Ron Wanttaja wrote:

Anyway, we had a combination of operations just outside the Class C, the moral
equivalent of an old, grizzled, test pilot, a test grid we had to fly by GPS,
and newbie controllers who apparently believed if we were on their scope and
talking to them, they could tell us where to fly.

And the truth is they COULD and DID tell you where to fly. And your pilot
(reasonably) disregarded their direction. Isn't that the way it always works?
It is up to the pilot to decide based on the all available information. As an
example of what can go wrong if a pilot follows a controller's erroneous
instructions: it was (apparently) the controller who instructed the pilot to
descend when his TCAS said climb that was a major factor in the mid-air of that
planeload of Russion kids in Switzerland last year. I can understand why the
father stabbed the controller to death a few days ago...

Russell Kent