Black, White or Grey........
It appears that there are a lot of people out there, who from the cosy confines of their computer desks are making assumptions based on less than 100% of the true facts. (For a change)
YES there are rules that should never be broken....
YES there are limits that should never be exceeded.....
YES there are situations that should never be approached.....
Ladies and gentlemen, let me ask you this:
IF you are unfortunate enough to crash your aeroplane into the sea, and you are just outside the radius of action of any of our SAR assets, if they stuck to all their limits, and
IF the weather was so bad on scene that, even if they did make it to you, they would be operating beyond their legal limits, and
IF there was a no chance that they would have any fuel remaining for an instrument recovery, if the bad weather caught them out, and certainly no diversion fuel, as is required by the big book, (or sets of books now), that’s if they reached you, and if they found you in the fog, and if they managed to rescue you,
In fact to lift at all would be just stupid.....
Would you want them to try?