IMO anyone who is willing to press on, especially if not IFR rated/equipped (which is no substitute for proper planning but gives you a fighting chance to find a way out after it has all gone pearshaped), becomes a candidate for the Darwin Awards.

The rules are there to protect you, your passengers and people on the ground. If you cannot make it today, try again another day.

I should have thought the 500ft rule makes it easy to make a decision, especially when there are passengers aboard or waiting to be collected.

"Sorry, I can't go on, it's illegal!" The decision is made for you by the legislation, you can blame the regulators - if you want.

Getting below 500ft to, say, 400ft, means you're taking the decision-making onto yourself and now you've got nothing to hang your hat on, as it were, except your judgement.

Given that there is evidence of flawed judgement to begin with by breaking the 500ft rule in the first place, I'm of the view that you're now fully established, so to speak, on a slippery slope.

And they only go downhil.