Mxsmanic wrote in
:

You're flying happily over the desert in your small plane, in bright,
clear weather, on your IFR flight plan. You notice a plume of smoke a
short distance away at your nine o'clock, and looking more carefully,
you see what looks like a stranded car with some people standing
around it. You'd like to investigate just to see if it might be
someone who needs help.

Given that you're on an IFR flight plan and under ATC control, how do
you handle this? I presume you can't just tell ATC that you're going
to swing south and drop to 2000 feet for a while to check something
out. Do you ask ATC to vector you towards the stranded car? Do you
cancel IFR to go take a look? Is there a way of suspending IFR
temporarily so that you can leave your planned route and altitude and
check out the source of the smoke? What's the procedure?

On a related note (whence the crosspost to r.a.p.), has this ever
happened to you? That is, have you ever seen something that looked
like a possible case of people in distress on the ground and decided
to go over and take a look and/or report it to ATC?

Yep, happened to me. I saw a ship spewing oil. I went closer (IFR in an
airliner, yet) to have a look.
Semd me 100$ and I'll tell you how it all worked.

Bertie