Copilot ‘deliberately crashed German jet’

Seyne-les-Alpes, France: The young copilot of the doomed Germanwings flight appears to have “deliberately” crashed the plane into the French Alps after locking his captain out of the cockpit, but is not believed to be part of a terrorist plot, French officials said Thursday. In a chilling account of the last minutes of Germanwings Flight 4U 9525, lead prosecutor Brice Robin said 28-year-old German Andreas Lubitz “deliberately” initiated the plane’s descent while alone at the controls. Lubitz appeared to “show a desire to want to destroy” the plane, Robin told reporters, basing his initial findings on recordings made by the Airbus’ cockpit flight recorder in the final minutes before the crash that killed all 150 passengers and crew on board. Robin said the 144 passengers died “instantly” and probably were not aware until the “very last moment” of the impending disaster. “The screams are heard only in the last moments before the impact,” said the prosecutor. “The copilot was alone at the controls,” he said. “He ... refused to open the door of the cockpit to the pilot.” The pilot, believed to have gone to the toilet, made increasingly furious attempts to re-enter the cockpit, banging on the door, the recordings show. There was no immediate clue as to the motive of the copilot, but investigators appeared to rule out terrorism. “At this moment, there is no indication that this is an act of terrorism,” Robin said, adding that Lubitz had no known terrorist connection. Germany’s interior minister echoed this, saying there was so far no indication of “a terrorist background.” However, Robin also said he was unwilling to use the word “suicide” and could not guess at Lubitz’s motive. “Usually when you commit suicide, you do it alone. When you’re responsible for 150 people, I don’t call that a suicide,” he said. The copilot, who deliberately set the controls “to accelerate the plane’s descent” into the side of a mountain in a region famous for its ski resorts, “was conscious until the moment of impact,” Robin said. “This action can only be deliberate. It would be impossible to turn the button by mistake. If you passed out and leaned over on it, it would only go a quarter-turn and do nothing,” he stressed. “He didn’t reply to a thing. He didn’t say a word. In the cockpit, it was utter silence.” AFP