You ever depart VFR and then misplace the airport?

ABC center, Cessna 123 wondering if we could get a popup IFR?
Cessna 123 squawk 4321.
Cessna 123 radar contact say intentions.
We'd like to get radar vectors to the ILS runway 36
Cessna 123 turn left heading 030, intercept the localizer, maintain 3000 until established, cleared for the ILS runway 36.
Land
No harm no foul.

Instead the dumba$$ decided to scud run at 400' AGL and try and find the airport using google maps. In the process he broke the law and scared a student with 11 hours so bad that he quit flying. That instructor needs to be flipping burgers.
 
lancie00 said:
ABC center, Cessna 123 wondering if we could get a popup IFR?
Cessna 123 squawk 4321.
Cessna 123 radar contact say intentions.
We'd like to get radar vectors to the ILS runway 36
Cessna 123 turn left heading 030, intercept the localizer, maintain 3000 until established, cleared for the ILS runway 36.
Land
No harm no foul.

Instead the dumba$$ decided to scud run at 400' AGL and try and find the airport using google maps. In the process he broke the law and scared a student with 11 hours so bad that he quit flying. That instructor needs to be flipping burgers.
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BTDT many times while instructing (the legal proper way)....of course it’s always part of a larger lesson on how weather can overcome your capabilities.
 
Oooops. Looked pretty questionable on the ground before they went. Notice the student seemed to start losing it before the instructor took over, it ain't easy.
 
Way it looked to me, it wasn’t a loss of the airport so much as a loss of SA on the part of the instructor.
 
lancie00 said:
ABC center, Cessna 123 wondering if we could get a popup IFR?
Cessna 123 squawk 4321.
Cessna 123 radar contact say intentions.
We'd like to get radar vectors to the ILS runway 36
Cessna 123 turn left heading 030, intercept the localizer, maintain 3000 until established, cleared for the ILS runway 36.
Land
No harm no foul.



That’s exactly what my CFII did with me one day. We no more than left the airport to head to the practice area for a pre-checkride review and the fog moved in. He called for a pop up clearance on the way back and let me fly the vectors, intercept the ILS and make my first instrument approach. We broke out about 800 or so feet AGL. It was fun and allowed me to see first hand what an instrument approach was like in actual IMC.
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Samesies. Low layer had moved in on my night session. Instructor got a pop up and let me fly it. Was pretty cool following needles in the dark in a cloud and seeing everything pop out right where it was supposed to.

Sent from my Pixel 3 using Tapatalk
 
lancie00 said:
ABC center, Cessna 123 wondering if we could get a popup IFR?
Cessna 123 squawk 4321.
Cessna 123 radar contact say intentions.
We'd like to get radar vectors to the ILS runway 36
Cessna 123 turn left heading 030, intercept the localizer, maintain 3000 until established, cleared for the ILS runway 36.
Land
No harm no foul.

Instead the dumba$$ decided to scud run at 400' AGL and try and find the airport using google maps. In the process he broke the law and scared a student with 11 hours so bad that he quit flying. That instructor needs to be flipping burgers.
Click to expand...

I mean.. that's what I'd do but maybe that airport didn't have an operational ILS or any other approaches the airplane was capable of using? Or perhaps it had been so long since the instructor shot an approach that he didn't feel like he could?


Or, as I look at it again there's snow on the ground so it's clearly cold out. Maybe he's afraid of icing?
 
IIMC is a true emergency. The instructor failed his student and himself.

When you push the weather and get into trouble, remember who put you there...
 
Looks like bad ADM but it's hard to tell without more. No audio to hear the discussion. With the camera set up to capture the panel, the outside will be brighter and whiter than the naked eye. You can get similar effects in a bright CAVU day. Was it that bad when they took off? Fog is a definite issue as snow melts if the weather warmed up. Some of the maneuvering could be less about finding the airport than about taking a safe route back to it free of terrain and obstacles without climbing further into it.

...although when the student (?) began using his phone, my immediate thought was, he's texting family to say goodbye.
 
cowman said:
I mean.. that's what I'd do but maybe that airport didn't have an operational ILS or any other approaches the airplane was capable of using? Or perhaps it had been so long since the instructor shot an approach that he didn't feel like he could?


Or, as I look at it again there's snow on the ground so it's clearly cold out. Maybe he's afraid of icing?
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No excuse. If that airport didn't have an approach, I'm sure there was one nearby that did. If he was incapable of flying an instrument approach, he should have gotten vectors to VFR. If he was afraid of icing he should have never been in the air. In my opinion, he was reckless and dangerous. He's lucky he didn't fly himself and his student 6' deep.
 
You ever depart VFR and then misplace the airport?
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Yes, many times. A normal winter day in northwest Alaska. Special VFR in and out of the class E all day long. Pass the end of the runway and enter the world of white.

That was not a white out condition. Looked more like they found a low scud layer. Looking over the instructors right shoulder I could see the ground when he leaned forward even when there was no forward visibility. When they descended out of the cloud there was at least 3 mile visibility. In Alaska I would take newbies out in weather like that so they could experience low cloud/low visibility days with an experienced person before they go off into the wild white yonder alone.

In daylight and severe VFR go out and practice a few 500 AGL patterns to landing. Might save your life sometime.

And no, I would not expect a VFR person to take off in that, nor would I have taken a primary student up at that time.
 
lancie00 said:
ABC center, Cessna 123 wondering if we could get a popup IFR?
Cessna 123 squawk 4321.
Cessna 123 radar contact say intentions.
We'd like to get radar vectors to the ILS runway 36
Cessna 123 turn left heading 030, intercept the localizer, maintain 3000 until established, cleared for the ILS runway 36.
Land
No harm no foul.

Instead the dumba$$ decided to scud run at 400' AGL and try and find the airport using google maps. In the process he broke the law and scared a student with 11 hours so bad that he quit flying. That instructor needs to be flipping burgers.
Click to expand...

I don't know. I might be worried about icing, and therefore want to get below the clouds ASAP. No great options. I am curious to read other's opinions on this for my own educational purposes. Also, I can't tell which airport that is. Are you sure there is a localizer?
 
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lancie00 said:
If he was afraid of icing he should have never been in the air.
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Well, he clearly was not expecting the low ceiling. (Not that I think that that was a reasonable expectation.) So, once he's in the clouds below freezing, now he's got to be worried about not being in icing conditions.
 
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From the reddit page:

The weather was very unpredicable (sic.) the day this was filmed. It would go from being clear to being socked into within an hour all morning. We had actually cancelled the lesson about two hours prior to going up but then the instructor called and asked if I still wanted to go as it had cleared up at the airport.
​
Certainly, some ammunition against this instructor with respect to the decision to take a primary student up that day.
 
eman1200 said:
Crazy.....who makes instructional videos with no sound?!?!??
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From the reddit thread:

I have the audio from once we shutdown but I decided to edit it out to post it here.​
 
PPC1052 said:
From the reddit thread:

I have the audio from once we shutdown but I decided to edit it out to post it here.​
Click to expand...

thanks. I was more taking any opportunity I could find to bust midlife's bawls.
 
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