Originally Posted by
Johnm
I agree, but then I've done it lots of times and have IMC. For a vanilla PPL out of sight of land on a grey day when the sky and sea are indistinguishable, it can be down right frightening
Maybe so but then it should be down to a judgement call on the part of the pilot making the flight as to whether they are current enough to deal with the conditions. On such a dark grey day then all the advice of climbinbg high is not going to be valid as they will be in cloud and even with an IMC they can't cross the FIR boundary in cloud.
There is far to much of people trying to project there own fears onto others rather than giving straight advice. Crossing the channel is no different any other flight. Plan properly, prepare and go. Wear life jackets, carry an EPIRB and go. The EPIRB is probably the best bit of kit you will buy, the mcmurdo fast find in the channel is likely to get you out of the water in under 30mins, hypothermic but alive. If it makes you feel better take a life raft as well.
Oh and suggesting that people learn to fly off the AI without proper instrument training (which is a damn sight more than a couple of hours) is even more "bar room cavalier". If the conditions require flight or possability of flight on the AI then the conditions are not VMC and the flight should not be undertaken by a basic PPL. So go "spew" your crap elsewhere.