A very thought provoking article indeed.
I have often sat in the tower and wondered at some incidents that happen.
Only yesterday morning I was in the centre and saw how a certain flying club wanted to send 2 students out of the CTR. The weather was marginal and the first one duly set off. As soon as they are airborne the instructor queried the weather with the ATC and wanted to know if the zone was going to go IMC. It was suggested to him that maybe he should return before it gets any worse.
What amazed me about this was that the instructor had not phoned the weather office AT ALL, even though the flight was a local flight and the ATIS weather was available to him (oh and he could see it was marginal before he left). The subsequent discussion in the centre was about airmanship, planning for a proper flight, etc and this starts the chain of events which can lead up to a (fatal?) incident ocurring.
The second pilot also said he had not consulted the weather man and elected to abort his flight before he got to the hold.
It is like flying in the circuit - how many pilots think that they need an alternate? Only a few weeks ago I was involved in an incident at night, when i queried it with an instructor about where his alternate was - his response was that they did not need one as he was staying in the circuit. To prove a point to him I asked him what would he do if the lights on the runway failed? His reply was that he would divert to Stellenbosch or Fisantekraal. At 2200B he got a fright when I told him that neither of those airfields has runway lights available (OK FASH has but with prior liaison). Afterwards he phoned me and said he had never thought about the need for an alternate airfield when he was in the circuit!!! (esp at night with so few options avail around FACT).