There may be more to the tragedy behind the crash of Germanwings Flight 9525. According to a French prosecutor, the co-pilot of the flight appears to have deliberately crashed the aircraft, during the time he had been left alone in the cockpit.
The captain was intentionally locked outside minutes before the A320 crashed into an alpine mountain ridge and co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, a 28-year-old German national, was silent throughout the plane’s descent and was alive at the point of impact.
–French Prosecutor Brice Robin
The prosecutor arrived at the conclusion after listening to the recordings on the plane’s black-box, which was recovered at the crash site in the French Alps. The recording also contains screams, believed to be from passengers, once they understood that the plane was about to crash.
Investigators are now looking into why the aircraft went into a sudden descent, from its cruising altitude of 38,000-feet, despite the absence of one crew member from the cockpit.
The flight reportedly crashed 10 minutes after the descent began, killing all 150 aboard.
However, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said that the episode bore no links to terrorism.
According to the current state of knowledge and after comparing information that we have, he does not have a terrorist background.
–Thomas de Maiziere
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