Nit Picker,
I started reading this thread and was quite shocked that before this poor individual has even had his funeral a number of posters were tearing to bits this tragic accident and the 'I would have done this' or I would have done that' was starting to come out. 'Surely he should have done this, gone there, been able to make it to here, etc etc' A bunch of you can't even agree on what the weather was it the airfield below him at the time of the emergency and yet still the - shoulda gone in there comes out. In my warped way I guess I was making a point - that was to put a ridiculous statement out there to entice someone to make a comment. Most choose to ignore it - you didn't and without knowing me, my background in aviation - you ASSUMED I was some pimply faced young wanabee pilot who played flight sim as you intimated in your posts to me. You based this on pure speculation given the information that I put in front of you. The fact is, I agree with everything you said regarding experience, I believe I am a fairly experience person within aviation, I have been involved in investigations, I have known personally over 40 people, spanning 34 years of flying, who have tragically been killed, and the smell of death in a wreckage is something you never forget. So you see, I made my point - you thought I was someone I was not so things are not always, just sometimes, not always what they seem to be, so those that think that this should have been avoidable or he should have landed here there whereever or could have glided to timbuktoo weren't there, don't know all the mitigating circumstances, don't know what was running through this poor guys mind, don't know what the actual wx conditions were and so on. WAIT and then when the report comes out tear it to bits if that makes you all feel good.
Sorry if I upset some on the way.