Pace, I agree they botched up, but...
The weather was forecast at 1000ft. The reason they didn't break out could have been wrong altimeter setting and/or that the ceilings lowered. And being on IFR flight plan rather than VFR hadn't made much difference if you can't use VOR/ILS/GS or radio. The culprit here is not that they were VFR on top in itself.
Icing was not forecast (as far as I understand).
I'm not saying they didn't mess up, just that one could end up in the exact same scenario, or worse (over mountains), even if one diverted promptly. I think the right response in both scenarios (battery dead, generator dead), would be to find VFR conditions. Failing that, I would let down over water or flatlands. But then again, how would you know without navigation equipment?
Thankfully, with more and more battery powered GPS and iPads on board, the same scenario would be harder to get in to today. But not impossible.
Last edited by AdamFrisch; 5th July 2012 at 22:24.