Re: A learning expirience in IMC.
But....but, they have moving map and other cool gizmo's!
......none of which make up for low or no SA.
As stated, VFR through IMC generally isn't a good thing. To do it safely (if there's truly a need for it, I'll cover that in a minute), it takes some really high SA and planning. My example for the previous sentence (which I'm sure people were about to go ape over
) was a couple of times in Afghan when my wingman and I got called over to a ground battle in progress at night. Problem was there was solid undercast below us, and the friendlies exchanging fire with the enemy underneath it didn't really have time, or ability, to give us an updated WX observation. Marshalling overhead, the only thing I could think to do was reference the old 1:100 map and note my position on it, and the friendlies position. Following that, I then had to determine what the elevations were surrounding and get an idea of what the terrain was doing in the surrounding area, none of which I could see from up here. Turns out it was mountainous, but with good valleys. From the current position, I then had to note time/speed/desired heading, minimum altitude I wanted to go down to (I don't know how accurate the map is, if at all), turn to the heading, hack the clock, and drop into the soup. Crosschecking time/speed/heading/altitude, I was able to eventually break out of the clouds undeneath but had to very quickly get my bearings as to where I was, where the battle was, and where the granite was. Not easy at night, with no moon and no lights anywhere besides tracers and high-order detonations. From there, was able to get the wingman to do the same thing and we were able to situate ourselves and get to work supporting the friendlies on the ground. The whole time I was descending through the soup to my made-up minimum altitude, I was just waiting for that instantaneous impact into terrain.......wondering if I'd even have time to register a thought that it had happened, or if it'd be so quick a death, there wouldn't be time for that.
Moral of the story is that VFR into IMC near terrain is nothing at all to be taken lightly. I came up with a half-assed, but useable plan quickly and without too much thought
only because I was forced to due to the situation. And my situation was pretty unique. The only time I can think of having to do this as a civilian pilot would be some sort of complete electrical failure or something similar....definitely something non-standard and emergency. But remember, all the technology in the world won't do anything for you if you have zero or low SA, don't have a plan, are not ahead of the aircraft and the situation, and are sitting fat/dumb/happy.
