Germanwings plane crash: Recap as investigations into French Alps disaster continues

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The co-pilot of the Germanwings passenger jet locked himself in the cockpit and deliberately flew the plane into the ground killing 150 people, it has been claimed.
Andreas Lubitz, 28, can be heard breathing "normally" as the plane descended around 30,000ft in just eight minutes before crashing into the French Alps.
Marseille prosecutor Brice Robin told today how the flight voice recorder reveals Lubitz and the captain talking in a "normal fashion" for the first 20 minutes after the plane left Barcelona for Dusseldorf.
The captain then tells Lubitz he is leaving the cockpit and he is charge.
But when he returns, Lubitz ignores requests to open the door via the intercom or after he knocks several times.
He then "voluntarily" operated a control which sent the plane into its final, fatal descent.
Mr Robin said Lubitz was not known as a terrorist and there were no grounds to consider the crash as a terrorist incident.
Recordings suggest passengers' screams began just before the final impact, he said.

6:41 am

Why did pilot leave cockpit before the crash?

Clues: Investigators hope the black box will reveal more about what caused the crash

 

The investigation into the Germanwings plane which crashed in the French Alps killing all 150 people on board resumes today amid startling new claims about what happened.
Voice recordings from the jet have revealed one of the pilots left the cockpit and could not get back in before the plane went down.
The recordings did not make clear why the pilot left the cockpit or why he could not regain entry as the plane steadily descended toward a mountain range on Tuesday.
Investigators will study the voice recordings from one of the "black boxes" for answers today while the search continued for a second black box.
"The guy outside is knocking lightly on the door and there is no answer," an unnamed investigator told the New York Times.
"And then he hits the door stronger and no answer. There is never an answer."
"You can hear he is trying to smash the door down," the investigator added.

6:46 am

'Very smooth, very cool' conversation, before crash

Reuters

Disaster: The Germanwings Airbus A320 registration D-AIPX in March, 2014

                                          

Early analysis of the cockpit voice recorder suggests a male pilot was trying to smash the door down to get back in.
However, there is not yet any indication why he left or what happened to the pilot left in charge of the plane.
A senior military official involved in the investigation described a "very smooth, very cool" conversation between the pilots during the early part of the flight from Barcelona to Düsseldorf.
Then the audio indicated that one of the men left the cockpit and could not re-enter.

7:14 am

Families to visit crash site today

PA

Martyn Matthews with his family daughter Jade, wife Sharon and son Nathan

 Relatives and friends of the 150 victims are due to go to visit the French Alps crash site today.
Lufthansa will operate two special flights - one from Barcelona and one from Dusseldorf - to Marseille, and both groups will travel on by road.
Germanwings chief Thomas Winkelmann said 72 passengers were German citizens, including 16 pupils returning from an exchange trip.
Spain said 51 of the dead were Spanish.
The three British victims were dad of two Martyn Matthews, 50, hotel management student Paul Bramley, 28 from Hull, and Marina Bandres, who lived with her family in Rochdale.
Other victims were from Australia, Argentina, Iran, Venezuela, the US, the Netherlands, Colombia, Mexico, Japan, Denmark and Israel.

7:48 am

Can a pilot be locked out of the cockpit?

The revelations from the voice recorder overnight has sparked speculation about access to the cockpit of a passenger jet.
According to the Airbus cockpit access video above, in the scenario that both pilots become incapacitated, there is an emergency code which staff can use.
This sounds a warning alarm in the cockpit before releasing the lock for five seconds.
However, an Australian pilot, who has flown the Airbus A320, has said it is possible for a person inside the cockpit to 'block' emergency access.
The pilot, who has not been named, told the Sydney Morning Herald a pilot could stop his co-pilot accessing the cockpit if he reacts quickly enough.
"If the person on the other side of the door says 'no', you can't get in," the Australian pilot said.

8:52 am

Some cockpit doors can withstand force of a grenade

Tougher rules on cockpit security were brought in in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.
In 2003 the US Federal Aviation Administration brought in new rules that meant pilots flying in the US would have some of the toughest cockpit doors in the world.
Each door cost up to £33,000 and could withstand "small-arms fire or fragmentation devices, such as grenades". Nearly 6,000 planes had to have the doors installed.
Similar rules are replicated across the world, but it's unclear exactly what security system Flight 4U9525 had - and experts are unwilling to give terrorists any tips.

9:08 am

Did pilot take plane into a nosedive on purpose?

Evidence is starting to suggest a pilot could have locked his colleague out of the cockpit and took the Germanwings into a nosedive.
David Kaminski-Morrow, air transport editor of the Flightglobal publication, said there had been crashes in Mozambique and Japan where something similar had happened.
He said: "Usually the cockpit door locks and to get in you have to have to put in a code, but inside there is a simple switch on the control panel the pilot would turn to lock the door.
"The 2013 plane crash in Mozambique had circumstances where the pilot left the cockpit and couldn't get back in while the guy in the cockpit took the plane into a nosedive."
He went on: "It looks like this incident has precedent at least consistent with that being a possibility. I'm starting to count the number of fatalities that can be attributed to the cockpit doors and whether its locks are saving lives."

9:45 am

Pilots 'involved in violent struggle before crash'

The investigation has now turned into a full-blown criminal enquiry today following revelations of a violent struggle on board, reports from France suggest.
Four specialists from Interpol have joined senior French detectives trying to work out why one of the pilots on the plane locked himself into the cockpit on Tuesday morning.
There were two airmen on board and they are said to have been fighting to open and close the cockpit door.
A chair is at one stage used to block the door, as the pilots shouted at each other in German, before the one outside ‘tried to smash the door down’.
The captain of the Airbus A320 had 6000 flying hours, while his co-pilot had just 600 and had only joined Germanwings, the Lufthansa affiliate, in 2013. It is not known which one was locked in the cockpit.
The revelations open up the possibility of a rogue pilot deliberately flying the plane into the French Alps and so murdering everyone on board. 
Such possibilities – including a terrorist theory – are being considered by Brice Robin, the Marseille Prosecutor, who has opened a criminal enquiry.
Cockpit recordings recovered from the crash site indicated one of the seats was pushed back and the door opened and closed, followed by the sound of knocking on the flight, which had been on its way from Barcelona in Spain to Dusseldorf in Germany.
‘There was no more conversation from that point until the crash,’ said a military source linked to a parallel technical enquiry by BEA, the French crash investigators, who are currently investigating the boxes in Le Bourget, near Paris.

10:09 am

Interpol to assist with investigation

Getty

Relatives of the Germanwings crash victims are on their way to the crash site

 The Airbus A320 suddenly began a fatal eight-minute descent shortly after reaching cruising altitude.
No distress signal was sent and the crew failed to respond to desperate attempts at contact from ground control.
Interpol, the international criminal police organisation, today confirmed that it has sent a team of experts to assist with the enquiry at the request of the French enquiries.
Four Interpol officers will initially be based with a crisis cell being coordinated from Paris.
Jurgen Stock, head of Interpol, said: ‘Interpol is committed to providing all the support required by countries hit by this tragic accident’
At least three Britons, 51 Spaniards and 72 Germans – including two babies and 16 school children - died in the so far unexplained crash of the Airbus.
BEA spokesman Remi Jouty confirmed voices were audible on the damaged black box voice recorder.
"We succeeded in getting an audio file which has usable sounds and voices.  We haven’t fully understood it all yet," said Mr Jouty.