The question of what procedure to follow during a go-around from a visual approach on an IFR flight plan sits in one of the more genuinely ambiguous corners of Part 121 operations, and the fact that experienced check airmen split evenly on the answer reflects a real gap in explicit regulatory language. A visual approach, as defined in the AIM (5-4-23), is not an instrument approach procedure. It is an ATC authorization for an IFR aircraft to proceed to the destination airport using visual references, which means no published missed approach procedure is formally associated with it in the way one is associated with an ILS or RNAV approach. This is precisely why the FAR/AIM does not contain the direct, dispositive language the original poster is searching for — the situation exists in a procedural gray zone between the IFR and VFR worlds.
Despite the ambiguity, the operational logic strongly favors flying the published missed approach for the runway in use. A Part 121 flight cleared for a visual approach remains on an active IFR flight plan and is receiving IFR separation services. ATC is managing traffic around that aircraft under IFR assumptions. When a go-around is initiated, the controller's first priority is maintaining separation from other IFR traffic, and the published missed approach procedure is the one tool both the crew and ATC can immediately reference to predict the aircraft's trajectory. Climbing to 1,500 AGL on whatever heading the aircraft happens to be tracking at go-around initiation provides no standardized obstacle clearance and no predictable routing that ATC can use to protect the flight from conflicting traffic. TERPS-designed missed approach procedures exist precisely because obstacle and terrain clearance cannot be assumed from an arbitrary climb gradient.
The "+1500 AGL into the jet pattern" convention comes from VFR and tower-environment thinking, where pattern altitudes are set and aircraft are under visual separation. That logic is appropriate when an aircraft is operating VFR or when ATC is actively providing vectors and visual separation in a high-density terminal environment with radar. However, defaulting to a jet pattern in IMC conditions, at night, or at airports near significant terrain without first verifying ATC's awareness and instructions introduces meaningful risk. The critical step in either case is immediate communication with ATC upon initiating the go-around — at which point the controller will typically issue climb instructions or confirm the missed approach procedure, resolving the ambiguity in real time.
The broader takeaway for Part 121 operators is that this question should be definitively answered in airline Standard Operating Procedures, not left to individual check airman interpretation. Airlines operating under OpSpecs are expected to have SOPs governing exactly these scenarios, and the split among check airmen is itself a red flag for training standardization. Operators that have not explicitly addressed go-around procedures from visual approaches in their training programs or Flight Operations Manuals are creating the conditions for inconsistent crew behavior in a high-workload phase of flight. Flight standards departments at carriers encountering this debate should treat it as a gap requiring a formal policy decision — with the published missed approach as the defensible default — rather than allowing the ambiguity to persist across cockpit culture.