Hi Brian
Can you please clarify this:
Ren, unfortunately many (I note some of those posting here) seemingly don't believe that a PIC can use any excuse to abrogate his failings. See the Norfolk Island thread and the lambasting the crew get. Any notion that human factors may have had a role to play was quickly and firmly squashed.
I'm not sure what you're saying exactly. I've been following the Norfolk thread and the overarching theme seems to be that the PIC was under all sorts of pressures (commercial, employment, potentially not wanting to look unsure....) but at the end of day he was the PIC and shouldn't have let the no-alternative/Norfolk-or-bust situation to have occurred. But you're also saying the human factors issue in that situation was squashed? It would seem the "PIC is PIC and needs to behave like a PIC" concept got away from James there in conducting that flight but the operator and regulator aren't going to acknowledge the unreasonable levels of pressure the PIC was under either.
One of the key points I'm trying to raise awareness of is that we (PICs) can get ourselves into a 'corner' with ourselves, our passengers and others who see us as so very capable way before we've even taken off and made our way to the "VFR into IMC corner" that this accident and the stories many are writing on here involves.
(PS - those two stories of yours are examples of people that were millimetres away from fatal crashes, thanks for sharing)
Ren