Shortly after that there is a loud bang on the door. The
pilot can be heard screaming, "For God's sake, open the
door!" Passengers can be heard screaming in the
background. At 10:35 a.m., loud metallic bangs can be
heard as though someone is trying to knock down the
door. The plane is at about 23,000 feet. Ninety
seconds later, another alarm goes off, "Terrain, pull
up!" the plane is at about 16,400 feet. The captain is
heard screaming, "Open the damn door!" At 10:38 AM, the
plane is descending toward the French Alps, and the
co-pilot can be heard breathing. The plane is at about
13,100 feet. At 10:40 AM, it sounds like the plane's
right wing scrapes a mountaintop, then screams can be
heard one more time. Those are the last sounds on the
voice recorder.
Officials reported that they have removed a computer and
other items from Lubitz's home in Dusseldorf, Germany. Among
the items, investigators have reportedly found
Antidepressants that belonged to Lubitz. No suicide note
was found nor did they find any indication that this act
was political or religious.
Last week Thabani Nkwanyana, a medical examiner at South
African Airways said "We are at big risk, we face an
aviation time bomb with the lack of proper psychological
assessment and regulations for aircrew."
Officials reported Lubitz hid an illness from his
employer and French authorities reported the copilot was
given a sick note from his doctor for the day of the
accident, "a torn-up current sick note, also valid for
the day of the incident" was found in the Lubitz’s
documents. According to the prosecutor’s statement, this
“would according to preliminary evaluation support the
assumption that the deceased had concealed his illness
towards his employer and his occupational environment.”
On
Friday the Lufthansa Group reported that their group
member airlines have adopted “rule of two” for aircraft
cockpits. In coordination with the Luftfahrtbundesamt (Germany’s aviation authority), the
other German airlines and the German aviation industry
association (Bundesverband der deutschen
Luftverkehrswirtschaft), the airlines will adopt a new
cockpit occupancy procedure as a precautionary measure.
Under the new procedure, two authorized persons must be
present in the cockpit at all times during a flight.
Search teams continue to recover remains from the
mountainside where the aircraft went down.
Update - April 2, 2015 - Offices
reported that Lubitz computer and iPad had been search
and their findings indicate that the copilot had search
the internet between March 16 to March 23, the day
before the crash for ways to commit suicide, and the
security measures for cockpit doors.
*The
"black box" is a generic term for two recording devices
carried aboard commercial airliners. The Flight Data
Recorder (FDR) records a variety of parameters related
to the operation and flight characteristics of the
plane. The Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) records the
voices of the flight crew, engine noise, and any other
sounds in the cockpit. All large commercial airliners
and certain varieties of smaller commercial, corporate,
and private aircraft are required by law to carry one or
both of these boxes, which generally cost between
$10,000 and $15,000 apiece. The data these devices
provide is often invaluable to experts investigating the
events leading up to an accident. The recovery of the
boxes is one of the highest priorities in any mishap
investigation, second only to locating survivors or
recovering the remains of victims. FDR information is
also often used to study other aviation safety issues,
engine performance, and to identify potential
maintenance issues.
Update - See BEA, French Civil Aviation Safety Investigation Authority
preliminary report published
May 2015
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