Updated article from NYT
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/27/world/europe/germanwings-crash.html
Wow teriwitt!
Wow, Teri!
I like how the media jumps to the conclusion that he was mentally ill.
We all know if he was Muslim he’d be labelled a terrorist instantly.
The media is a mess…
^^^ I don’t know if they are jumping to conclusions, but they are throwing a lot of theories out there. I won’t jump on any bandwagon , but will wait for more information to come out.
It is murder, not suicide. A suicidal person takes their own life, a homicidal maniac kills others. I had wondered why at first every news outlet was saying accident, when it’s much more rare to crash mid flight. I used to think I wanted my pilots to take a breathalyzer before each flight, now I almost want a copy of a psych eval.
Maybe a murder suicide…maybe something more sinister.
I would label it a murder-suicide. Not uncommon an event where someone is doing both things. At this point though - why does it matter what it is labelled? It doesn’t bring anyone back or make the airline less liable.
@0br0123 Thank you, for voicing what I have been bursting to say.
I don’t see any news reports saying that the first officer denied the captain access to the cockpit. Surely, if they can actually hear him breathing, they would be able to hear the entry code being entered, and the denial, as it is LOUD. And if you were just about to crash into a mountain, why would you have steady, calm breathing? Breathing as if you were asleep, or incapacitated. Too many assumptions by the news agencies.
Inside the cockpit, the door entry override is just a switch. See Airbus informational video:
http://qz.com/370386/this-video-shows-how-a-pilot-might-have-been-locked-out-of-the-cockpit-of-germanwings-9525/
Busdriver, they know from the transponder the plane was deliberately put into the descent by the person in the cockpit. Now, I’m not a pilot but that seems pretty clear to me that whoever was in the cockpit wasn’t incapacitated.
I’m cracking up, here, GMTplus7, as I’m an Airbus captain, and am not going to learn a whole lot more from an informational video 
Why yes, the override is just a switch. However, when you enter the emergency access code, a sound that is extremely loud activates in the cockpit, and you really can’t hear anything else. It is obnoxious. If the cockpit voice recorder that they recovered can pick up the sound of the first officer breathing, it can surely pick up the sound of the emergency access code being entered. The beeps that the entry of the code makes, and then the very loud tone that follows. They should know right now if the code was entered or not. In fact, they should know if the captain entered the wrong code, as they would just hear the beeps, but not the loud tone.
I actually am very uncomfortable with the amount of information on the cockpit doors that have been publicized. I am only saying general things that would not help anyone learn how to access the cockpit.
“Busdriver, they know from the transponder the plane was deliberately put into the descent by the person in the cockpit. Now, I’m not a pilot but that seems pretty clear to me that whoever was in the cockpit wasn’t incapacitated”
The transponder will not tell you who or how the aircraft got into a descent. It will only give out altitude information, not how the plane got there. It can’t tell you if the autopilot was disconnected, if there is a mechanical malfunction, if someone accidentally knocked it off (done that), or descended purposefully. A person becoming incapacitated could easily disconnect the autopilot accidentally, with one button push. Maybe the captain drugged the fo, started the airplane into a descent, and left the cockpit. Who can know at this point?
What gets me, is why someone who is crashing an airplane, listening to air traffic control yelling at him, the captain and flight attendants knocking furiously on the door and yelling, and the passengers SCREAMING, had slow and regular breathing all the way up to the point of impact. That doesn’t make sense to me at all.
Ok. You’re certainly free to discount any of information being reported, but the investigators (the French equivalent to our NTSB) seem pretty certain it happened the way I’ve explained. I would think seasoned investigators know what they are talking about.
The also know when the pilot left the cockpit and that the plane was put into the descent after that.
I do apologize as I haven’t read the whole thread (I’m lucky if I can get even one page to load)…
BD, if you can comfortably answer this, is it typical to have 3 pilots on board at any one time? (In a US commercial plane)
Busdriver… " What gets me, is why someone who is crashing an airplane, listening to air traffic control yelling at him, the captain and flight attendants knocking furiously on the door and yelling, and the passengers SCREAMING, had slow and regular breathing all the way up to the point of impact. That doesn’t make sense to me at all. "
Good point. It’s great to have a consultant who knows how the planes work. How could the Co Pilot, with evil plans, predict the Captain would have “physiological needs” precisely when the plan was over the Alps? Perhaps it is the Captain who disabled the Co-Pilot and the reentry drama is a performance. The world will now shift while all journalists rush to the Captain’s home to examine his life, political views, and religion.
Anyway, this appears to be mass murder and horrible beyond my imagination.
“BD, if you can comfortably answer this, is it typical to have 3 pilots on board at any one time? (In a US commercial plane)”
I can’t say it’s typical. It wouldn’t be that unusual though, as if there is a check airman giving pilots a line check, there would be three pilots in the cockpit. There are often pilots jumpseating in the back (or in the cockpit), because the price is right (free). I’m not sure if anyone operates equipment with three people in the cockpit anymore, at least in the US, except for the military. I used to be a flight engineer in the DC-10 and 727, which required three, but I doubt anyone in the US flies them anymore. Sometimes there are what is called “augmented crews” for particularly long flights, generally overwater. The reality is, airlines don’t want to pay for three pilots to crew an airplane unless it is required, and I doubt they ever will.
“Ok. You’re certainly free to discount any of information being reported, but the investigators (the French equivalent to our NTSB) seem pretty certain it happened the way I’ve explained. I would think seasoned investigators know what they are talking about.”
Yep, they are awfully certain, aren’t they? They seem pretty happy to be the current experts on television. However, competent investigators know that accident investigations take months, sometimes years, and leaping to conclusions with only a small amount of data is often going to be a mistake. They will have a much better idea when they find the flight data recorder, not just making assumptions based upon the cockpit voice recorder.
“The also know when the pilot left the cockpit and that the plane was put into the descent after that”
Yet unless they have far more data than they are releasing, that doesn’t absolutely prove enough to make a definitive analysis. I have no trust in the seasoned French investigators who are so swift to their conclusion. I’d take a NTSB accident investigator (who isn’t just interested in being on camera) over them any day.
Apparently the co-pilot was breathing normally the entire descent. It is scary to be a pilot these days - if a pilot can’t trust his co-pilot, who can he trust?
He was 27, which sounds young to me still.
He had only 100 hrs on that type of plane, and had stopped out of training for six months because of burnout.
Perhaps irregular scheduling messed with his head somehow.