To me its another classic case of not asking ATC for help soon enough. He found himself stuck above cloud in both turbulent and icing conditions. I am sure if at the first sign of his concern he had conveyed those thoughts to ATC he would have been offered radar vectors not necessary to the nearest airfield but to an area clear of cloud in which he could make a visual descent. With lossimouth radar only 30 miles away they could have idented him and given him radar vectors to fly north, descend over the Moray firth clear of cloud and high ground and hopefully divert then to Inverness/Lossie/Kinloss.
There have been many occasions whilst I have been talking to aircraft you just get that feeling in your water that all is not well......a little word from me asking are you really OK is all that it takes for them to admit "No It Is Not".....so should you every feel threatened and unsure please please tell ATC, we can only help if we know there is a problem.
