C182 pilot reported; on a night takeoff; entering IMC when ATIS reported VMC.

Attributes
ACN	1684349
Time
Date	201909
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	MRY.Airport
State Reference	CA
Environment
Flight Conditions	Mixed
Light	Dawn
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Skylane 182/RG Turbo Skylane/RG
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Initial Climb
Route In Use	Direct
Flight Plan	None
Person 1
Function	Pilot Flying Single Pilot
Qualification	Flight Crew Private
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 46 Flight Crew Total 350 Flight Crew Type 280
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Procedural FAR Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Inflight Event / Encounter VFR In IMC

Narrative:

ATIS reported VFR; clouds 3;500 feet and broken. Sunrise was in minutes; so the clouds were not visible. After takeoff; upon turning right crosswind; I flew straight into IMC. I was only at 1;500 feet when this took place. I placed the aircraft on autopilot and continued direct with a 500 fpm climb as I knew this route was the safest way to handle the situation as turning back to the airport would have been dangerous as mry is located at the base of a mountain. Several minutes later I broke through the unexpected cloud layer and leveled out at 5;500 feet which was the best altitude with VFR conditions and 10 plus mile visibility. The ATIS and weather reporting was not congruent with actual weather conditions.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: C182 pilot reported; on a night takeoff; entering IMC when ATIS reported VMC.

Narrative: ATIS reported VFR; clouds 3;500 feet and broken. Sunrise was in minutes; so the clouds were not visible. After takeoff; upon turning right crosswind; I flew straight into IMC. I was only at 1;500 feet when this took place. I placed the aircraft on autopilot and continued direct with a 500 fpm climb as I knew this route was the safest way to handle the situation as turning back to the airport would have been dangerous as MRY is located at the base of a mountain. Several minutes later I broke through the unexpected cloud layer and leveled out at 5;500 feet which was the best altitude with VFR conditions and 10 plus mile visibility. The ATIS and weather reporting was not congruent with actual weather conditions.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site 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.