If the 407 pilot was going VFR from Baton Rouge to Lakefront, New Orleans, he'd want to intercept the south shore of Lake Ponchartrain and then scoot just north of New Orleans International. His plan probably looked something like this.
Even a casual glance at the New Orleans chart would show the big powerline cutting north/south across the western part of the lake, just east of where I-55 and I-10 merge. It is unbelievable that a pilot who was familiar with that area would *not* know about it. New Orleans is a tricky place to fly around. There are powerplants and refineries and all kinds of obstacles that can trip up a helicopter pilot. The nearest tower of that powerline south of I-10 is about 500 feet from the roadway. The next tower is out over the water(!), about 250 feet north of the Interstate. The wires themselves were not marked, and I'd bet that they were invisible until just before impact. Not a good situation.
The other thing is that we know that inland fog is never universally even. It can be patchy...thicker in some spots, thinner in others. This particular day was not a "zero/zero" fogged-in, can't-see-sh*t, sort of day. Dash cam video of the event shows fairly good visibility on the ground. Maybe the pilot had good ground contact and it was sunny above, and maybe he thought he was doing okay. Who knows. I haven't seen any info on how fast he was going, so I'm not sure where people are getting some of the numbers they're reporting.
Those of us who fly for a living don't get to turn down flights just because we're not feeling it, or just because we think the weather
might be (or become) too bad to fly. If the weather is above "minimums," we go flying (unless there's a huge squall line or "something" that's definitely coming that would make launching unsafe). You can't really say, "Well...ahhhh...there might be some fog between here and there, and so I'd rather just cancel the flight today, boss." You won't be a professional pilot for long if you do that more than once or twice.
Our (usually non-pilot) bosses are generally not dumb; most of the time they're familiar with basic-VFR minimums as they apply to airplanes and helicopters here in the U.S., and they expect us to be capable of flying in them. If the weather is "generally" flyable, our bosses expect us to fly and use our superior judgment to not crash and kill them. And that's what we do. Most of the time.
At PHI, our over-water cross-country weather minimums were 500/3. The problem is, even 500/3 can turn into zero-zero very unexpectedly. I was once flying along at 500', fat dumb and happy under a very dark overcast. Visibility underneath was, like, ten miles or more. All of a sudden, the clouds in my area let loose and I was suddenly engulfed in heavy rain. With my vast 2,500 hours of experience, I said something profound like, "ZOIKS!" They hadn't taught us about that in training. The forward viz was so bad that I honestly considered popping the floats and setting it down on the water. But luckily I was over a shallow part of the Gulf of Mexico and a platform soon appeared - on which I landed. That was 1987. In the following years, I have diverted around weather, done a 180, and even landed in a field or two to wait out an improvement. I'd like to say that I always maintained nice and comfortable "VFR" conditions throughout my flying career, but it just ain't so. We fly helicopters. And helicopters sometimes fly in some crappy weather.
To say, "Well
I would never fly in such bad weather as that 407 pilot!"makes the person talking (or writing) sound foolish and silly. Of course you would, if you're really a commercial helicopter pilot. The key is to do something
else before it gets so bad that you hit something. The unfortunate 407 pilot did not, and sadly he paid the ultimate price. He's not the first, and probably won't be the last.