Originally Posted by
Sillert,V.I.
I know there are many here who believe a flight of this nature should never have taken place in a piston single at night.
That said, the aircraft type was designed for this type of mission when flown IFR by a suitably qualified and licenced pilot.
If this flight had been planned using this aircraft, but IFR using the airways at a sensible flight level, it would almost certainly have ended uneventfully.
How difficult would it have been in practice to have found a suitably qualified CPL/IR to captain this flight?
Or maybe they did have one, Dave Henderson, who took one look at the weather and said, "Sorry fellas, no chance," and they had the backup fly him instead (because he was willing, being an enterprising "semi-commercial" pilot).
The way this played out had everything to do with how it was set up. A charter (commercially-operated) flight is NOT the same as a privately-operated flight, just with a better qualified pilot. There are takeoff requirements, destination weather requirements, etc. Let's say icing was reported. In a non-FIKI aircraft, you can't then fly. All sorts of stuff.
As I said earlier, there's a reason why there's more training involved. And it's ultimately to protect passengers.
What baffles me is that people (agents) handle their product so carelessly. If I had a £15,000,000 asset, I don't care if it was £15,000,000 worth of horse dung, I would make sure it was cared for properly. And that does not involve putting it on a plane with an unqualified crew.
I guess I'd make a pretty good agent. And what do these agents give a crap for what the flight costs anyway? These clients have money. Are they friggin' pocketing the difference or what? The whole thing makes so little sense.