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Reporter: Alex Cullen | Producer: Thea Dikeos
May 3, 2015, 9:58 pm
Full story - Germanwings raises questions about pilot suicide Full story - Germanwings raises questions about pilot suicide
The crash of Germanwings Flight 9525 six weeks ago in the French Alps has raised new and disturbing questions about the mental health of commercial aviation pilots.
There have now been eight passenger airline crashes in the last 20 years that have been suspected murder-suicides.
Sunday Night reporter Alex Cullen interviewed an investigator who sounded the alarm on a suicide-suspected air crash closer to home. His warnings have been ignored by the industry.
"At the moment pilots are psychologically tested once, that is at the start of their career, that is to become a pilot. After that there is nothing, absolutely nothing," Cullen said.
"They are given a physical test and they are also asked questions like “are you depressed?”, “are you drinking heavily?”, “are you using drugs?”, but nothing on the scale that should be done, nothing on the scale of a psychological test that can weed out these pilots who are suffering these mental health issues."
The Germanwings flight is a high-profile example of probable pilot-suicide, crashed into the French Alps by captain Andreas Lubitz.
But in recent years a series of commercial pilots appear to have crashed their aircraft intentionally or been stopped by fellow crew members as they tried.
They were all played down, officially due to a lack of evidence, and did not lead to any major changes in the psychological monitoring of pilots.
In 1997, SilkAir flight 185 crashed in an Indonesian river, killing 104 people. It was suspected that captain Tsu Way Ming flipped the plane on its back using his skills as a former fighter pilot and drove it into the ground at supersonic speed.
Not a single complete body, body part, or limb was found, as the entire aircraft and passengers disintegrated upon impact. Only six positive identifications were later obtained
Ming had recently been demoted after a complaint about his 'cowboy' flying behavior. Investigators later learned he was millions in debt from a stock market crash and his family life was under strain. Indonesian investigators ruled out suicide, but United States investigators concluded that he had driven the plane into the ground.
Derek Ward, the father of killed NZ copilot Duncan Ward has launched his own investigation into the Silkair flight that killed his son.
"I think if the airline was capable of monitoring the flying crew properly, he wouldn't have been [flying]." Ward said.
"Unfortunately, for Singapore, for somebody to commit mass murder on this scale would have been a total loss of face for the country."
Cullen said if the airline industry had acted decisively after Silk Air Flight 185 slammed into an Indonesian River in December 1997 might the Germanwings disaster may have been prevented.
In another example, an EgyptAir Boeing 767 departing New York crashed into the Atlantic off Nantucket Island and killed 217 people just two years later. The United States National Transportation Safety Board found that the co-pilot purposely put the jetliner into a steep dive after uttering repeatedly, “I rely on God.”
Despite many reports of Lubitz's actions, the investigation into the cause of the Germanwings flight 9525 crash is ongoing and will likely not be completed until late this year.
Germanwings co-pilot in French Alps crash rehearsed ‘controlled descent on previous flight’
PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 06 May, 2015, 6:11pm
UPDATED : Wednesday, 06 May, 2015, 10:11pm
Agence France-Presse in Paris
People pay their respects ahead of the annual general meeting of Lufthansa Group at the Congress Centre in Hamburg. Photo: AFP
The co-pilot of the doomed Germanwings flight deliberately crashed the plane into the French Alps after "rehearsing" the descent on an earlier flight, French investigators said yesterday.
The BEA civil aviation investigators said the co-pilot, 27-year-old Andreas Lubitz, had practiced the manoeuvre on the outbound trip from Dusseldorf to Barcelona, just hours before his suicidal actions caused the return flight to crash.
"Several altitude selections towards 100 ft were recorded during descent on the flight that preceded the accident flight, while the co-pilot was alone in the cockpit," read the report.
Remi Jouty, the director of the BEA, told journalists there had been no "noticeable effect" as the plane had already begun its descent into Barcelona while he was carrying out the practice manipulations. The Germanwings Airbus 320 crashed in the French Alps on March 24, killing all 150 people on board.
The probe into the crash confirmed initial suspicions that Lubitz deliberately brought the plane down.
On the fatal flight back to Dusseldorf which left at 9am local time, everything initially proceeded normally, with Lubitz even eating his meal 15 minutes into the flight, the report said.
At 9.30am the captain left the cockpit to go to the toilet, and the selected altitude on the flight control unit changed "in one second" from cruising altitude of 11,600 metres to 100 feet - the minimum height possible to select on an A320.
During the descent, air traffic controllers in the city of Marseille tried to call the plane 11 times on three different frequencies with no response. The air force also tried to contact the plane three times to no avail.
The cockpit recorder showed the pilot's frantic efforts to re-enter the cockpit. The interphone rang three times and he triggered a signal in the cockpit when he entered a code to open the door, which is heavily reinforced to prevent hijackings.
A person was heard knocking on the door six times and a muffled voice could be heard asking for the door to be opened.
Another five "noises similar to violent blows" could be heard and a warning system blared "Terrain, Terrain, Pull Up, Pull Up" until the crash.
All 150 Germanwings crash victims identified: statement
AFP
May 20, 2015, 3:41 am
Marseille (AFP) - Investigators have identified the remains of all 150 people aboard a Germanwings flight that was deliberately crashed into the French Alps, a prosecutor said Tuesday, allowing them finally to be laid to rest.
Experts have taken over six weeks to painstakingly match DNA found at the crash site to that provided by the victims' families.
"The 150 death certificates can now be signed, as well as the 150 burial permits," said Marseille city prosecutor Brice Robin in a statement.
The Germanwings Airbus 320 crashed in the French Alps on March 24 en route from Barcelona to Duesseldorf.
Investigations have revealed that 27-year-old co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, who had a history of severe depression, had purposefully downed the plane.
France's BEA civil aviation investigators said Lubitz had even "rehearsed" changing the data settings to send the plane from a cruising altitude of 11,600 metres (38,000 feet) to 100 feet, on the outbound flight to Barcelona.
On the return leg, Lubitz locked the cockpit door after the pilot left to go to the toilet and then put the plane into a steep descent.
Air traffic controllers in the southern French city of Marseille called the plane 11 times and the air force also tried but without response.
The cockpit recorder revealed the pilot's frantic efforts to re-enter the cockpit which is protected by a heavily re-inforced door to prevent hijackings.
The crash has cast a spotlight on how pilots' medical conditions are tracked, as well as on cockpit door locking systems and cockpit access and exit procedures.
Following the crash, several countries announced they would insist on having two people in the cockpit at all times -- a rule which is already standard in the United States.
The final investigation report is expected in a year's time.
First Germanwings crash victims' bodies repatriated
AFP
June 10, 2015, 5:29 am
Marignane (France) (AFP) - The first bodies from the Germanwings plane that was deliberately crashed in the French Alps were being repatriated to Germany on Tuesday.
A special flight operated by Lufthansa was carrying the remains of 44 Germans, among the 150 onboard when the jet crashed on March 24, from the southern French city of Marseille to Duesseldorf in western Germany.
A Lufthansa MD-11 cargo plane took off from Marseille airport at 1903 GMT on Tuesday, an AFP reporter said.
Lufthansa, the parent company of budget airline Germanwings, said in a press release that the plane was due to arrive in Duesseldorf at 2030 GMT.
A total of 72 Germans had been onboard the doomed Airbus A320, which was heading from Barcelona to Duesseldorf when it crashed in the French Alps.
Brice Robin, the French prosecutor who is leading the investigation into the crash, is due to meet Thursday with relatives of some of the other victims to discuss the identification and repatriation of remains.
Last week the families of some of the 16 teenage victims from the same German high school angrily complained to Lufthansa after they were told the repatriation would be delayed due to problems with the issuing of death certificates. Lufthansa later said the flight would go ahead as initially planned.
The teenagers, from the northwest German town of Haltern, had been flying back from an exchange trip to Spain.
"After this first special flight to Duesseldorf, the other victims will be gradually transferred to their home countries in the coming weeks," Lufthansa said.
"The French authorities are working hard in order to create the formal conditions for the transfer of the victims as soon as possible."
"Lufthansa is in close contact with the relatives to ensure that the transfer of the victims is carried out according to the relatives' wishes."
Investigators only last month finished identifying the remains of all 150 people aboard Germanwings Flight 4U 9525.
They say that 27-year-old German co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, who had a history of severe depression, intentionally downed the plane.
Germanwings copilot Andreas Lubitz feared going blind
Date June 12, 2015 - 6:44AM
German medical secrecy laws discouraged doctors from reporting concerns he was unfit to fly.
Marseilles Prosecutor Brice Robin discusses the case in March. Photo: AFP
Paris: The copilot who crashed a Germanwings jet into the Alps feared he was losing his eyesight, and some of the many doctors he consulted felt he was unfit to fly, a French prosecutor says.
The revelation comes as French authorities formally opened a criminal inquiry into the plane crash.
All 150 passengers and crew on board were killed when a Germanwings A320 crashed into the French Alps in March. Photo: Reuters
The doctors didn't report their concerns to Andreas Lubitz's employers, however, because of German patient privacy laws, Marseilles Prosecutor Brice Robin told reporters in Paris on Thursday.
Mr Robin met families of victims on Thursday and updated reporters on the status of the investigation into the March 24 crash, which killed all 150 people aboard. Families are just starting to receive remains of their loved ones and will start holding burials in the coming days and weeks.
Mr Robin said the investigation so far "has enabled us to confirm without a shadow of a doubt ... Mr Andreas Lubitz deliberately destroyed the plane and deliberately killed 150 people, including himself".
Co-pilot Andreas Lubitz feared going blind. Photo: AP
Investigators say Mr Lubitz locked the pilot out of the cockpit and flew the plane into a French mountainside, after having researched suicide methods and cockpit door rules and practised an unusual descent.
Mr Robin said Mr Lubitz had also investigated vision problems, and "feared going blind" – a career-ending malady for a pilot. Mr Lubitz had suffered depression in the past and been on antidepressants.
Mr Lubitz had seven medical appointments within the month before the March 24 crash, including three appointments with a psychiatrist, Mr Robin said. Some of the doctors felt Mr Lubitz was psychologically unstable, and some felt he was unfit to fly, but "unfortunately that information was not reported because of medical secrecy requirements", the prosecutor said.
In Germany, doctors risk prison if they disclose information about their patients to anyone unless there is evidence they intend to commit a serious crime or harm themselves.
Germanwings and parent company Lufthansa have said that Mr Lubitz had passed all medical tests and was cleared by doctors as fit to fly.
The question for investigators now is who could be held responsible. The prosecutor upgraded the investigation from a preliminary probe to a full-fledged manslaughter inquiry, which hands the case to investigating magistrates who can file eventual charges against people or entities.
Mr Robin said the investigation will be lead by a panel of three judges tasked with determining if mistakes were made in analysing the mental state of Mr Lubitz.
German lawyer Peter Kortas, whose firm represents relatives of 34 victims, said negotiations with Germanwings about compensation began several days ago. Families were also seeking answers about delays in the return of victims' remains.
"In this moment everything else is not as important as the fact that the bodies, [the] remains be returned to their families," Mr Kortas said. "It's already more than 2½ months since the crash happened, so it's finally necessary to get to closure."
Remains of exchange students killed in Germanwings crash arrive home
Date June 11, 2015 - 11:59AM
Melissa Eddy
Haltern am See, Germany: As their friends held white roses, a group of students returned home from a language exchange program that ended in tragedy when their Germanwings flight crashed in the French Alps more than two months ago. The German teens, their remains borne in white hearses, were among the first 44 of the 150 victims to be repatriated.
Hundreds of people in this town, about 50 miles from Duesseldorf and known before the crash mostly for its blue lake and web of hiking trails and cycling paths, pressed along the road leading to the students' school Wednesday, awaiting the procession of hearses bearing the coffins.
Hours before the cars arrived, a woman who would only give her name as Kerstin, "a fellow mama," had scrambled to organize several hundred white candles and roses that were later held high by townspeople and classmates in a silent tribute.
Students from the Joseph-Koenig-Gymnasium watch as hearses carrying the remains of 16 of their fellow students and two teachers who were killed in the Germanwings plane crash in March drive slowly past on Wednesday. Photo: Getty Images
"It should look nice when the children finally come home," she said, as she begged bystanders to help keep the candles lit against the breeze.
A Lufthansa cargo plane carrying the coffins of many of the German victims landed late on Tuesday at Duesseldorf Airport from Marseille, France.
French investigators have spent the past 11 weeks sifting through evidence recovered from the mountainside where the co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz, is believed to have deliberately steered the Airbus A320, headed to Duesseldorf from Barcelona, Spain.
A woman holds a white rose as the hearses transporting coffins with the bodies of victims pass. Photo: AP
The 16 high school students were among the first of the 72 German dead to be repatriated. Along with two teachers, they had been on their way home from an exchange with a partner school near Barcelona. All together, the 150 victims were from at least 18 different countries, with several holding two passports.
"It is a difficult day because we are again intensively confronted with this terrible tragedy, but it is also a good day," said Bodo Klimpel, the town's mayor. "There is a certain relief that the families, after waiting so long, now have their children back and are able to lay them to rest."
Heinz Joachim Schoettes, a spokesman for Germanwings, said that all the crew members, except Lubitz, were among those repatriated on Wednesday. Lubitz's family had arranged for his remains to be returned separately, he said.
Messages are posted on an airport wall in Duesseldorf, Germany to commemorate the victims of the March 24 Germanwings plane crash. Photo: AP
After a brief ceremony at a hangar at the airport, when the families had time alone at the coffins, each marked with a photograph, they departed for their home cities. Most of the Haltern families took part in the organised procession, under police escort, that ended in front of the school, Joseph-Koenig-Gymnasium.
Elmar Giemulla, a lawyer who is representing many of the victims' families, including those from Haltern, said the repatriation was an important psychological step.
"For a lot of these people, they still have the last image in their mind of their children waving goodbye from the airport" on their way to Spain, Mr Giemulla said. "This is why getting back the remains is so important. Now they see the coffins and they know their children are inside. They are confronted with reality."
Hearses carrying coffins with remains of victims of the Germanwings flight 4U 9525 on highway A52 on their way to Haltern, Germany. Photo: AP
After the final hearse rounded the corner beyond the school, sobs could be heard as parents comforted their children and small groups of teens supported one another in tightly wound hugs. Many brought their roses and placed them before a row of 18 saplings planted in memory of the classmates and teachers who died in the crash. A plaque bearing their names will be added to the memorial, said Ulrich Wessel, the school principal.
Mr Klimpel said the city was planning a separate memorial at the town's main cemetery in the fall. In the meantime, some students have expressed their grief on a German memorial website.
"You were such a great friend! You were always so happy, no matter how much the others annoyed you," wrote one person, who gave her name only as Melina, beside the image of a green candle, to her friend, Elena Bless.
Coffins of the victims are loaded onto a Lufthansa plane at Marseille airport France. Photo: AP
Annette and Martin Bless, the parents of Elena who died a day before her 16th birthday, have set up a foundation in their daughter's memory with the aim of helping other students take part in language exchanges.
"According to Elena's wishes, the foundation shall support other pupils participating in school exchange programs and attending work placements abroad," the foundation's website says.
Many of the Haltern victims were set to be buried this week, although some families rescheduled their funeral plans after Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, told them that the repatriation would be delayed because of a bureaucratic error on some of the death certificates. The error was rectified in two days, however, allowing the initial repatriations to take place as originally planned.
Lufthansa said the remains of the other victims would be returned for burial in the coming weeks.
Robert Tansill Oliver and Maribel Calvo, parents of a businessman who was on board the Germanwings jet. Photo: AP
Doctors who treated Germanwings pilot Andreas Lubitz for depression and mental illness before he killed 150 people by crashing into the Alps last year, refused to speak with French investigators who were trying to prevent a similar sequence from ever happening again, one victim’s father said on Saturday.
The French investigators told relatives at a meeting in Barcelona that the German doctors were not required to talk about Lubitz’s medical conditions under German privacy laws and they didn’t, even though the 27-year-old also died in the March 24, 2015 plane crash.
The experts from France’s BEA crash investigation agency did obtain detailed German medical records about Lubitz but “they emphasised that the doctors, those who treated him, refused to give any information”, said Robert Tansill Oliver, who attended the Germanwings relatives’ meeting.
The French investigators told the relatives that one of their safety recommendations would be a requirement that doctors provide authorities with information about pilots’ mental health issues.
The BEA on Saturday declined to comment on the closed-door meetings with relatives, who were shown a slide show but given no written materials.
The meetings on Saturday in Barcelona and Bonn briefed the victims’ relatives about a BEA report being released on Sunday that is expected to make recommendations to help aviation agencies and airlines around the world prevent similar crashes. Most of the victims of Flight 9525 from Barcelona to Duesseldorf were from Spain and Germany.
Germanwings and Lufthansa have strongly denied any wrongdoing in the crash, insisting that the co-pilot was certified fit to fly. In the months before the crash, Lubitz visited 41 doctors, and none warned his employer or authorities that Lubitz might be too ill to fly. Germany’s confidentiality laws prevent sensitive personal information from being widely shared, although the law allows doctors to suspend patient privacy if they believe there is a danger to the person’s safety or that of others.
Oliver’s 37-year-old son, Robert Oliver Calvo, died in the crash, leaving behind a wife and two children. His son was an American who lived in Spain and managed property for the Barcelona-based clothing chain Desigual.
Investigators say Lubitz deliberately crashed the plane into a French mountainside. He had previously been treated for depression and suicidal tendencies and documents seized by prosecutors show he partly hid his medical history from employers.
The BEA representatives told victims’ relatives in Barcelona “they would have liked to have talked to the doctors who treated Lubitz to understand why he acted in such a suicidal way. They wanted to understand why a young pilot with supposedly a nice family life would want to commit suicide,” Oliver Calvo’s father said. “They wanted to find out why he did what he did, the root causes.”
Oliver, a retired teacher who is also American and lives in a Barcelona suburb, said relatives at the meeting were told about Lubitz’ mental health problems, including a psychotic depressive episode.
Some of this information was forwarded to Germanwings, his employer, while other data was not, Oliver said.
Oliver said relatives at the meeting in Barcelona “were really upset”.
“People were not happy at all with some of the explanations. Some of the family members felt as if these BEA representatives were Lubitz’ lawyers – making excuses as to why Germanwings didn’t take action knowing what they knew,” he said.
“How is it possible Germanwings would let a crazy guy fly a plane? He was mentally unbalanced, tremendously unbalanced,” he added.
No mention was made of a media report that one of Lubitz’s doctors two weeks before the crash thought he should not fly but did not give the information to authorities, Oliver said.
In Bonn, Christof Wellens, a lawyer for some victims’ families, said they had questions about “how is it possible that such an ill person gets a pilot license?”
Investigators said one of their recommendations is for more transparency between doctors who treat pilots and the airlines they work for, Oliver said, adding that the victims’ relatives could not understand why the doctors refused to speak with the French investigators.
“Everyone in the auditorium was asking the same question: ‘Why did these German doctors refuse to talk to you?” he said.
Oliver said he feared there may never be clarity over why Lubitz crashed the plane unless his German doctors agreed to be interviewed. He said he believed that Germany needs to change its laws to make sure that doctors who treat pilots are required to talk to investigators in the future.
“How did he fall through the cracks? The controls did not work,” Oliver said. “You listen to this information and you wonder, ‘Am I safe to fly on a plane?’”
FBI documents show the Germanwings pilot who fatally crashed his flight struggled in his training.
The German pilot who deliberately flew his airliner into a mountainside last year struggled with learning to fly and failed a key test of his skills during training in the US, according FBI interviews with his flight instructors.
Andreas Lubitz was promoted anyway. But his training difficulties were one more "red flag" that should have caused Lufthansa and the airline's Arizona flight school to take a closer look and discover his history of depression, asserted attorneys representing families of crash victims.
Lubitz was a co-pilot for Germanwings, a regional airline owned by Lufthansa, when he locked Flight 9524's captain out of the cockpit and set the plane on a collision course with a mountain in the French Alps last year.
All 144 passengers and six crew members, including Lubitz, were killed.
One instructor, Juergen Theerkorn, described Lubitz as "not an ace pilot", and said he failed one flight test because of a "situational awareness issue".
In aviation, loss of situational awareness usually means a pilot becomes absorbed in something and loses track of what else is happening with the plane.
But while Lubitz struggled with training, he would achieve passing scores enabling him to continue the program, Nickell said.
The FBI conducted the interviews a week after the March 24, 2015, crash.
Summaries were only recently released by prosecutors in Germany, according to attorneys with Kriendler & Kriendler in New York, who are representing the families in a lawsuit against the flight school. The lawyers provided copies to The Associated Press.
Officials for Lufthansa and the flight school didn't immediately reply to requests for comment.
An investigation has revealed that Lubitz was being treated for a relapse of severe depression and suicidal tendencies but had hid the information from Germanwings.
Germany's strict patient privacy laws didn't allow doctors to share medical information with an employer without the patient's permission.
