Question for mil pilots: DIY IFR approach legality in emergencies?
I was reading a book called Viper Pilot and at one point in the book, the author talks about an enormous sandstorm wrecking visibility at all nearby airfields. The tankers flew off to alternates and were too far to provide refueling and his entire flight was in an emergency fuel state. The only alternates not engulfed by the sandstorm were beyond their max range at their fuel state.
In the book, he describes flying a dry run over a runway while he still had enough visibility (I think it was about 1/2 mile at that point), and he set a steerpoint over the runway as he flew and sent the steerpoint to his flight via the link. He then did a pattern and landed, with the visibility dropping to something like 1/4 or 1/8th of a mile. The whole flight landed safely by following the DIY approach.
So, this technique actually works quite well and probably saved the flight. I tried it in the Falcon BMS sim and it worked a lot better than I expected.
But what is the legality of this in the military? Would you be in doo-doo for allowing your fuel state to get so low? And how does the military react to this kind of DIY instrument approach if conducted in an emergency like as described?