplexing that such an experienced individual should have found themselves unsure of position on a route that could readily have been conducted at low level - however inadvisable.
Guernsey Based Piper Lance - N101DW