Chopjock - the weather on the day was exactly as forecast so he had no excuse for launching - a simple telephone call to Swansea or Pembrey would have confirmed the poor conditions - Swansea was in cloud.
If you have a look at a map or google earth you will see just how far, in such poor conditions, he had to go following the coastline to get to Pembrey - not exactly a short hop to safety - it is a long way up the estuary so the risky option would be to take a dirty dart across with only the sea to look at. I don't know what he did but I bet it was much harder work and considerably less safe than accepting the met is crap and cancelling the flight.
No matter what we say on this forum, people will still launch and press on because it is the weekend and the only time they can fly so why should they let the weather stop them - anyway who listens to the met man anyway he's wrong so often. The list of excuses for getting airborne is shi*e weather is endless and the desire to go flying very strong - just a shame it costs people their lives.