Germanwings airliner crashes in French Alps

Germanwings airliner crashes in French Alps

• 6 minutes ago
  

An Airbus A320 airliner has crashed in the French Alps between Barcelonnette and Digne, French aviation officials and police have said.
The jet belongs to the German airline Germanwings, a subsidiary of Lufthansa.
The plane had reportedly been en route from Barcelona to Dusseldorf and was carrying 142 passengers and six crew.
French President Francois Hollande said: "The conditions of the accident, which have not yet been clarified, lead us to think there are no survivors."
Mr Hollande said the crash was a tragedy and called for solidarity with the victims, adding that the area was very difficult to access.

He said he would be speaking shortly with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
The plane issued a distress call at 10:47 (09:47 GMT), according to sources quoted by AFP news agency.
Search-and-rescue teams are headed to the crash site at Meolans-Revels, said regional council head Eric Ciotti.
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said he had sent Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve to the scene and a ministerial crisis cell to co-ordinate the incident had been set up.
The interior ministry said debris had been located at an altitude of 2,000 metres.
Both Airbus and Germanwings have said they are aware of the reports but cannot yet confirm them.
The Airbus A320 is single-aisle passenger jet popular for short- and medium-haul flights.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32030270

It's just been confirmed that 16 schoolchildren and 2 teachers from the same school in Germany were on the flight together with 2 babies.

What a terrible tragedy.

I've been looking at the aerial views from a rescue plane, it is very difficult terrain, but apparently a helicopter has just landed near the crash site and a piece of debris has been found the size of a car, but no survivors.

http://news.sky.com/story/1452758/pilot-locked-out-of-crash-jets-cockpit-report

A bizarre (if true) development.

Freedom wrote:http://news.sky.com/story/1452758/pilot-locked-out-of-crash-jets-cockpit-report

A bizarre (if true) development.

It's been confirmed just now on BBC news that the plane was brought down in a deliberate act of sabotage by the co-pilot who was 28 and had only about 630 air miles experience, where as the main pilot had 6,000 (I think, I'm trying to remember what was said earlier).

It seems frightening that the main pilot can be shut out of the cockpit by a junior pilot and cannot gain access, absolutely shocking.

Germanwings plane crash: Co-pilot 'wanted to destroy plane'

The co-pilot of the Germanwings plane that crashed into the French Alps on Tuesday appeared to want to "destroy the plane", French officials said.
Marseille prosecutor Brice Robin, citing information from the "black box" voice recorder, said the co-pilot was alone in the cockpit.
He intentionally started a descent while the pilot was locked out.
Mr Robin said there was "absolute silence in the cockpit" as the pilot fought to re-enter it.
The co-pilot, now named as Andreas Lubitz, 28, was alive until the final impact, the prosecutors added.

The Airbus 320 from Barcelona to Duesseldorf hit a mountain, killing all 144 passengers and six crew, after a rapid eight-minute descent.
"We hear the pilot ask the co-pilot to take control of the plane and we hear at the same time the sound of a seat moving backwards and the sound of a door closing," Mr Robin told reporters.
"At that moment, the co-pilot is controlling the plane by himself. While he is alone, the co-pilot presses the buttons of the flight monitoring system to put into action the descent of the aeroplane.
"This action on the altitude controls can only be deliberate."
He added: "The most plausible interpretation is that the co-pilot through a voluntary act had refused to open the cabin door to let the captain in. He pushed the button to trigger the aircraft to lose altitude. He operated this button for a reason we don't know yet, but it appears that the reason was to destroy this plane."
Mr Robin added that air traffic controllers made repeated attempts to contact the aircraft, but to no avail.
The co-pilot was not known to have any links with terrorism, he said.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32063587

Thanks Candyfloss. I didn't look at the BBC website, I'm glued to the TV news at the moment. What a terrible ordeal for the families and the people who have to recover the bodies off the mountain sides, very dangerous and upsetting work.

It doesn't bear thinking about what it must have been like for all those people in the eight minutes that the plane was descending.

Freedom wrote:It doesn't bear thinking about what it must have been like for all those people in the eight minutes that the plane was descending.

Apparently they didn't know what was happening until the last seconds as the sounds of screaming could be heard on the black box recorder.  Horrendous!

It would have been very quick, someone has just mentioned.

Absolutely horrendous!
I've a massive fear of flying and never have flown, this is my worst nightmare and my thoughts are with all those on board and their families left behind

wjk wrote:Absolutely horrendous!
I've a massive fear of flying and never have flown, this is my worst nightmare and my thoughts are with all those on board and their families left behind  

I've flown many, many times over the past 45 years and the only thought I ever had was wondering how the planes ever got off the ground as they are so huge but the happenings in the past year or so put a whole new perspective on the dangers of flying.

This crash is a terrible nightmare for the families, friends and work colleagues of all those on board.  It is also a nightmare for the airplane investigators and manufacturers as to how now the security of who is allowed to access a cockpit can be revised.  After 9/11 the security procedures were changed apparently to the detriment of someone in the cockpit being able to shut other people out.

Yes, I think that is what is so shocking, that it was one of the actual pilots that have caused this. Where do they go, security wise, after this? Maybe some way that the pilots can over ride the locking device on the door?

This is so tragic

I have seen it suggested that there should be a rule that there must be two people in the cockpit at any time.  If a pilot has to leave for any reason then another member of the crew should go in.

A pilot on Sky has just said there is a code that can be put in, in case the pilot in the cockpit has passed out, so that the other pilot can get in. But there is also a button inside the cockpit that over rides the code and that is what probably happened in this case.

They have said there was a code that the captain had to override the procedure to enter the cockpit but the co-pilot had pressed a button to stop that, which seems unbelievable.  It has also been mentioned that a third trained person could be used to sit in the cockpit when one pilot leaves to go to the loo to check on the pilot left in the cockpit so that they are not taken ill, passes out etc.  A bit late thinking about that now.  

P.S.  I've just read your post wjk, we've more or less said the same thing.

Sorry. Already been covered I see. Having a busy one so not read whole thread.

It does make you wonder as to the mentality of some of these security people who sit on committees who come up with suggestions regarding aircraft as after 9/11 security to enter cockpits.  I thought it would have been obvious to someone in a security capacity that if you can override a security entry code well it isn't really secure if someone wants to bring a plane down and lock the other pilot out.  Surely someone must have thought about that, if not then they're all idiots and need sacking.

They seem to be ruling out terrorism I have just been reading, and are saying he committed suicide??  I find that hard to believe, why on earth would you want to take all those innocent men, women and children with you.  Surely you would do it another way.  I can't get my head round that I'm afraid.

There have been a few previous incidents where it is thought that pilot suicide was the reason for them.

Off topic a little, some people think that the Moorgate Station crash in 1975 was due to the driver committing suicide.

candyfloss wrote:They seem to be ruling out terrorism I have just been reading, and are saying he committed suicide??  I find that hard to believe, why on earth would you want to take all those innocent men, women and children with you.  Surely you would do it another way.  I can't get my head round that I'm afraid.

It doesn't seem to make any difference if it was a terrorism act or suicide, the result was the same, killing all on board.  The co-pilot could have been radicalised recently or could have had personal issues with the airline, his training or something else.

I just find it absurd that the security people who thought up the security systems for the cockpit door didn't think about if someone was a terrorist trained as a pilot and could lock the other pilot out.  A USA expert has just been interviewed on the BBC News and the airline industry now seems to be in a complete panic about this issue and what can be done to override this security lapse.

I could have told them myself it wasn't a good idea as no doubt millions of ordinary people could.

They are also now worried about how the black boxes are built and recovered as the "expert" said it should have been found and recovered on Tuesday not leaving the families to wait for the news until Thursday.

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Also what's the point of having a black box on a plane that goes down in an Ocean thousands of miles away from land if it can't be located, yet apparently car number plates can be read from outer space.  

Good points, DFM!
The terrorists from 9/11 were trained pilots so would have known (if it happened today) all the security systems in place.
But what can be done?

I'm not an expert of course but surely something like a security code which could be changed from day to day and only given by the air traffic controller people to unlock a locked cabin door if something horrendous had happened on board.  If it's all done by electronics I would have thought a security system could be devised that could be overridden by air traffic controllers from the ground wherever the plane is, even by a satellite connection. Or that the pilot leaving the cabin puts the plane on auto pilot for say 10 minutes while he's in the loo and it can't be overridden and air traffic control have to be advised of the plane being put on autopilot for that time.  I'm just thinking off the top of my head right now, of course it probably sounds rubbish to a lot of people.

A former airline captain has just been interviewed on BBC News and he was part of the "security committee" together with many international "experts" who came up with the idea of the locked cabin door.  They obviously didn't put much thought into it.

What reasons would a pilot have for leaving the cockpit? On a short haul flight it could only be the call of nature. So maybe pilots should use a piddle pack such as those fighter pilots use. On long haul I think there are more than 2 pilots on board. In any case perhaps there should never be only 1 person in the cockpit.

Just heard on the news that Easyjet have said that there must be 2 people on the flight deck at all times from now on.

I've just had a thought, for what it's worth, what if the senior pilot didn't take a toilet break and the plane carried on to its destination without any problems. Did the junior pilot just thought out of the blue "OK, I'll take this plane down now and kill 150 people", or had he thought about it for many weeks whilst he was co-piloting planes.

I wonder how many flights the junior pilot had done beforehand without the senior pilot taking a loo break or if he had been in charge of a plane previously where the senior pilot had left the cabin for 5 or 10 minutes but he decided not to act at that moment.