I'm sorry Pace, but you seriously expect a PPL/Ultralight pilot to know about flight level settings? Especially such a low hour pilot? If I recall correctly, he can't even go above 10,000 feet!
I think a big part of this discussion is the discrepancy between the big guys (i.e. you high hour heavy metal drivers) and the little guys here (i.e. us private sardine can pushers). When a 172 hits an Airbus, they both go down; so they both have as much right to be in the air as anybody and are as important on ATC's radar as each other. The problem I'm having with this whole discussion isn't so much the negative comments directed at Mr. H (whether he deserves it or not), it's the comments directed at light aviation pilots - comments like;
"I am rapidly coming to the conclusion that a Pilots Airmanship is inversely proportional to the aircrafts Max All Up Weight and/or HP of his engine...."
...that really get my blood flowing. Are you guys serious? You're telling a low time pilot that he should be kicked out of the sky (a sky that you seem to act like you own) because he's rusty (giving him a very large benefit of the doubt here) on procedures, or doesn't know procedures that are outright IFR only? You guys sure are the cream of the crop, yea, you made it all the way to the top and slugged your way through the private sector, but guess what - private flying didn't go away when you left it behind, and it's got just as much right to be in the air as you do. Maybe if we had less of this snotty nose in the air attitude towards light plane pilots, the current pilot retention rate wouldn't be below 50% and new pilot numbers falling like Mr. Biggles here.
EDIT: People are replying to my post and I can't reply back, as I am waiting for moderator approval. Please view my latest reply here, sorry if this is uncouth but I hate being muzzled in a good debate
I would very much like a chance to defend myself, but alas I must wait for a moderator to approve my posts? So I write this in an attempt to calm the fire of argument that is currently burning within me
vanHorck: I do not know Mr. H nor have ever been in the country of Britain to begin with. It seems that you have misinterpreted my remarks, as you seem to think the main thrust of my point is to defend Biggle-boy. No, my main remark is that the attitude expressed by many of the people in this thread is quite derogatory to private pilots.
I also am offended and slightly perturbed by the idea that since I present a different argument, I am lumped in with Mr. H here; I'm a safe pilot. I passed my check ride with flying colors; I always do a run up before take off, I always do a double walkaround and double check my fuel and oil before I go up. I always practice proper radio calls and try to sound as professional as possible. Hell, I want to learn so much and be so perfect at flying that I kick myself when there's even the slightest bump in my landings - and there generally isn't, even with the 20 knot crosswind across the beach where I typically land with the under 3,000 lb DA-20 that I usually fly. And I'm teaching myself aeronautics to boot, with a $200+ library slowly being built on my shelf.
Mariner9: I know what a flight level is, my point is that you hardly ever hear it as a private pilot, at least in my (admittedly) small experience range. I usually stay below 3,000 feet, so I have a different experience than Mr. H here. I would have probably made his ill-fated flight at 2,500 feet as well, because that's where I'm most comfortable. And I'm sorry, but I was also taught that if I didn't understand a tower's instructions, I would simply ask for clarification; not become a danger to life and limb because I didn't know the definition of one of the commands.
Also, you got me on the proportionality - nice way to toss in a casual insult though. No, I mixed up what I read and managed to get it quite wrong. My mistake.
A Pommie: I'm sorry, I haven't heard the word "flight level" in over two years, and I've never heard it spoken on the radio. I guess I should stop flying because I forgot that bit of minutia, instead of asking the tower to clarify their instruction when the need arose?
EDIT2: Honestly Pace, I wouldn't shift the blame from him to the training. That just gets the flight instructors in trouble for a dumb student; if he didn't know how to do something, he should have asked someone (again, me being the safe pilot, that's what I do - I just did that last week actually, asking a senior pilot at the FBO for some procedure clarifications on a trip I was making), he should have checked his fuel, etc etc. I don't know the layout of the area he was in, so I can't comment on his landing choice. Pancaking into a tree surely was not the best option though, isn't England quite famous for it's large flat fields?