Media allege cover-up
German media reports allege an attempted cover-up by Germanwings. The airline supposedly downplayed the incident when it informed BFU a day after the incident. BFU didn't see grounds for further invetigation then, daily newspaper "Die Welt" says. Only when new information was available a year later a thorough investigation was initiated. [Edit] Cockpit voice recordings had been deleted by then, flight data has been available for investigation.
A speaker for the Lufthansa-subsidiary denied these reports. Both Pilots had been fit to fly throughout the incident, neither ones ability to fly had been incapacitated, the newspaper quotes a Germanwings spokesperson.
According to the preliminary report by BFU, both pilots say otherwise. With the FO nearly unconscious, the Captain was "at the limit of his capacity" and suffering from "tunnel vision", the report says. The plane was coming in too fast on final. "As the Captain felt neither physically nor psychologically able to perform a go-around, he told the Co-Pilot that he would overrule the 1000 feet safety gate" in order to get the plane down a soon as possible.
Last edited by txl; 28th Sep 2012 at 17:56.
Reason: Correction regarding voice and flight data availability