Plenty of good replies here - remember, it's not the cloud but the sudden stop that kills. And if you haven't flown in real cloud, it feels nothing like being under-the-hood - probably the first time in your life that you really can't see and feel where you're going, and you're doing it an 1nm every 30 secs or so.
I'd like to offer a (very typical) scenario:
- Poor weather - not great vis and some drizzle patches - no real horizon.
- You're plodding along, at an increased level of alertness, navigating carefully and getting closer to your destination.
- Rising ground (or falling cloudbase) and you're being pushed from your planned cruise down to low level, but 500' AGL is still legal, and you're only a little below that - stress of weather and all that.
- Naturally, you're over the lower ground (the valley), because the hilltops are in cloud. Drizzle increasing, you're busy peering through the windscreen.
- Remember, grey cloud seen against grey drizzle with no horizon -> can't see it approaching at 100k until you're in it.
- Now, suddenly, you're in cloud.
The situation:
- You are actually only barely above the treetops - and you know it.
- You know you can't turn cause there's hills - somewhere - close.
- You know the only way to stay vaguely upright is to rely on that tiny bit of instrument practice from years ago.
- You can't both fly the instruments and look out.
Scary? If you get lucky and survive - you learnt a couple of things. You used one of you nine lives. VFR aircraft are not practical timely transport, if you can't wait, don't fly. Safe air transport really does require IFR, though IFR is no guarantee.
Last edited by drpixie; 29th Jan 2015 at 03:45.