Hilton wrote:

[...]

I've been following this accident closely because he took off from my home
airport, I am *very* familiar with route, I took note of the weather that
day when I heard about the accident, I watched the aircraft fly along Hwy
101 around (usually below) 1000' MSL for about 30 miles (on SJC's RADAR),
and the 'fire' story added mystery. It's very sad that a pilot lost his
life and the question that remains to be answered is why no IFR clearance
out of RHV? Plane not IFR capable (at the time), pilots not current, a
delay getting out of RHV, something else?

A few years ago weather fooled me to fly across these hills toward
Hollister. I was coming from the opposite direction, flying home to
SJC. In the Central Valley sky was overcast, but at higher elevation,
10-12 thousand feet if I recall it correctly, so I maintained my altitude
without a problem. As I was close to Panoche I saw that the clouds
over the hills were darker, however I could see the sun patches on
the Ocean from beneath them. I saw no high buildup and I estimated
the height of this layer to be approx. 1000' at max. I saw a jet
descending between this low layer and the high elevation overcast.
I listened to Hollister traffic, many people were flying over there,
and so I attempted to cross toward Hollister/Gilroy.

That was a mistake. As I entered the valley close to Panoche VOR, in
just a few minutes the ceiling became literally closing on me. The air
became violent and I decided that its enough of the foolishness with
this "somehow scraping the ceiling and going home anyway." I made a
180. But behind me clouds were also already so low that I could not
see the sides of the pass. I went into a climb and I was forced to
enter IMC conditions for at least a half of this turn before I was
atop of the cloud layer. I flew back toward Harris Ranch and I stayed
there overnight.

So I got my big scare and I was astonished and angry about myself
that I brought myself into such risky situation. During the
entire evening, while enjoying an opulent dinner at Harris Ranch,
I tried to understand and to summarize my mistakes. My top list
is:

a) I called Flight Watch as I passed Tehachapi Pass and I saw that
weather was completely different on this side of the Sierras.
They warned against attempting to fly VFR further than to Fresno.
My personal assessment of the high ceiling and the presence of
sunny patches seduced me to ignore their expertise and to push
it too far. This was probably the classic "I wanna reach my
destination" syndrome.
b) Never try to enter passes or otherwise fly over hills with a
low ceiling over them, especially if the due point is close to
the temperature. Clear passage might be only an optical illusion,
moist air might turn into clouds in a matter of minutes.
c) You/me/us are not more clever that *them*. If *their* brains
failed to properly assess a possible danger, you can do the same
kind of mistake and possibly make one more entry in the NTSB
statistics. Thus stay away from marginal situations.

While reading this NTSB report I wonder if the pilots of the
Commander have also underestimated the speed in which visibility
might deteriorate under such conditions, and that's why they did
not bothered to obtain IFR clearance on takeoff from RHV.

Thomas


Anyway, just thought I'd update the group.

Hilton