Co-Pilot Andreas Lubitzn in Germanwings Crash Hid Medical Condition From Employer … Authorities Find Torn Up Doctors’ Notes Stating He Was Too Ill to Work, Including Day of the Plane Crash

Search of Andreas Lubitzn’s home finds doctor’s notes that he was too ill to work …

The NY Times is reporting that Andreas Lubitzn, the co-pilot who deliberately crashed Germanwings flight 9525 into the French Alps on Tuesday killing all aboard, had been given a mental health diagnosis but kept the condition hidden from his employer. Prosecutors said on Friday that among the items found at Mr. Lubitz’s home were several doctors’ notes stating that he was too ill to work, including on the day of the crash; one of the notes had been torn up.

Isn’t this special. We have an individual who received a doctor’s note that says he is too ill to work; however, the employer does not get the same.

Investigators probe Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz’s background

Andreas Lubitz, the pilot who flew a Germanwings jetliner into the French Alps on Tuesday, had been given a mental health diagnosis but kept the condition hidden from his employer, the authorities said Friday.

A psychiatric diagnosis might explain why Mr. Lubitz, a 27-year-old German, did not disclose his full medical record to Germanwings and its parent company, Lufthansa. Certain diagnoses are grounds for a pilot’s license to be revoked.

Prosecutors said on Friday that among the items found at Mr. Lubitz’s home were several doctors’ notes stating that he was too ill to work, including on the day of the crash; one of the notes had been torn up. These documents “support the preliminary assessment that the deceased hid his illness from his employer and colleagues,” the prosecutors said in a statement.

Daily Commentary – Friday, March 27, 2015 – Look Back at Events this Past Week Including that Horrible Plane Crash

• Remember, flying is still the safest form of transportation!
• UPDATE: Since recording this audio they are now saying the Co-Pilot intentionally crashed the plane

Daily Commentary – Friday, March 27, 2015 Download

French Prosecutor Brice Robin Says Germanwings Co-Pilot Deliberately Crashed Airbus Jet … Terrorism? (Update: [Pic] Co-Pilot Andreas Lubitz Deliberately Crashed Plane)

IT WAS NO ACCIDENT: The Germanwings Flight 4U9525 crash turns out to be a deliberate act of terrorism … Was it radical Islam or violent extremist?

A French prosecutor handling the plane crash of Germanwings Flight 4U9525 stated that the evidence from the cockpit voice recorder indicated that the co-pilot had deliberately crash ed the plane. According the the prosecutor, the co-pilot deliberately locked the captain out of the cockpit and steered the plane into its fatal descent. The co-pilot has been identified as 28 year old German Andreas Günter, the individual responsible for the deliberate airline crash. Lubitz was described as a German national. However, his motivation at this point for deliberately crashing the plane is unknown. Was he a lone wolf Islamic terrorist, was he a violent extremest, or was he crazy. Now the question becomes, why did this individual commit such a heinous act.

The chief Marseille prosecutor handling the investigation into the crash of a Germanwings jetliner said on Thursday that evidence from the cockpit voice recorder indicated that the co-pilot had deliberately locked the captain out of the cockpit and steered the plane into its fatal descent.

“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 co-pilot’s intention 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 his actions. He said that his inquiry had shown that the crash was intentional.

More from the prosecutor discussing what took place prior to the plane crash killing all aboard.

The prosecutor said that the authorities had a full transcript of the final 30 minutes of the voice recorder.

“During the first 20 minutes, the pilots talk normally,” he said, saying they spoke in a “cheerful” and “courteous” way. “There is nothing abnormal happening,” he said.
The prosecutor said the transcript showed that the captain was preparing a briefing for landing in Düsseldorf. The co-pilot’s answer, the prosecutor said, was “laconic.”

The commanding pilot then asked the co-pilot to take over, and the noise of a seat backing up and a door closing could be heard.

“At this stage, the co-pilot is in control, alone,” the prosecutor said. “It is when he is alone that the co-pilot manipulates the flight monitoring system to activate the decent of the plane.” The prosecutor said that this action could only have been “voluntary.”

“You can hear the commanding pilot ask for access to the cockpit several times,” the prosecutor said. “He identifies himself, but the co-pilot does not provide any answer.”

“You can hear human breathing in the cockpit up until the moment of impact,” the prosecutor said. “The pilot was therefore alive.”

UK Daily Mail – Pic of co-pilot Andreas Lubitz

UPDATE I: Germanwings tragedy was no accident.

French prosecutor Brice Robin said in Marseille on Thursday that the co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz, requested control of the aircraft about 20 minutes into the flight. The pilot then left the cockpit, leaving the co-pilot in full control of the plane.

Lubitz manually and “intentionally” set the plane on the descent that drove it into the mountainside in the southern French Alps. It was the co-pilot’s “intention to destroy this plane,” Robin said.

Robin confirmed a report by The New York Times that the pilot tried aggressively to get back into the cockpit, but was denied access.

The prosecutor said the pilot was heard pleading with the co-pilot over a telephone intercom system from the cabin for access, but that he got no answer from the co-pilot.

VIDEO – click HERE or on pic to watch

UPDATE II: Germanwings plane crash – Live updates from UK Telegraph as investigations into French Alps disaster continues

Breaking: Germanwings A320 Flight 4U9525 from Barcelona to Dusseldorf Crashes in French Alps … 144 Passengers & 6 Crew Feared Dead (Update French President Says Likely No Survivors)

A Germanwings Flight 4U9525, Airbus A320 crash in French Alps near Digne, with 150 people on board, 144 passengers and 6 crew members. Germanwings is a low-cost, economy airline subsidiary of Lufthansa Airlines. Flight 4U9525 was traveling from Barcelona to Duesseldorf. According to sources quoted by AFP news agency, the plane had issued a distress call at 10:47 (09:47 GMT), 5:47 ET.  According to the flight tracking website Flightradar24, Germanwings Flight 4U9525 climbed to 38,000 feet before it started to descend, and the signal was lost at 6,800 feet. The A320 disappeared off the radar before crashing near Digne-les-Bains.

An Airbus operated by Lufthansa’s Germanwings budget airline crashed in southern France on Tuesday and all 148 on board were feared dead.

French President Francois Hollande said he believed none of those on board had survived.

“There were 148 people on board,” Hollande said. “The conditions of the accident, which have not yet been clarified, lead us to think there are no survivors.”

VIDEO – BBC

•  A Germanwings Airbus A320 has crashed in French Alps near Digne, with 148 people on board
• Flight 4U 9525 was travelling between Barcelona and Duesseldorf
• French President Francois Hollande said he believed none of those on board had survived
• Cologne-based Germanwings says it was aware of reports
• The low-cost airline owned by giant German carrier Lufthansa

Updates and Live reporting from the BBC.

Lufthansa Twitter

UPDATE I: French President Francois Hollande Says, ‘Apparently No Survivors’ After Passenger Plane Crashes in France.

French President Francois Hollande has expressed his “solidarity and condolences” with Germany in phone call to Angela Merke.

“I want to express my solidarity to the family of the victims. We do not yet know the identities of the victims. It is a mourning we have to go through because it is a tragedy that has happened on our soil,” he said.

UPDATE II:  Lufthansa, which owns Germanwings, released a statement:

“We do not yet know what has happened to flight 4U 9525. My deepest sympathy goes to the families and friends of our passengers and crew on 4U 9525. If our fears are confirmed, this is a dark day for Lufthansa. We hope to find survivors,” said Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr in the statement.

UPDATE III: Airbus A320 crash in the Alps: Francois Hollande says 148 feared dead, no survivors expected.

The Airbus A320, operated by the budget airline Germanwings, was en route from Barcelona to Dusseldorf when it vanished from radar screens at 09.39 local time.

Flight GWI18G came down near Prads-Haute-Bléone, between Digne-les-Bains and Barcelonnette, north-west of Monaco. It was flying at just 6,800ft at the time and Bernard Cazeneuve, the French interior minister, said debris had been found at an altitute of 6,500ft.

A distress signal, thought to have been sent by aircraft’s automatically-activated crash position indicator, was picked up at 10.47 local time, showing that the aircraft was “at 5,000ft in an abnormal situation”, said Alain Vidalies, the French transport minister.

Pic – UK Telegraph

UPDATE IV: Why did 9525 plummet from 40,000ft?

The 24 year old plane, built by the French Airbus consortium, transmitted a distress signal at 9.47am local time,  with one unconfirmed report saying it was sent out at 6,800 feet.

The distress call, typically transmitted in a general aircraft emergency, did not give any additional information about the type of emergency.

The aircraft was flying at its normal cruising altitude of around 40,000 ft, but within 10 minutes made a staggeringly swift descent to around 6,200 feet.

This points to a major problem with the aircraft, and suggests the two pilots were struggling to control the plummeting aircraft.

This graph from FlightRadar24 shows how the plane lost altitude and speed prior to disappearing from the radar.

UPDATE V:  Bodies are being taken to a local village gym, it is being used as a temporary morgue as bodies are being recovered.

UPDATE VI: The crash site is a two and a half hour walk from the nearest settlement, and is inaccessible by land vehicles. Pics from rescue helicopter.

UPDATE VII: French officials said a police helicopter had located the crash site and first items of debris near the small town of Barcelonnette in the Alpes-de-Hautes-Provences.

UPDATE VIII - Total of 150 people on board Germanwings flight

Germanwings has confirmed the number of people on board as 150.

This includes 144 passengers and six cabin crew.

United Airlines Flight 1074 Grounded After Unruly Passenger Rushed the Cockpit … Passengers Restrain Man

Jihadists in the cargo hold … Terrorism or just a mental case?

A United Airlines plane en route to Denver was forced to return to Dulles International Airport in Washington, DC after a passenger became unruly and rushed the cockpit. However, in a post 9-11 world passengers will no longer tolerate this type of behavior as the out of control man was tackled and restrained by passengers (Picture). No passengers were injured and no weapons were found. It appears that the unruly passenger was simply crazy. However, according to one passenger the man said, “At one point when his head was down he said there were jihadists in the cargo hold and he did say jihad a couple times.”

A United Airlines flight was forced to return to Washington, D.C., after a passenger failed to comply with crew instructions, a spokesperson for the airline said today.

Flight 1074 en route to Denver returned to Dulles International Airport shortly after takeoff late Monday. The pilots told air traffic controllers that the passenger became violent but was restrained by passengers, according to LiveATC.net.

“He ran forward towards the cockpit and he is being restrained by passengers,” said one of the pilots. “Cockpit is secure and we would like to return to the airport and have the authorities meet him.”

United Airlines flight turns around due to unruly passenger.

The pilots told air traffic controllers that the passenger started acting violently but was later subdued by other passengers, according to LiveATC.net, which provides audio of air traffic control transmissions.

“He ran forward towards the cockpit, and he is being restrained by passengers,” one of the pilots said. “Cockpit is secure, and we would like to return to the airport and have the authorities meet him.”

A cell phone video shows the man, bruised on his face, held down by other passengers.

“Don’t move,” one passenger says. “You’re OK. We’re going to get you off this plane, buddy.”

The plane landed at Dulles around 10:40 p.m. ET, said Kimberly GIbbs, a spokeswoman for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority.

“A passenger was removed from the plane and transported to a local hospital for evaluation,” she said.