Disagree: "
Weather yet again" - those kinda wire strikes you get from scud running. As suspected earlier, it was a terrible mistake to even try in that kind of weather. The top of the ridge-line was probably obscured in the clouds and instead of turning around, all three
rated occupants of the helicopter must have decided to give it a shot through the gap
Pardon my cynicism, but it strikes me odd if (multiple) instructors give such a bad example to their students. As bad as it sounds: since they didn't make it, no harm is done; but all the times before they got away with such a stunt have probably been perceived as "commercial helicopter flying" by their students: monkey see, monkey do.