Inexperienced instrument rated private pilot descended early on an ILS approach when he flew the gli...

Attributes
ACN	837251
Time
Date	200905
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	HYA.Airport
State Reference	MA
Environment
Flight Conditions	Mixed
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Small Aircraft Low Wing 1 Eng Retractable Gear
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Final Approach
Route In Use	Other ILS
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	ILS/VOR
Person 1
Function	Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 12 Flight Crew Total 1100 Flight Crew Type 125
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Altitude Excursion From Assigned Altitude Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT

Narrative:

Weather forecast was clear below at least 9000 ft along entire route. Approximately 40 miles west of hya noticed developing low cloud layer; checked ATIS at hya and heard 1600 broken; 2000 ovc. Asked for and received a pop-up IFR clearance for the ILS runway 24 into hya; received vectors to the ILS. After establishing on the localizer; did not receive glideslope and decided to convert the approach into a localizer approach in-place. Bad decision; got confused and descended too early. Tower called low altitude alert and I stopped descent. By this time I was below the cloud deck; which was at 1000 ft; not 1600 as on the ATIS; and completed approach visually. Possibly I misinterpreted the instruments and confused being below the glideslope (normal for the localizer intercept) with not receiving it at all. Observations: 'real' IFR is not the same as under the hood. I need to spend more time doing real IFR. Or at least do a lot more practice approaches; and ones where things don't go exactly as planned. Possibly; as a casual pilot (less than 100 hours per year) I should do an instrument proficiency check every six months whether I need to or not.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Inexperienced instrument rated private pilot descended early on an ILS approach when he flew the glideslope out procedure in lieu of the ILS because he felt the glideslope display was malfunctioning.

Narrative: Weather forecast was clear below at least 9000 FT along entire route. Approximately 40 miles west of HYA noticed developing low cloud layer; checked ATIS at HYA and heard 1600 BKN; 2000 OVC. Asked for and received a pop-up IFR clearance for the ILS Runway 24 into HYA; received vectors to the ILS. After establishing on the localizer; did not receive glideslope and decided to convert the approach into a localizer approach in-place. Bad decision; got confused and descended too early. Tower called low altitude alert and I stopped descent. By this time I was below the cloud deck; which was at 1000 FT; not 1600 as on the ATIS; and completed approach visually. Possibly I misinterpreted the instruments and confused being below the glideslope (normal for the localizer intercept) with not receiving it at all. Observations: 'Real' IFR is not the same as under the hood. I need to spend more time doing real IFR. Or at least do a lot more practice approaches; and ones where things don't go exactly as planned. Possibly; as a casual pilot (less than 100 hours per year) I should do an instrument proficiency check every six months whether I need to or not.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.