Mmmmm I’m going to take exception to this.

It is certainly possible (and easy) to become disoriented in IMC.

But every private pilot has at least a couple of hours of simulated instrument time and should be capable of navigating their aircraft back out of a cloud.

You are taught, if you have a competent instructor, to ignore your senses and rely on the instruments in such situations, as well as recovery from unusual attitudes by instruments alone.

I don’t doubt that people forget their training or don’t keep current however.

Also, there is no such thing (for light aircraft) as an unrecoverable attitude that results in impacting the ground a minute and a half later.

Any properly loaded certificated light aircraft can be recovered from any attitude if you have that much time.

It takes a max of about 10 seconds to recover an aircraft from any unusual attitude and reestablish straight and level flight.

A spiral dive (the typical situation with loss of visual reference) it might take 15 seconds since you have to bleed off the speed you picked up.

There might be some extremely low drag aircraft that might be a bit more problematic in that regard, but they are typically also capable of much higher VNE limits.

The link I posted above is from an instrument rated pilot of an instrument flight plan who nearly got himself and passengers killed in IMC. A couple or few hours under the hood is not nearly enough to handle actual IMC a few years later.

And yes, in theory properly loaded certified plane can be recovered in most of the cases. But it is not going to help you to know that recovery takes 10k feet if you are at 8k AGL.

The pilot in question was obviously not actually qualified to operate in IMC, which he intentionally entered.

If you are a pilot and do not take recurrent training or actively practice -in the aircraft you fly- on unusual conditions, you are actively in abdication of your responsibility as a pilot and should not be flying anything heavier than a part103 aircraft. There is a reason why even landing at night requires a 90day currency before you can land at night with a passenger. Being a pilot is not like riding a bicycle. It requires constant skill maintenance.

There is no situation you can get into where the aircraft is still intact where a recovery in a light aircraft will take more than about 1000 feet if properly executed. Perhaps in some aircraft as much as 2000 feet.

The only way I can imagine anything so extreme is that you are already at VNE pointed straight down and you have to slip the plane a little to slow down before you can pull significant Gs on the airframe. That might take a few seconds. But it also assumes you already have been in an unusual attitude for quite some time and chose not to recover until now.

Sorry I didn't realize you are a pilot and answer was very generic. But here is "unrecoverable" scenarios: - Accelerate beyond Va: need gentle control inputs will be required and it will take more time to recover; - Invert the plane: unless it's aerobatic your oil will stop flowing and engine will die very fast; - T-tails have problems with controls effectiveness that delay recovery.

> There is a reason why even landing at night requires a 90day currency...

With passengers. I don't like to fly at night in a single engine plane and I go months if not years between night (solo) landings. Granted I don't fly to unlighted runways, but in my experience landing at night on a lighted runway is not that harder than landing during the day.

> ... in a light aircraft will take more than about 1000 feet if properly executed. Perhaps in some aircraft as much as 2000 feet.

Many planes have been modified after the spin certification had been done. E.g. on my A36 I have tip tanks, radar, TN engine, anti-ice, ... I have no idea if it will recover from spin as expected or not. And I have no interest in testing it. I can tell you that I lose 500-600 feet in a stall. This gives me a hint that recovery from a spin might be more than 1000 feet.

It's not possible to enter an unrecoverable spin in a light aircraft?

An aircraft that cannot be recovered from a spin under regular loading must be equipped with a spin recovery drouge or granted a special exception in order to be certificated.

Aircraft that are deemed incapable of entering a spin inside their operational envelope may be granted an exception. (Some stall resistant aircraft like the ercoupe or some canards, for example )

In practice, although many light aircraft are not certified for intentional spins, almost all of them are recoverable from a fully developed spin inside 1000 feet. YMMV with a large transport category aircraft however lol.

A fully developed spin is like a seed helicoptering to the ground. It is a stable condition, with a low and constant rate of descent. It used to be taught as standard practice for c150 pilots to use a flat (fully developed, stable) spin to descend through clouds into a known safe ceiling if a non instrument pilot found themselves trapped above a cloud layer with sufficient clear space below the layer to descend into.

Spins are not, generally, a boogie-man… but accidentally entering one during a steep turn near the ground is a really bad idea. I have more than one friend who has tried it , 0/10 would not recommend.

One possible exception is when you have floats attached. I’m not sure of the spin recoverability of a light plane with floats, never tried it, but I do know mounting floats on many aircraft effectively voids their intentional spin endorsement and sometimes requires the installation of additional vertical stabilisers on the empennage.

I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t want to spin my old t-cart on floats with a kayak tucked under one wing and a pair of rifles strapped to the other. Don’t have to worry about VNE with that outfit though lol.

Nice, thanks for the answer. I always conceptualized a spin as an unstable state that just gets worse and worse if left unattended.

You might be thinking of a spiral dive. A spiral dive is what disoriented pilots in IMC often get into, and if you don’t have your wits about you it can really ruin your day.

The problem is that in a spiral dive your butt feel is like you are going straight and level, but your airspeed and feel of the airplane is telling you to pull up.

It will appear that the artificial horizon has failed (it will usually be indicating the truth, but it will feel wrong and you will think it’s broken, or it may be past it’s gimbal lock limits. )

If you follow your instincts, you will try to pull up. That will have the effect of tightening the spiral component of the dive but will not cause the aircraft to regain level flight. It will also have the effect of drastically increasing the stress on the airframe, which may already be beyond its maximum structural speed.

Recovery from a spiral dive is very easy… but you have to know you are in a spiral dive, and without visual reference to the ground that requires awareness and correct interpretation of the flight instruments.

You are in a spiral dive if:

A: you are going at an inexplicably high speed for your engine and airframe configuration (you are in a dive). Most pilots recognise this easily.

And

B: your rate of turn indicator is off center or especially, pegged to one side. You have to be looking for this.

Aside from that, a rapid descent showing on the VSI and altimeter.

Other gyroscopic instruments such as the heading indicator and the artificial horizon may be showing erratic or incorrect information.

Recovery is easy:

1: immediately pull the throttle to idle.

2: neutralise the turn that is indicated on the turn indicator using normal control inputs. Do not attempt to pull up until the turn has stopped completely.

3: gently pull out of the dive. Avoid abrupt control movements until the aircraft is below manoeuvring speed.

4: continue to fly the aircraft. If you are in clouds consider carb heat to avoid icing.

That’s really it.