OK, so we have:
-- the Kennedy accident, which was night VMC that frankly only a nutcase would consider as anything but IMC from the outset.
-- the Scillies helicopter, which -- and I may be wrong here -- I believe was not disorientation but lapse of concentration and they literally ploughed straight into the sea.
-- a tale of an ME108 on a sightseeing trip offshore hitting the ocean. (What was he doing, was he doing steep turns?)
Back, then, to my original question, you see, because if flying into the sea as a result of spatial disorientation in haze in stable cruising flight is a significant danger (like CFIT, carb icing, fuel exhaustion, loss of control in cloud) then we would read about it on a regular basis in the rags. We don't, so what conclusion do we draw? Is it that vfr pilots are very prudent and avoid flying in very low vis offshore? Possible as a part explanation, but I don't buy the fact that pilots are significantly smarter with this danger than they are with CFIT etc..
Or is that although mostly it is scary, it is very rarely fatal? The lack of accident reports seems to point to the latter.
QDM