Just a general question about the AW139 and its autopilot. If you were going to do an IF departure which required a vertical climb (just say you were going to go from zero vis as in this case), does the aircraft have an attitude hold so all the pilot had to do was pull up smoothly on the collective to high power and the attitude and heading would remain the same, so conducting a safe vertical climb?
If it did, then apart from the (IMHO) inherent risk of departing in fog at night, trying to over-ride the autopilot by hand flying it does seem to indicate a lack of awareness of aircraft system and a waste of a four axis system.