From what I can gather the Pilot was very experienced, and honestly should have known better. He flew knowingly into IMC, and seemed to have persisted. Even though there was strong winds and mountain wave wind shear, and the VAC pump cut out, he persisted. If he was Visual at Craven he should have held in VMC there, not continue into the soup. He had a truck load fuel. He was full fuel out of Cooly with 330mins Total endurance. And if it was going to be a no go, i.e. no clearance onwards, then request to fly back to Taree, and go to the pub, and try again the next day. He wasn't flying a bank run. He didn't have commercial pressure.
As a Night VFR pilot flying into IMC he should've done a 180deg turn on instruments and flown back out again and remain VMC. I'm sorry but he painted himself and his passengers into a corner that night. Its such a terrible tragedy lets not forget this.
I said this in a post before but deleted after reading the BASI report in the National Archive. He seemed to be well north of track when he reported his ADF was spinning or directly tracking. Next time RastoreA you fly the route in your airplane try dialling up the Scone NDB 209khz( I suppose its not there any more) as apposed to the SGT NDB 290khz( maybe gone aswell).He may have had them tuned incorrectly ( dyslexic figure change). Has this theory already been discussed with your investigation team? If he was tracking on fixed card ADF and magnetic compass after DG failure to Scone on weaker signal over the hills might account for his off track excursion.
Last edited by Sheep Guts; 4th Jun 2014 at 13:29.