Mooney_Driver wrote:
By the looks of it, 1.5 km could well have been present but a low ceiling of approximately 200-300 ft AGL.
Golf requires 1.5 km and “free of clouds”. I think, although marginal, the takeoff could have been legally ok. As long as IFR in airspace Golf is not prohibited in Austria, then that is what he was aiming for.
A possible situation is that he mixed up the runway he was actually starting on. The risk for doing so is particularly high if it is your homebase, where you’d think that all is safe and easy?
An IFR airfield (more precisely an instrument runway) has much broader rules for lights, obstacle free zones, etc. that help the pilot to fly his plan and to survive even in case of deviations
Yes I agree but most VFR airfields I fly from would allow +/-30deg departure on runway track for 10nm on shallow 2% gradient without hitting obstacles, trees or terrain…there could be noise area & airspace
What does not work is flying “VFR circuits & departures”, the turns are very tight anyway and one has never done it in VMC before as the circuit is usually busy, then one day they decide to do it in IMC on IFR instruments
Most IR pilots for some reason will complicate their task when mixing VFR/IFR & VMC/IMC on departures, on takeoff at 10ft call it IFR and fly as such, if you need airspace access and separation talk to ATC, it works every time (in Golf without ATIS/RVR, the ceiling is always above your head and clouds don’t exist 
on landing, it’s a different story)
Malibuflyer wrote:
Yes, with modern avionics you could also build yourself a hand made departure routing that works exactly like this. My limited experience, however, is, that pilots who tend to fly illegal IMC departures from VFR runways are not the ones who spend hours of preparation and programming of avionics
Well, anyone most certainly has his GPS programmed somehow, so the magenta line should be there anyhow. Out of Hohenems, you would typically put either the VRP Echo as the first waypoint or a waypoint in the direction of your destination, in this case maybe NUNRI. Both would give you a straight out of runway 05 following the Rhine valley. Even if he had put only the destination, the magenta line would have gone straight over the city of Dornbirn and then over higher terrain beyond the city.
Malibuflyer wrote:
He had some problem with the plane and wanted to turn around but the weather north of the field was worse so that he tried to fly a right hand pattern
He was based there, so he knows the area like the back of his hand. He also lived in Dornbirn. A right hand circuit to runway 05 is not done at all, exactly because of the high terrain, only gliders would use a northeastern circuit. The circuit for 23 is right hand, for 05 it’s left hand over the Rhine valley.
If he was really trying to fly the circuit, then he must have fallen for the usual right turns while departing out of 23. If he had a problem in this kind of visibility, the best thing to do (provided he did not have an engine out) would have been to climb asap on top of the clouds. Even with runway heading and normal climb, he would have been out pretty fast.
UdoR wrote:
A possible situation is that he mixed up the runway he was actually starting on. The risk for doing so is particularly high if it is your homebase, where you’d think that all is safe and easy?
That is what my gut feeling is, yes. The circuit in Hohenems is to the northwest, in the Rhine valley. If you take off on 23 your first turn would be to the right. Particularly if you aim for a departure to the Northeast.
Ibra wrote:
Any reason why this does does not apply to VFR airfields, say you depart in IMC as long as you are not planning to go back?
It does apply to VFR airfields. You can legally depart down to 400 m RVR, even in Germany. (At least from an Ops rules point of view. Germany may have legally binding restrictions on the use of airfields.)
The problem starts when you’re airborne as in Germany any IFR clearance you get when departing a VFR airfield won’t be valid until you pass the MVA in the climb. At the the same time controlled airspace begins so low that you can’t usually (possibly nowhere) reach the safe IFR altitude in class G, so you need a clearance which you can’t have.
Airborne_Again wrote:
At the the same time controlled airspace begins so low that you can’t usually (possibly nowhere) reach the safe IFR altitude in class G, so you need a clearance which you can’t have.
If you apply that strictly, then there is no way out of or into Mallorca Son Bonet into or out of IFR (class A from 1000ft AGL up on the island, higher up once over the sea but class G is almost everywhere in the huge Palma TMA at least 1000ft below MVA) . ATC do not apply that strictly and either grant VFR clearances into class A or IFR below MVA maintaining own separation from solid objects.
It does apply to VFR airfields. You can legally depart down to 400 m RVR, even in Germany. (At least from an Ops rules point of view. Germany may have legally binding restrictions on the use of airfields.)
The problem starts when you’re airborne as in Germany any IFR clearance you get when departing a VFR airfield won’t be valid until you pass the MVA in the climb. At the the same time controlled airspace begins so low that you can’t usually (possibly nowhere) reach the safe IFR altitude in class G, so you need a clearance which you can’t have.
I am not sure how things work in Germany, can you get an “IFR airspace en-route clearance” on phone?
In any case there is zillions of way to make it tough life depending on IMC/VMC, CAS/OCAS, MVA/MSA…but as long as you know how to handle lost comms the answer is rather simple: in Golf the weather is always VMC and the flight path is always done according to IFR trajectories, everything 100% legal and safe
I know the answer in UK/France, for my own consumption, in UK, I come across IRI/IRE who suggest circling at 300ft agl in those situations, in France, I was told you have to fly the visual circuit…
This is a VFR airfield. IMC conditions prevailed. When will people finally learn?
Antonio wrote:
If you apply that strictly, then there is no way out of or into Mallorca Son Bonet into or out of IFR (class A from 1000ft AGL up on the island, higher up once over the sea but class G is almost everywhere in the huge Palma TMA at least 1000ft below MVA) . ATC do not apply that strictly and either grant VFR clearances into class A or IFR below MVA maintaining own separation from solid objects.
I was referring to the situation in Germany.
This is a VFR airfield. IMC conditions prevailed. When will people finally learn?
That is the wrong way to look at it , here is a better way, how the risk profile of takeoff in IMC changes when you add GPS IAP to AD entry with OCH = 500ft ? Now you have an IFR airport with AFIS but usually no SID departure and no lights are added, can you takeoff with 1.5km visibility & 50ft ceiling? what has changed?
The legality of IFR takeoff from “VFR airfields” and the associated minima is country & airfield dependent…
