2010-06 · NASA ASRS report 891834
A Q400 flight crew requested direct the destination airport's ILS as part of the pre-departure clearance. The request was granted but the aircraft must maintain VFR during the departure climb. The crew was unable the VFR climb and so ATC issued IFR vectors away from terrain.
The Captain had requested a clearance to proceed (after departure) direct to a fix on the destination airport ILS. While giving us our takeoff clearance; the Tower Controller then gave us a clearance to climb VFR direct to the fix up to 15;000 FT. Based on the observed weather on arrival this seemed like it would work. Shortly after takeoff and in the turn direct; it became apparent that VFR to 15;000 would not work. The Captain then informed Center that we would not be able to maintain VFR in that direction all the way to 15;000. The Controller then added that for terrain; we would have to maintain that for the direct clearance; and that Tower had informed him that we had accepted the VFR climb. We told him that we did; it was not what we requested; but we thought it would still work. He gave us a heading away from the westerly rising terrain and a climb to 9;000. Upon reaching that altitude he then cleared us to join the airway to our destination. Never did we fly into IFR conditions while on the VFR clearance. Perhaps the Center Controller thought we were already doing that; because his response to our confession that we would not be able to comply with our original clearance seemed terse. Our goal was to keep our operation moving along without flying far out of the way on a SID that seemed unnecessary. Our acceptance of VFR clearance when it wasn't what we expected was more impulsive than a well thought out plan; i.e.; just fly the SID; the fact that it seemed like it would work; based on our observation of the weather at arrival; was really not the way to go. Better would have been to stick with what we know for sure will work.
This event happened mainly because I got ahead of myself. As a pilot group we are usually trying expedite all operations from departure to cruise to arrivals. I tried to expedite by proceeding direct. Clearly; I should not have accepted this clearance before takeoff as weather conditions had changed much more rapidly than I had anticipated. When we arrived (from the north) we were in VFR conditions through 15;000 and had the field in sight out of 10;000. I observed a broken to scattered layer over the airport only. The weather to the west looked pretty good. (I could see the hills). But; by the time we took off the broken to scattered layer had spread out to the west precluding us from maintaining VFR all the way up to 15;000. 10;000 Was as high as we could go VFR. We maintained VFR while ATC vectored us to avoid terrain. The terrain was in sight until entering the clouds around 10;000 FT. I should have waited to accept this clearance so that I could be ABSOLUTELY sure that the weather would let us easily comply with ATC instructions.
Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.
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