I support the surprise expressed by some of us here is about the re-entering IMC a second time after re-gaining VMC coming out of IMC.

If he were perhaps staring at the artificial horizon. but also disoriented (and/or stressed) to the point where his brain wasn't interpreting what the gage was telling him, then perhaps he didn't realize he was climbing back in?

,...at least that's kinda what happened to me once.

During the descent seen in the video....the aircraft appeared to be traveling quite fast....and it seemed it was approaching some low cloud or fog.

Could it be something as simple as trying to slow down and the pitch up took him back into cloud.

From the collateral information it does appear he was "lost" despite being very close to his takeoff point and in an area he knew well.

Also....there are two ways to use the "Direct To" feature on a GPS....one is for your Destination....and the other is to your Departure Point.

In poor weather....using your Take Off Point as the waypoint and flying the reciprocal track away from the Take Off Point towards your destination allows you a very quick way of getting turned around if you encounter deteriorating weather.

Linden, New Jersey was not that far away.

Had the Pilot followed the shoreline at a low altitude and slow ground speed and used all of his navaids....perhaps this tragedy might have been avoided.

I don't believe its hard to explain at all. Incapacitating Spatial Disorientation, where a pilot knows that he is disoriented but fails or is incapable of taking the proper corrective action. Maybe a somatogravic illusion (among others)? Does anyone doubt this pilot’s disorientation? It’s never a requirement to be completely IMC for SD, and recovery is not necessarily instantaneous. USAF paper which gives examples of ISD located here.

Looks to me extremely likely that it was disorientation. For everyone who seems amazed that he did not regain control after "regaining VMC" - remember, what happened is that the helicopter became visible intermittently from a point on the ground. That means that IF, the pilot was looking in the correct direction, he could have seen a patch of terra firma , (maybe through a hole in the clouds). That does not mean he had a horizon, knew the attitude or position of the helicopter, and its not sufficient for a regain of situational awareness. So, was it really VMC?

Except that, the abrupt pull up when the helicopter is seen emerging from the bottom of the cloud the first time around strongly suggests he had a good visual reference to complete that manoeuvre.

It's not impossible that the extreme attitudes reached had toppled one or both of the aircraft main gyros, so even if he tried to use the AI he would have been on a hiding to nothing.

Mjb, any idea how close the Edison plant is to 6N5?

Something doesn't add up here. I mean, the wx looks quite flyable. Viz at last 2000; ceiling 300, 400 ft, maybe down to 200 at some patches You may not reach your destination, but you can try. You can give it a go, slow but steady, and return to base if it gets hairy. It's not like as if the wx closed in behind him. And the pilot seems very much in control of his machine, stable hover etc as shown in the second video (the earlier one in the time line).

I wrote pretty much this same opinion in earlier posts. This wasn't a 200-hour pilot that suddenly found himself at 6N5 facing some crappy wx. And the reported wx was 500 and 1.25 miles vis.....the video supports this.

Intermittent IMC is far more dangerous and disorientating than full IMC as you have conflicting information between the instruments and the fleeting glimpses of the ground or cloud base - the human brain is hardwired to prefer visual information cues even if they are not telling the whole truth with regards to the horizon or the vertical.

Get on instruments - stay on instruments.

No need for him to ever look at the flight instruments...he was in VMC, just look at the East River and shoreline and fly back to the heliport. I just don't understand why so many here are hard-over for "lost and disoriented."

Unless you don't hold an IR, as in this case. Get visual, stay visual.

Because, as the report stated, he "did not know whre he was".

but if you don't hold an IR, don't go flying in poor weather - 2000m viz and 500 cloudbase is not good VFR weather.