Germanwings airliner crashes in French Alps

[Rafterman]

I've been following this and it seems Lufthansa are one of the few, if not perhaps the only, major airline to not operate a 'two person' rule with respect how many people must be in the cockpit at all times. In every other major airline, if one of the cockpit crew takes a break and leaves the cockpit, another crew member must replace him/her before they can leave. I assume this is to prevent emergencies due to medical or psychological issues from either pilot or co-pilot.

I sense Lufthansa may be changing their policy in the very near future.

I find that odd as well. Many times I've seen a cockpit crew member come out of the cockpit to use the restroom. Typically a flight attendant will block the aisle with a beverage cart and stay there the entire time while the crew member is in the head. Additionally, a second flight attendant will go into the cockpit to maintain the 2-person requirement.

[Space Commander Travis]

how do they know that he did all the things you're all gleefully speculating about and accusing him of? Did he reel off his manifesto as the plane lost height? Did he yell "Allah Akbar"? (Because we know you're all anxiously hoping that'll he turn out to have "Links to Radical Islam", aren't you)?

[KariW]

I agree with you. Officials are saying that the co-pilot deliberately locked out the pilot and manually initiated a descent. Whatever his reasons are behind doing it, you cannot blame anyone else for his actions. I'm sure he did have his reasons, but if what the officials have said is true (which is what DOTNM is basing her opinion on) then the blame lies with this co-pilot. If he had not done those two things, I think it is pretty safe to assume that all those people would still be alive.

Very well put MoonGazer and DOT! I have to believe that the officials involved with this case have had time to review the data, and make preliminary judgments on what happened those last few minutes before the crash. At this point It sounds to me like the copilot took deliberate actions to insure that the plane crashed..... more time will tell if this is indeed the case.

[+OverSword]

how do they know that he did all the things you're all gleefully speculating about and accusing him of? Did he reel off his manifesto as the plane lost height? Did he yell "Allah Akbar"? (Because we know you're all anxiously hoping that'll he turn out to have "Links to Radical Islam", aren't you)?

Who are you talking to?

[Space Commander Travis]

Very well put MoonGazer and DOT! I have to believe that the officials involved with this case have had time to review the data, and make preliminary judgments on what happened those last few minutes before the crash. At this point It sounds to me like the copilot took deliberate actions to insure that the plane crashed..... more time will tell if this is indeed the case.

In two days? This would have to be the quickest accident investigation ever. The officials wouldn't have had anything like enough time to recover all the potentially significant debris, let alone review all the data on the data recorders (if they've even recovered the flight data recorder yet, they hadn't last time I'd heard). If the officials have said anything at all to that effect, they ought to be fired for pre-empting the investigation.

[Space Commander Travis]

Who are you talking to?

Most of the people in the last couple of pages in this thread, with all their gleeful accusations that the co-pilot is a mass murderer (and also, they all gleefully hope, an Islamic Fundamentalist).

[TSS]

Most of the people in the last couple of pages in this thread, with all their gleeful accusations that the co-pilot is a mass murderer (and also, they all gleefully hope, an Islamic Fundamentalist).

Yeah.....I mean, maybe he was just really crap with directions....

[Lilly]

Uh, there are any number of radical political groups that aren't religiously motived (Islamic or otherwise). The man could have also just been seriously mentally ill and suffered some type of psychotic breakdown. Or...there's something else that caused this behavior that hasn't been discovered as of yet.

[Tiggs]

Most of the people in the last couple of pages in this thread, with all their gleeful accusations that the co-pilot is a mass murderer

“At this moment, in light of investigation, the interpretation we can give at this time is that the co-pilot through voluntary abstention refused to open the door of the cockpit to the commander, and activated the button that commands the loss of altitude,” the prosecutor, Brice Robin, said.

He said it appeared that the intention of the co-pilot, identified as Andreas Lubitz, had been “to destroy the aircraft.” He said that the voice recorder showed that the co-pilot had been breathing until before the moment of impact, suggesting that he was conscious and deliberate in bringing the plane down and killing 144 passengers and five other crew members in the French Alps on Tuesday.

Source: New York Times

[Lilly]

Yeah.....I mean, maybe he was just really crap with directions....

That would take some doing as 'up verses down' isn't all that complex.

[TSS]

That would take some doing as 'up verses down' isn't all that complex.

No but we wouldn't want Norbert getting upset that people are discussing what has actually been released thus far....so to keep him happy i'm going to go with the co-pilot needing a better map, or a better compass....

[Raptor Witness]

Apparently the mental health system in Germany is in shambles, in part due to the reunification efforts of East and West Germany.

It mirrors what has happened in the United States, for other reasons, but often stems from the delusional belief that the human brain isn't really an organ like the kidney, the heart, or the intestines.

Often we see these mass murder suicides as a form of protest; however, this is pure speculation at this point.

Depression has been described as anger turned inward, but that seems oversimplified.

My guess is, since we know he loved to fly, he was symbolically killing a lover.

See the article below by the National Institutes of Health.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/17149540/

"In 2003 the total number of psychiatric beds was a mere two thirds of the overall bed capacity in 1991, the first year as a re-unified Germany, when psychiatric beds in East and West Germany totaled 80,275. From 1970 onwards the number of psychiatric beds was cut by roughly half."

Edited March 26, 2015 by Raptor Witness

[Still Waters]

The man could have also just been seriously mentally ill and suffered some type of psychotic breakdown.

That's quite possible.

15.31 Matthias Gebauer, Der Spiegel magazine's online chief correspondent, has tweeted that co-pilot Andreas Lubitz may have suffered from depression or burnout.

He says he spoke to his neighbours and friends who said he was struck by depression during the several months he took out of his pilot training in 2009.

http://www.telegraph...board-live.html

[KariW]

In two days? This would have to be the quickest accident investigation ever. The officials wouldn't have had anything like enough time to recover all the potentially significant debris, let alone review all the data on the data recorders (if they've even recovered the flight data recorder yet, they hadn't last time I'd heard). If the officials have said anything at all to that effect, they ought to be fired for pre-empting the investigation.

So sorry if my intent wasn't clear in my post. I wasn't referring to a full investigation of the debris, etc. God knows how many months/years that may take. I was just referring to "preliminary" findings and what they know from the data found on the flight recorder. Surely it doesn't take more than a day to run through & listen to the flight recorder a couple of times to make a "preliminary" judgment on what was happening with the Pilot and copilot?

[KariW]

Uh, there are any number of radical political groups that aren't religiously motived (Islamic or otherwise). The man could have also just been seriously mentally ill and suffered some type of psychotic breakdown. Or...there's something else that caused this behavior that hasn't been discovered as of yet.

Very well put, Lilly! At this point we really don't know "why" the copilot took the actions he did. Could be anything at this point!

[Space Commander Travis]

I've never known such a bunch of ghouls so eager to point the finger and accuse people of murder, based entirely on what the most rushed and least scientific "investigation" in history has allegedly said.

[Daughter of the Nine Moons]

I'm never seen so much gleefully ghoulish speculation. "There is a special place in hell reserved for him" has to take the biscuit so far.

Why?

The copilot willfully and deliberately locked the captain out of the cockpit. He disabled the door so the captain could not use reenter the cockpit.

The copilot willfully and deliberately began a manual descent crashing the plane into the side of the mountain.

It's murder, not suicide when one person kills 149 others.

PS nothing gleeful about my post just a statement of fact.

[Space Commander Travis]

“At this moment, in light of investigation, the interpretation we can give at this time is that the co-pilot through voluntary abstention refused to open the door of the cockpit to the commander, and activated the button that commands the loss of altitude,” the prosecutor, Brice Robin, said.

He said it appeared that the intention of the co-pilot, identified as Andreas Lubitz, had been “to destroy the aircraft.” He said that the voice recorder showed that the co-pilot had been breathing until before the moment of impact, suggesting that he was conscious and deliberate in bringing the plane down and killing 144 passengers and five other crew members in the French Alps on Tuesday.

Source: New York Times

Um... and this alleged "Investigator" seems to need to brush up on his medical knowledge too, since people do actually continue to breathe even if they're unconscious, does he know?

Why?

The copilot willfully and deliberately locked the captain out of the cockpit. He disabled the door so the captain could not use reenter the cockpit.

The copilot willfully and deliberately began a manual descent crashing the plane into the side of the mountain.

It's murder, not suicide when one person kills 149 others.

PS nothing gleeful about my post just a statement of fact.

and we know that... how exactly? That he did this deliberately?

[keithisco]

So sorry if my intent wasn't clear in my post. I wasn't referring to a full investigation of the debris, etc. God knows how many months/years that may take. I was just referring to "preliminary" findings and what they know from the data found on the flight recorder. Surely it doesn't take more than a day to run through & listen to the flight recorder a couple of times to make a "preliminary" judgment on what was happening with the Pilot and copilot?

Yes it does... it all depends on the quality of the audio, whether or not the recording has been compromised through impact damage or sudden EM damage from crashing.

I think now that the Safety rules need to change - it must be made impossible to lock out the Pilot in Command from the cockpit, if the Pilot in Command is suspect then perhaps an override from ATC could be made available to ensure that a potentially unstable PiC cannot gain access to the cockpit. Equally, the same must be made available for a suspect 2nd Pilot.

One change that could happen immediately is that no pilot is ever permitted to be on the flight deck alone, whoever needs a "rest break" must first have a 3rd person on the Flight Deck prior to leaving.

The sheer tragedy that someone who has a death wish decides to take another 150 souls with them into oblivion is beyond me.

I am just thinking aloud at the moment but as an Aero Functional Safety Consultant then this is so far out - of - normal as to be almost incomprehensible.

[Cookie Monster]

Uh, there are any number of radical political groups that aren't religiously motived (Islamic or otherwise). The man could have also just been seriously mentally ill and suffered some type of psychotic breakdown. Or...there's something else that caused this behavior that hasn't been discovered as of yet.

Its easy to spot someone who is obsessive. Whether it be a fear of germs, having to do things in patterns, having to keep everything tidy, having to check they've done something 5 times or spending their days going from one fascination to another, its hard to miss. Needless to say when someone who is obsessive encounters a distressful circumstance instead of getting over it and moving on with their lives they fixate on it giving themselves a mental breakdown instead.

If he has had a mental breakdown the question is why wasn't he psychologically screened before being offered the position? A typical psych questionnaire during an interview spots the obsessives.

Edited March 26, 2015 by RabidMongoose

[Michelle]

Um... and this alleged "Investigator" seems to need to brush up on his medical knowledge too, since people do actually continue to breathe even if they're unconscious, does he know?

and we know that... how exactly? That he did this deliberately?

The first thing I would do if I thought I was losing consciousness would be to lock the door so I couldn't receive help and someone else could take over the plane. It doesn't make sense any other way than how it is being reported.

Edited March 26, 2015 by Michelle

[Merc14]

Um... and this alleged "Investigator" seems to need to brush up on his medical knowledge too, since people do actually continue to breathe even if they're unconscious, does he know?

and we know that... how exactly? That he did this deliberately?

The copilot committed two acts that are recorded on the black boxes that prove beyond a shadow of a doubt these were purposeful acts and that they led to the destruction of the aircraft:

1.

per AP: The A320 is designed with safeguards to allow emergency entry if a pilot inside is unresponsive, but the override code known to the crew does not go into effect — and indeed goes into a lockdown — if the person inside the cockpit specifically denies entry, according to an Airbus training video and a pilot who has six years of experience with the jets.

This means the copilot purposely locked the pilot out.

2.

From

http://www.twincities.com/ci_27789659/

: "When he was alone, the co-pilot manipulated the buttons of the flight monitoring system to initiate the aircraft's descent," Robin said.

This can't be done automatically, it was a manipulation of controls at the copilots stations.

Neither of the above could be done by mistake and the copilot had complete control till the end as we was heard to be breathing. What would you call this act?

Edited March 26, 2015 by Merc14

[Daughter of the Nine Moons]

Um... and this alleged "Investigator" seems to need to brush up on his medical knowledge too, since people do actually continue to breathe even if they're unconscious, does he know?

and we know that... how exactly? That he did this deliberately?

A good indication is that the airline states both actions (disabling the flight crews access to the cabin and initiating a controlled descent) must be initiated manually.

Edited March 26, 2015 by Daughter of the Nine Moons

[KariW]

Yes it does... it all depends on the quality of the audio, whether or not the recording has been compromised through impact damage or sudden EM damage from crashing.

Very True, but would the officials in this particular case be making statements on the actions of the pilot and copilot if the flight recorder was so heavily damaged? Sounds to me like, they were able to retrieve some data and have a preliminary idea of what was happening with the two main pilots. If the flight recorder was not heavily damaged, then how long would it take fore them to listen and examine the data a couple of times? Not long!

[KariW]

One change that could happen immediately is that no pilot is ever permitted to be on the flight deck alone, whoever needs a "rest break" must first have a 3rd person on the Flight Deck prior to leaving.

Totally agree with this statement!