FH.....Playing the "What was he thinking?" game is utterly useless as there is no way ever to know what any person is thinking at any given point in their Lives.
Only they know and shy of them telling you in person....would you come close to knowing as they might not be telling the truth in their admission.
One thing is certain....and requires very little "thinking"....if you are scud running...doing so at a 140 Knots....close to the ground...in a valley with high ground on both sides of your flight path....that is all you are going to be cogitating about.
Ara failed to cope with the situation he had gotten himself into.....and from what evidence we have....was trying to do so and initially was doing the right thing....executing a climb to VMC on top of a thin layer of cloud.
He failed to perform that maneuver.
The NTSB says it was because of Spatial Disorientation.
Much is being made of his task loading as he made the climb...and anyone that has gone IIMC. KNOWS how burdened you are if it is unplanned, unexpected, and you had not prepared yourself for that eventuality.
That preparation begins long before you take your seat in the aircraft and continues until that IIMC event occurs.
Successful encounters with IIMC should be as investigated as are failed encounters....to determine what Pilots did right and build training and testing to inculcate that knowledge into all of us.
In a fully kitted out IFR Twin like the S76B that Ara was flying....a straight ahead IMC Climb to VMC on Top should have been easy to accomplish yet Ara failed......why?
It was not because ATC asked something of him in response to his calling them about his intentions.....or being distracted as he punched the Ident Button on the Transponder Control Panel.
He had been cut loose from SCT ATC...told to squawk VFR (1200) and to contact ATC when closer to Camarillo.....thus the Transponder should have already been set to 1200 from the specific squawk he had been using....leaving him to push one button one time in order to comply with ATC's request.....an action he did not have to do immediately or at all as he was certainly dealing with an Emergency situation.
You want to ask what he was thinking.....then ask some useful questions and summon up an answer that means something and might explain what happened.
I ask what was he thinking when I ask why he did not use the Autopilot System to HIS best advantage during routine VMC Flights and carry that good thinking over to flights like the one he was making the day of the crash.
Why did he ignore the very procedure he tested other company pilots on....re the existing IIMC SOP of slow down, divert, turn around, or land?
Why did he not discuss alternative plans with his Director of Operations as was required by the Operator's Risk Assessment Policy?
Those are the kinds of questions that need to be asked and answered.
Ara is no different than any of us....but something happened to take him and his passengers from us that day.
It was not Spatial Disorientation that did it....it was something that set him up in the situation that allowed that to happen.
That is the real cause of the accident...not Ara getting Vertigo as says the NTSB.