Originally Posted by
JimEli
I don't believe its hard to explain at all. Incapacitating Spatial Disorientation, where a pilot knows that he is disoriented but fails or is incapable of taking the proper corrective action. Maybe a somatogravic illusion (among others)? Does anyone doubt this pilot’s disorientation? It’s never a requirement to be completely IMC for SD, and recovery is not necessarily instantaneous. USAF paper which gives examples of ISD located
here.
Looks to me extremely likely that it was disorientation. For everyone who seems amazed that he did not regain control after "regaining VMC" - remember, what happened is that the helicopter became visible intermittently from a point on the ground. That means that IF, the pilot was looking in the correct direction, he could have seen a patch of terra firma , (maybe through a hole in the clouds). That does not mean he had a horizon, knew the attitude or position of the helicopter, and its not sufficient for a regain of situational awareness. So, was it really VMC?