Airbus A320 crashed in Southern France

[juice]

Meanwhile, via Twitter a thank you note to the pilots taking one grateful passenger home:

@jaidillon: A letter given to a colleague from a passenger onboard his aircraft.. Providing proof that we're all in this together http://t.co/a0NrT3LAtT

[mary meagher]

roving, on his post of 30 March, 22:52, refers us to the British Airways prosecution of an unstable approach on the part of a 747 pilot who should have gone around a lot sooner; I believe he nearly took out the Marriott hotel.
Subsequent to his civil trial and conviction, he took his own life.

And the pilot who took up Nigel Farage on May 2010 to fly an election campaign banner in his "Sky Banners" company Wilga, from Hinton Airfield and crashed, became extremely unstable and took his own life on 12 November 2013.

In both these cases, it was very very unlikely that the pilots would ever have been able to get back their commercial license. No doubt the insurance policy for loss of license and income would have excluded mental problems.

If such policies did not exclude mental problems, self reporting may not be avoided. I have a friend who developed DVT (deep vein thrombosis) only a year after becoming ATPL and flying with an airline. He collected on his insurance and now works for the Civil Aviation Authority. If this avenue of maintaining your self respect is closed for any mental problem, of course the sufferer will keep it secret as possible.

[blind pew]

you quote from an incident which highlights all that is wrong in the industry and compounds the fears of the average line pilot.
Glen carried out an approach which should never had started and wouldn't have done bar an alleged "illegal" dispensation given to him from a duty flight manager.
The crew was sick and taking medication...presumably prescribed by the company doctor...the autopilot had a fault which hadn't been properly rectified and they were fatigued.
Many of us had the feeling that if anyone should have been prosecuted it was management....but of course they weren't and there was a rumour that relevant tech log entries went awol.

After posting on here I was contacted by an ex mate who wanted to know more details of what I knew with respect to the management pilot..end of friendship.

In a similar vein I posted in support of a Captain - another operator and authority - who had been fired as he had stated that he didn't have anywhere to go with problems...especially the authority...result was I received a letter from the revenue investigation department...dirty business I'm sad to say.

[A0283]

@leightman,
No point of impact

There is little explicit official information on this. But ...

A. The searchers use maps that have an initial or main point of impact on it, you can Google them, and some maps have a 'spread of fragments' boundary line.
B. I read about an official reference coordinate for the point of impact, some maps showed that coordinate, i have not tried to match or correlate those maps to check them for accuracy, perhaps somebody else has,
C. There was a single statement in an article about the plane hitting 'a lower mountain first with the right wing', before having the main impact .... I have seen no confirmation of this. I have not tried to match available debris photos with that dual impact statement. An answer to this is a required small piece in the full puzzle.
D. It has been stated in a few articles and apparently quoting officials ... That to be sure, the search area is wider than the 'impact plus area' ... Because they want to check if the plane lost parts before reaching the impact area. I dont know if that effort continued after the 'intentional crash' came out.

All this will need to be confirmed by the investigation. And they are working very systematically to that end as far as I can see. The mountain road that they are building now will help to speed up the whole process. Just saying 'the guy did it' is not enough for improving safety, for professionals and i imagine also not enough for the relatives. They need to go all the way, and literally show it.

Let's hope that the quality of the work on the ground will be joined by improved communication to public and press. Statements of a French Gendarmerie official embedded in the German Polizei team in Duesseldorf ... And separate statements by the French and German procureur and Staatsanwalt.... Next to the BEA.... Requires more streamlining and international coordination. I know that everyone has his own procedural and legal obligations to fulfill, but still. Need for improvement on this point should end up in a lessons learned report. It would even expect some statements on this in the Final BEA+ Report.

I am fortunate because I am well able to read french, german and english. But even with that knowledge it takes substantial time to correctly match and check statements. For investigative purposes english could be leading. That will be much harder for the judicial side. A remedy for the that could be sending out own language statements always joined by a formal english translation. Spain and Catalunia have, it appears, positioned themselves behind the French/German effort. That is commendable from the communication point of view.

[portmanteau]

you can be sure that identification of voices of crew would be the priority, confirmed by someone in GW Flight Ops who would automatically be present.

[Tom Bangla]

This blog on The Economist website includes a good summary of the dilemma that occupies much of this thread's discussion.

"One of the cruellest aspects of this tragedy is the impossibility of preventing recurrences. Technical faults, once diagnosed, can be fixed. Operational shortcomings can be ironed out, if never perfected. But when a person in a position of trust decides to betray that privilege, no amount of forethought or red tape can negate the threat they pose. If it could, then the “position of trust” would have been nominal only."

Germanwings flight 9525: A human response to a human tragedy | The Economist (http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2015/03/germanwings-flight-9525)

[infrequentflyer789]

Please consider the following scenario
Buzzer goes off, Capt & FA in cockpit.
Capt assess the person requesting entry is a security hazard and wishes to deny them entry
FA decides the person outside the door is to be permitted entry.
and now please answer:[LIST=1]


Substitute FO for FA and the problem reduces to one already solved.

Or maybe airlines could, you know, cooperate and talk to each other and those that have been doing this for over a decade could explain what has been learned over that time.


I believe life has moved on since last week, and risks that were not apparent prior to last week are now known world wide. IMO this policy adds clear new risks, now the "2 in cockpit" rule is so widely known and practiced.

I would add, again, that this already was widely known and practiced and if there is additional risk from the folks who serve you coffee then there should be evidence in the actual incident record - as there is of the risk of leaving one person on deck behind a locked door.

And "life has moved on since last week"... but life did not move on after LAM 470, EgyptAir, Silk Air ? Were they just being ignored as "couldn't happen here" or because they were African or Arabs or Asians ?

[Ian W]

As a former lawyer but now airline captain, I feel uncomfortable that so far we have only been given carefully selected 'facts' by the investigating authorities, sometimes in a strangely arse-about-face manner - I refer to alleged encouragement by the co-pilot to get the Captain to take an in-flight toilet break which is highly relevant to the notion of premeditation but wasn't mentioned by the investigators until the last couple of days. Is this slow release of information a case of confirmation bias?


I don't think that is quite fair on the procureur. If he had said without quoting the CVR that First Officer had deliberately flown the aircraft into the ground. He would have been howled down by everyone including you. So he had to provide a level of corroborative evidence from the CVR which I believe he did reluctantly. He was still howled down not least by people on this site. So he provided more information from the CVR to make it plain what had happened. (This is actually my experience of the legal / police systems in Europe they always have more corroborative evidence but show the minimum necessary.) So as you state the information came out apparently in the 'wrong order'. This is not confirmation bias it is the way that it is done when someone only wants to provide sufficient information to make their case. As it is in this thread here are many who would have preferred the CVR to be kept confidential for 18 months or so while BEA carry out their investigation. This would have left the captain (or his family) and Airbus hung out to dry by all the people claiming that it was an aircraft fault or poor maintenance.

From my point of view the procureur has followed his procedures in an exemplary fashion. It may not be the way other countries would have done it but I suspect had the crash been of a US airliner into the Rockies the FBI would have followed very much the same path.

[FullWings]

The armoured and lockable flight crew door was brought in after 2001 to stop unauthorised access. It was designed deliberately so that if there was a conscious pilot inside, there was no means short of high explosives for a “hostile” to force entry, even with complete knowledge of the mechanism, codes, etc. Also, another crew member could not be coerced into opening it by some “secret” method.

In this particular case, it functioned as specified.
I tend to concur it is perhaps less to do with the design of the door security (and glad discussion has died down from this), and more a problem on how to detect pilots with medical conditions making them unfit to be entrusted with the lives of their fellow crew and passengers. There is no easy solution to this, but like all noteworthy accidents, it will certainly get a lot in the industry thinking and talking about it.
Absolutely. The problem many of us have who actually work in the industry is that knee-jerk reactions to very rare/unlikely events often lead to an overall reduction in safety standards as very few of the implications have been properly thought through.

One might even argue that as the “pool” of pilots with current medicals and mental illnesses sufficiently severe for suicide at work to be a possibility is demonstrably tiny, a recent reduction in this number by one is significant.

[NigelOnDraft]

Substitute FO for FA and the problem reduces to one already solvedAgreed, provided the training, background & medical checks, all reveal that:
The FA has an equal, or lesser risk to the substituted pilot
The adding of extra people does not increase the risk
It all comes down to the risk assessment, and which crucially EASA and the CAA say, the risk of having 2 on the Flt Deck must be assessed and allowed for.

Each airline's risk assessment will no doubt differ... but others as well as me have pointed out the FA "risk" has issues - and very specific ones to do with mental illness / depression / associated medication / self diagnosis (as well as separate security ones).

[NigelOnDraft]

So, how would you assess the risk from a qualified pilot, serving as an FA while waiting for an FO slot?Almost by definition, if they held a current Class 1 medical, the risk is the same I would think?

[A0283]

Accident to the Airbus A320-211 registered D-AIPX, flight GWI18G, on 24 March 2015 (http://www.bea.aero/fr/enquetes/vol.gwi18g/info31mars2015.en.php)
INFORMATION ON 31 MARCH 2015

The Safety Investigation is continuing. It will be focused on:

Describing more precisely, from the technical perspective, the history of the flight. This work will be based on detailed analysis of data from the CVR as well as analysis of any flight parameter data that may be available.
Studying the systemic weaknesses might possibily have led to this aviation disaster or other similar events. Within this context, the Safety Investigation will be oriented towards the cockpit door locking system logic and cockpit access and exit procedures, as well as the criteria and procedures applied to detect specific psychological profiles
Note A0283: The words 'that may be available' are an answer to the question about the FDR status.

[Lonewolf_50]

What hope is there that FDR data will be recovered, or the various bits and pieces that seem to be missing at the moment will be found and usable?

Granted, this was a high kinetic energy crash, but I was under the impression that CVR's and FDR's are very robust bits of kit. Yes, saw the deformation of the CVR body. As most crashes in recent history have had FDR's survive some serious destruction of an airframe, it is disappointing to learn that now and again the black box itself doesn't survive in usable form.
:(

IIRC, the recent freighter crash in Bagram fell afoul of a form of that, in terms of the area where the CVR/FDR are located being where the internal damage leading to the crash began, with the signal being lost shortly after rotation. The boxes themselves seemed to have survived that horrific crash.

[Evanelpus]

What hope is there that FDR data will be recovered, or the various bits and pieces that seem to be missing at the moment will be found and usable?

I don't know if they sit relatively close together. If they do, I suppose we should be grateful that the CVR survived as well as it did!

[DaveReidUK]

it is disappointing to learn that now and again the black box itself doesn't survive in usable form.Few accidents involve a CFIT at 350 knots.

I would guess that armouring a recorder so that it's guaranteed to survive such an impact would result in its weight being prohibitive. It's lucky that the CVR survived relatively intact.

[susier]

AFAIK nowhere has it been reported that the FDR has likely been destroyed.


My impression is that the memory module became detached from its casing on impact and therefore is still present somewhere in the vicinity. It may only be a matter of continuing the search until it turns up.


If anyone can clarify?

[RatherBeFlying]

I haven't yet seen the recovered shell of the FDR; so two possibilities for the storage media and data capsule:


Data capsule intact with or without outer cover on -- being cylindrical it could be a long way downhill if not trapped in debris. Rainfall can move it a long ways and even bury it in sediment. In the mountains heavy rain and debris flows are ever present. Snowmelt also triggers debris flows. It may be necessary to vacuum dredge the streambed and run it through a screen. All this in difficult terrain.
Capsule broken and storage media scattered -- the entire hillside area will have to be treated like an archaeological dig. Labor intensive, time consuming and distressing because of fragmentary human remains:(


Description of debris from 1956 TCA CFIT at Mt Slesse:
http://forums.clubtread.com/27-british-columbia/18246-1956-mt-slesse-tca-dc4m2-air-crash-debris-field.html

[toffeez]

According to what the authorities have announced, they seem to be looking for a large orange object, not a card or other component.
Now they have built a road, access to the site is easier.

[NigelOnDraft]

I believe the "FDR case found, memory/storage missing" came at the 3 leaders brief, not from the BEA or prosecutor? I also saw somewhere reference to maybe this being the QAR?

If both the above have any truth, one can see the confusion?

Spec I have just read equates to 270K decelerating over 450cm. Given a 350K impact, I have no idea how much the tail would have slowed by the time the FDR area reached the surface?

[MichaelOLearyGenius]

I'm sure there will be a lot of pilots taking anti-depressants on the fly that will be getting worried right now. The initial medical examination should include a review of GP notes to see if there has been a previous history of psychiatric illness.

[Vinnie Boombatz]

@oldoberon, 31 Mar 2015 at 09:37 --

There are a variety of recorder models and manufacturers.

The FDR in the AF 447 accident was a Honeywell 4700. The spec:

http://www51.honeywell.com/aero/common/documents/Flight_Data_Recorder_%28SSFDR%29.pdf

"The SSFDR's crash survivable memory unit (CSMU) provides for complete data recovery when subjected to the crash conditions stipulated in ED-55 and ED-56a: Impact Shock 3400G, 6.5 milliseconds . . . "

The BEA final report on AF 447 states that "For the FDR, only the protected unit (CSMU or memory module) was present. The CVR was complete."

The EUROCAE and RTCA documents (e.g., ED-55) that have the detailed requirements are on pay-per-view sites.

A few popular press articles (not specs):

BBC NEWS | Special Reports | Flight recorders: clues to air crashes (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8096089.stm)

AutoSpeed - Inside the Black Box (http://www.autospeed.com/cms/article.html?&A=1227)

[Toc Vil]

According to latest news from the Bild Zeitung website, their journalists and those of Paris Match could view a video from a memory card, recovered by rescuers, and probably taken with a cell phone during the last seconds of the fatal flight. The contents would be consistent with the declarations of the Marseilles prosecutor about the pax realising their fate, "My God heard in several languages, and the Captain hitting the cockpit door with some metallic tool.

[Carjockey]

From the Grauniad:

"Five days after the Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz seemingly crashed his plane into the French Alps, killing all 150 people on board, there was a growing backlash in Germany (http://www.theguardian.com/world/germany) on Saturday against what many in his hometown feel is a tasteless rush to judgment.
Residents say French investigators have been too hasty in blaming Lubitz for the crash, and that the full facts about his medical condition and apparent long history of depression are not yet known.

Pilots’ organisations have also said that the conclusion of French air accident experts that Lubitz deliberately locked (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/26/germanwings-flight-4u9525-deliberately-flown-into-mountain-says-prosecutor) the captain out of the cabin, then calmly steered flight 4U9525 into a mountain, is premature."

Andreas Lubitz's hometown condemns rush to judge Germanwings co-pilot | World news | The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/28/andreas-lubitzs-hometown-condemns-rush-to-judge-germanwings-co-pilot)

[skytrax]

According to CNN, a video from inside the plane with the final moments before the crash has been found!
The content has been described in a couple of publications, jst been posted. I belive they mentioned Bild and Match.

Apparently it comes from one of the phone's memory card, found at the crash site.

LE: for those who can read German
http://www.bild.de/news/ausland/flug-4u9525/video-germanwings-sekunden-bis-zum-absturz-40376768.bild.html

[G-CPTN]

How come that something apparently recovered from the crash site has come into the public domain?

Wouldn't you expect all such evidence to be impounded by the investigators?

[Severe Clear]

Inside the A320 - Exclusive: The final moments before the crash (http://www.parismatch.com/Actu/International/Exclusive-The-final-moments-before-the-crash-736774)

[Lonewolf_50]

G-CPTN:
Yes, I would expect (and hope for) that, but I would also expect that a "French military official" would not feed the NYT ... and that apparently happened. :uhoh: Leaks like that are IMO not helpful to the job that the crash investigators are trying to do in a methodical way.

@SevereClear: I detect a bit of "filling in the blanks" in the breaking news story that you linked to. Thanks for the link anyway. If one ever needed an illustration of "if it bleeds it leads" in journalism, this one seems a textbook case.

[JamesT73J]

How come that something apparently recovered from the crash site has come into the public domain?

Wouldn't you expect all such evidence to be impounded by the investigators?

Yeah, you would. Like the CVR audio, and the NYT source that leaked the FO story.

[papershuffler]

Somehow does not surprise me at all.

I think we've already established that this investigation is as leaky as one of dear Liza's buckets, and attempts to stem the gush of information are about as effective as the hapless Henry.

[Castlehard]

Inside the A320 - Exclusive: The final moments before the crash (http://www.parismatch.com/Actu/International/Exclusive-The-final-moments-before-the-crash-736774)

Interesting that the claim is made that the FO was wearing an O2 mask.

[LUALBA]

Unfortunatly it seems these "magazines" have the video. Hope will never be published.

http://www.airlive.net/2015/03/breaking-paris-match-magazine-has.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

[EternalNY1]

Interesting that the claim is made that the FO was wearing an O2 mask.

Where are they getting this from?

This apparent new leak is claiming to have cell phone audio from inside the cabin. How does this in any way tie into the co-pilot having an O2 mask on?

[NilVolentibusArduum]

ex girlfriend statement:

"but she added that he suffered from the pressure of his job, stating: "We spoke a lot about work and then he became another person. He became agitated about the circumstances in which he had to work, too little money, anxiety about his contract and too much pressure."

Andreas Lubitz planned spectacular gesture that would go down in history, claims ex-girlfriend - Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/aviation/11501075/Andreas-Lubitz-planned-spectacular-gesture-that-would-go-down-in-history-claims-ex-girlfriend.html)

Do we need another motive?

I hope our airline managers / politicians understand that this can't happen another time and start reducing workload and start treating people as humans with limits...

[Castlehard]

Quote:
Interesting that the claim is made that the FO was wearing an O2 mask.
Where are they getting this from?

This apparent new leak is claiming to have cell phone audio from inside the cabin. How does this in any way tie into the co-pilot having an O2 mask on?


The Paris Match article also includes a timeline derived from the CVR and that is where the statement is made that the FO is wearing an O2 mask.

[lomapaseo]

Unfortunatly it seems these "magazines" have the video. Hope will never be published.

Does it add any useful facts to the investigation or is it just manufactured to sell copy?

[Tiennetti]

The information there is BS
You would never have a"sink rate" at 13000ft, nor a "terrain, pull up" if the levations are around 6800ft

[flash8]

The information there is BS
You would never have a"sink rate" at 13000ft, nor a "terrain, pull up" if the levations are around 6800ft

Puzzled me as well as being absurd... this 'investigation' is becoming worryingly surreal in its reporting.

[cldrvr]

Kneejerk reaction havng 2 "crew" up front at all times? A cabin crew, no disrespect to the profession, gets in with minimal training, 4-6 weeks and minimal back ground check only to end up in front.

Seriously? Did they not think this one through, how easy would it be now for those who are so inclined to get on a course and within a few months they have full unfettered access to any flight deck over Europe.

This is not solving the underlying problem, and no it is not just the mental state of the FO, it is the total erosion of the terms and conditions in the airline world where P2F is becoming the norm in the low cost sector, not the exception.

Unless the white elephant in the room gets addressed, this won't be the last in Europe, how many others are out there who have been pushed to breaking point and see this as a way out and as a way to highlight their plight in absentia.

Do you really know the guy/girl sitting on your right? Do you? You trust him with your life? How about that newly recruited CC taking your place when you go for a comfort break?

This is not a solution, this is creating an even larger problem then we already have.

[WillowRun 6-3]

Way to go, comic relief, super-succinct too!
On the release of news reports of - reportedly - a cellphone's memory and a video of the fateful final moments in flight: of course opportunists, some of them in the service, or hoping to be in the service, of the families of the victims, are trying to build a public mindset about the suffering the victims endured. Ambulance chaser - now, how does a person say that in French, translated to German, translated thence to English? The victims' families ultimately will deserve compensation, no doubt. But sensationalism is the handmaiden of the greedy, and leaks are their currency. And: if only Henry had been possessed of the sense to.....think for himself.

[Airbubba]

Dusseldorf, Germany (CNN)—[Breaking news update, posted at 4:11 p.m. ET]

Lt. Col. Jean-Marc Menichini, a French Gendarmerie spokesman in charge of communications on rescue efforts around the Germanwings crash site, told CNN that the Paris Match and Bild reports of a video recorded in the final seconds before the crash were "completely wrong" and "unwarranted." He explained that cell phones have been collected on the site but that they "hadn't been exploited yet."

Reports: Video found in Germanwings wreckage - CNN.com (http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/31/europe/france-germanwings-plane-crash-main/index.html)

The accompanying CNN clip has some babble about a recovered 'SIM' card that supposedly contained the recording. I don't think you can record much video on a SIM card. :confused:

[Ian W]

Apparently a Dutch 777 captain 'predicted' the probability of the Germanwings crash.

Dutch pilot predicted French Alps crash - Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/netherlands/11506244/Dutch-pilot-predicted-French-Alps-crash.html)

Perhaps Nigel on Draft needs to have a quiet word with him :)

[KClemens]

@Airbubba

The accompanying CNN clip has some babble about a recovered 'SIM' card that supposedly contained the recording. I don't think you can record much video on a SIM card. :confused:

Well even with a cheap smart phone you can take videos of 5 mins and longer.

[NWA SLF]

The investigation report on UA93 states the CVR was recovered 25 feet below ground. It does not say it was in the crater on top of the earth - it was under 25 feet of earth. Assuming this aircraft struck ground at nearly the same speed, it would indicate the possible difficulty in finding the memory module. I addition, the impact was apparently into the side of a ridge, not at the bottom of the valley where much of the debris was recovered. If it was into the side, the impact would have dislodged a great deal of earth with which the data module is intermixed. It would be a surprise if it was recovered quickly.

[NigelOnDraft]

Ian

I have no issue with what the Dutch Capt wrote - agree with him, and as I earlier said, when I excused myself sometimes I would joke to the FO "and where are we diverting to...?" post the Ethiopian event.

My concern is the knee-jerk reaction that the whole issue is solved by adding a FA to the mix. This solves some issues, but creates many others? If one reads the EASA/CAA recommendation closely, and what the BEA stated today - adding the "2nd crew" is not the complete answer.

What is needed is a review - as per the EASA recommendation, and now the BEA - of the complete Risk Assessment over the door etc. I do not envy those carrying out that task, they will never be told in hindsight they are right - just as here, after an accident "they got it wrong".

If the GW accident scenario is correct (which I think it is), the solution is not to allow suicidal pilots on the Flt Deck, and mitigate that with an FA. The solution is to avoid, somehow, those pilots whilst in that state of mind, being on the Flt Deck surely? (BEA point 2)

[WW I Flying Ace]

The accompanying CNN clip has some babble about a recovered 'SIM' card that supposedly contained the recording. I don't think you can record much video on a SIM card.Of course not but microSD-card can contain a lot of video and layman can easily confuse the two.

[DrPhillipa]

If the GW accident scenario is correct (which I think it is), the solution is not to allow suicidal pilots on the Flt Deck, and mitigate that with an FA. The solution is to avoid, somehow, those pilots whilst in that state of mind, being on the Flt Deck surely? (BEA point 2) My personal experience is that most suicidal persons prefer to be alone, or at least feel alone at the time. An "audience of one" even if it were a case of going out in a blaze of revengeful anger and glory. So the FA in the cockpit could well be at least a hinderance in general; albeit of unknown specific usefulness in this case.

[AVR4000]

The references to a "SIM" card is obviously wrong; it would be a microSD card that contains the video and I would also say that it is highly probable that there will be a couple of recordings extracted since it is logical that a couple of passengers shot video with their devices.

I think the first videos where being shot when it became evident to those on the forward rows that there was a problem, i.e. when the captain was unable to get back to the flight deck.

To me, it is logical to assume the existence of video recordings of the take-off, initial climb, perhaps some climb-out and then a couple of several minutes long ones of the descent, which can be synchronized with the CVR.

The content of those recordings will be pretty obvious with a focus on the captain trying to get back in, worried passengers, perhaps even passengers trying to assist the captain and PA callouts from the cabin crew, which I think is probable) and then screams and praying when it became evident that the aircraft was descending into the mountains. If someone "fake" a recording, I am afraid that the "fake" won't be far off the true content of such recordings.

I would also bet on at least 10 recordings if not more made by different passengers (we can simply assume that most people on this flight had a phone with decent camcorder).

The timeline stated in the article about "13,000 feet" is obviously wrong and is the result of journalistic twisting. I would assume that there will be a combination of radio altimeter "one thousand feet", "five hundred" and "one hundred" callouts paired with the GPWS warnings even if I haven't seen any source mentioning it.

I wouldn't be surprised of some of the video recordings will leak out and end up on YouTube and/or other sharing sites, especially when a couple of videos are recovered.

Edit: The heavy "shake" mentioned in the article indicates that there was an initial impact before the aircraft hit the mountain. I can't remember seeing anything about such an event and it must be some wreckage there then.

From the pictures, I got the impression that the A320 hit the mountain ridge close to the top and disintegrated with everything "raining" down from above. We are extremely lucky that the CVR survived even if its release should have been managed in a different way.

[NigelOnDraft]

My personal eyperience is that most suicidal persons prefer to be alone, or at least feel alone at the time. An "audience of one" even if it were a case of going out in a blaze of revengeful anger and glory. So the FA in the cockpit could well be at least a hinderance in general; albeit of unknown specific usefulness in this caseMaybe so, but as above, that is to me, for the airline and/or regulator to decide as part of the overall risk assessment - and ultimately take responsibility for. Not pPrune!

Hi IceFlyerBut when the airlines would say that the pilots must do this test every half year, it would be very safe to prevent those suicidesI have to ask, what is it to do with the Airlines? Is it really the task of an airline to decide if a pilot is fit to fly?

It is the regulator who defines the medical requirements, it is the regulator who runs the medical checks and issues the medical certificates. Surely it is they, assuming this co-pilot had a valid medical, who have to answer why he had one?

[gmorton]

In this article in The Guardian, the information about the phone video footage is published concurrently with Lufthansa saying that they've handed over an email to investigators that was from Lubitz to Lufthansa training school informing them of his serious depressive episode.....and Lufthansa will be cancelling their 60th anniversary festivities in April.
Andreas Lubitz told Lufthansa flight school of 'serious depressive episode' | World news | The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/31/germanwings-plane-crash-insurers-compensation-costs-200m)

[PrivtPilotRadarTech]

[QUOTE=Vinnie Boombatz;8927825]@oldoberon, 31 Mar 2015 at 09:37 --

There are a variety of recorder models and manufacturers.
(...)
"The SSFDR's crash survivable memory unit (CSMU) provides for complete data recovery when subjected to the crash conditions stipulated in ED-55 and ED-56a: Impact Shock 3400G, 6.5 milliseconds . . . "

Electronics is my game. Looking at diagrams of CVR's and FDR's they have a number of sub assemblies in a sheet metal housing. The memory module, or "crash survivable memory unit" (thanks Vinnie) is the part that matters after a crash. It's armored in a cylindrical stainless steel casing, and being heavy, it COULD be torn from the other parts of the recorder, but I think it unlikely that it was destroyed. It may be imbedded in the mountainside, covered by a slide, or it may have flown or rolled some distance, but I believe they will find it. I have read that "part of the FDR has been found", but have also read a denial, that NO part of it has been found. Talk of the memory card "flying out" seems like BS, that "crash survivable memory unit" is very rugged, designed to withstand impact, fire, and submersion. I think someone heard "memory unit" and pictured the SD card in their camera or phone instead of a stainless steel cylinder.

[WillowRun 6-3]

I only wish to concur strongly and emphatically with the points Nigel on Draft has made in the two (2) most current posts. The question of fitness to fly a certificated air transport category aircraft is a matter which must be regulated by each State's national laws, policies and regulations. These in turn must be (if the State is a party to the Chicago Convention) consistent with and faithful to the ICAO Annexes, SARPs and related guidance. However.....as their name implies, SARPs include not only Standards, but also Recommended Practices.
Solving the problem of cockpit access will not be easy. Every State with a major civil aviation sector naturally will tend to -- confirmation bias? -- favor its own way of thinking about such matters. But, uniformity is an underlying principle of the current international civil aviation order. And ordinary, or routine if you prefer, processes in this arena - whether at the EASA or FAA level, or with ICAO at a more inclusive international level - do not move quickly.
But solving the procedural and mechanistic issues around FD access will seem simple, compared to reform, if not "systemic reset", around mental wellness, fitness to fly, and questions of mental illness.
One thing everyone does agree on, or should agree on IMO, is that knee-jerks produce pains where discomfort was not within the scope of the knee's, or the jerk's, intent.

[Lonewolf_50]

what about this? Airbus with 150 passengers moments away from disaster after cockpit filled with toxic gases (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2210473/Airbus-150-passengers-moments-away-disaster-cockpit-filled-toxic-gases.html)
Is'nt it alarmingly similar? (That incident was raised about 100 pages ago, FWIW. :cool: )
Could be a worthwhile line of inquire ... but if the FO put on his O2 mask, would that not mitigate the effects?
Putting on the O2 masks seems to be what the captain and FO did in that case.
As I read the summary in the previous post, in the 2010 incident they were at lower altitude and presumably at lower cabin altitude.
Not sure if being at a higher cabin altitude would accelerate the effects of that kind of fumes intrusion into the cockpit.
A problem of being able to fit that hazard into this incident is that after a 350 kt impact with a mountain, whatever might have led to a leak is probably beyond forensic analysis due to kinetic damage/destruction.
Beyond that, the fumes hypothesis does not seem to explain entering a descent and locking others out of the cabin, does it?

If it does, how does it?

[weebobby]

"However, Lieutenant Colonel Jean-Marc Menichini, a high ranking official involved in the recovery operation, has categorically denied that any mobile phone footage had been found by investigators at the site."

[AirScotia]

"However, Lieutenant Colonel Jean-Marc Menichini, a high ranking official involved in the recovery operation, has categorically denied that any mobile phone footage had been found by investigators at the site."

Is this an official denial, or a leaked one? It's becoming hard to know.

[rideforever]

I calculated that at 500 kmh a 50 m plane would take a fraction of second to crash. I can only say it was mercifully extremely quick. It takes almost a whole second for a thought to be registered, and there was no time for that, there would have been no recognizance of the crash.

If one were to get a serious diagnosis from a doctor one day, there would be a lot of time to think about it.

What can we do, we are mortal, that is simply how it is.

I hope the papers will not make too ugly a scene if there are video recordings.

[peekay4]

Interesting that the claim is made that the FO was wearing an O2 mask.
Hmm. In the FAA world, if one pilot exits the cockpit while the aircraft is at or above FL250, the remaining pilot must wear the 02 mask. Ref: 14 CFR 121.333(c)(3)

However, I don't think there is a similar regulation in Europe that mandates wearing the O2 mask while cruising at FL380. Maybe someone more familiar with Germanwings ops can comment?

[SD.]

It doesn't matter if the guy had 630 hours or 25,000 hours. Mental health can rear its ugly head at anytime during a career.

Throughout this thread, I've seen a few posts from over pond claiming that this wouldn't have happened stateside. The U.S. navy and FedEx never vetted out the suicide attempt of FedEx 705.

IMO, the German medical authority should be answering the question of why this guy was in possession of a class 1 medical, and all airlines worldwide need to look at their policies and employee welfare.

[Buzz Coil]

In the USA, depressed pilots could continue to fly if their depression was treated by medication as of around 2010 (Don't know off the top of my head, when it became the case in Europe). The problem is, most depression now is treated by an SSRI, such as Prozac. As has been pointed out before in this forum, Prozac and drugs like it, occasionally cause people who may not otherwise take their own life or the lives of others, to do just those things (Not often, but often enough to be a public safety concern). I'm not thinking that depressed pilots shouldn't fly. In many cases of depression, one of the best treatments is to immerse yourself in your work, to get your mind off of of the depression or it's cause, whether it be piloting or playing football (after any needed time off).
It is too risky for a pilot to take Prozac or similar SSRI's. If depressed pilots must be medicated, they should take an amphetamine such as Dexedrine or Adderall, or an amphetamine analog, like Methylphenidate (Ritalin). These drugs may not help depression as much as Prozac and the like, but they don't have the danger to public safety side effect of suicide, while taking others with you.
A depressed pilot might not quite be "on his game". Crewmates and automation can make up for that, but a pilot on Prozac might be hell on wheels (or wings), while he flies the aeroplane into the mountainside.
Of course, the public may never know if Lubitz was on an SSRI, such as Prozac (aka: Fluctin, Fluoxetine HCL), but it seems likely he and many past mass murderers were on them.
I wonder if Jet Blue pilot, who went crazy on a flight and had to be restrained by passengers, was on an SSRI (Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor)?
Change the regulations. Prohibit the use of SSRI's for commercial pilots. Pilots and passengers are better off with an unmedicated depressed pilot than one on Prozac!

[vapilot2004]

The problem is, that the pilots have to solve a psychological test once when they apply for the job. After that they will never be asked again about their psychological behavior.

But when the airlines would say that the pilots must do this test every half year, it would be very safe to prevent those suicides.

The solution will be knee-jerk reactions and regulatory band-aids - par for the course in commercial aviation or anywhere government is involved - but serves only to kick that can a little further down the road to 'perfection'.

Leaving aside mechanical failures and software anomalies, commercial airline operations in the area of human resources have many points of weakness along the chain of trust. From baggage handlers to engineers to cabin crew to pilots. In this case, it will be the guys up front that will carry the burden of new and 'improved' guidelines, but the threat of catastrophe remains.

Talk all you want about mental health but that door was the last link in chain.Of course they wont accept that because of costs of redesign.Psychometric testing and more SOPs will be their answer......The lunatics run the asylum.They always have.Always will.

The idea is not a bad thing,Rananim, but I see this as a less-than ideal solution. What is really needed is a support system that doesn't include the finishing of one's airline career as is the case in the US. If we can accomplish this, more may be willing to come forward, admit the need for help, and get it.

[oldoberon]

What is really needed is a support system that doesn't include the finishing of one's airline career as is the case in the US. If we can accomplish this, more may be willing to come forward, admit the need for help, and get it.

Removing the threats/fears is the only way to get honesty/openness from the pilots.

I would add the the treatment could involve a period of grounding (with full pay) but with closely supervised flights (3rd pilot on fd?) to keep all quals upto date (ready for a return to duty). Demonstrates an expected return to normal for the pilot.

In cases of permanent grounding there has to be a decent compensation package.

[vapilot2004]

In cases of permanent grounding there has to be a decent compensation package.

Airline-subsidized LOL insurance, without the mental illness clause would be one way through. ALPA offers such a policy, however it is not cheap and there's no payout in cases of being unemployable due to (at least in the states) airline hiring/re-hiring practices, which while not LOL per se, carries the same result as losing one's license.

I also appreciate your way of considering transport from an everyman's perspective, Oldoberon. The taxi analogy is spot on and yes, mile for mile, flying remains the safest way to go. As to passenger fears, for EU/UK airlines, the newly enacted two-crew cockpit SOPs are surely intended to mitigate those fears while also limiting liability.

[DozyWannabe]

...innocent until proven guilty...
To be fair, I'd argue that the concepts of innocence and guilt have no place whatsoever in accident investigation. That stuff's for the legal beagles - and frankly, they're welcome to it.

As far as accident investigation goes, the central matters are:

What happened?
Why and how did it happen? (if possible to determine)
What are the possibilities regarding why and how it happened? (if not)
How can we stop it from happening again?


At present, the standard procedures in France (and I believe Germany as well) require that a criminal investigation be opened in the event of an aviation accident as a matter of course. It's worth reading up on the differences between their methods and ours before pontificating IMO.

Despite the apparent leaks, the investigators themselves have released only the information that they can confirm and deem necessary. However, the fact that they have not explicitly contradicted the leaked information implies a likelihood that they consider this to be a deliberate act based on the evidence they have so far. It's a rotten thing to have to contemplate, but contemplate it we must.

On a bit of a tangent, I'm fortunate enough to have a missus who has several friends who specialise in mental healthcare, and from what I've heard the vast and sweeping majority of clinical depression cases pose no risk of harm to anyone but themselves. Willingness to harm others is very much atypical of clinical depression pathologies.

It follows that - if this was a deliberate act brought on by mental health problems - the pathology is likely to be far more complex than usual - it's certainly going to be more than a case of clinical depression.

[Buzz Coil]

DozyWannabe: "It follows that - if this was a deliberate act brought on by mental health problems - the pathology is likely to be far more complex than usual - it's certainly going to be more than a case of clinical depression."

Me thinks you are right.

[Water pilot]

High explosives? This door is beginning to take on mythological properties.

Seriously, any shipyard or commercial construction site has hand operated tools that would make short work of the door - but you would have a hard time getting them past security. After all, somebody had to fabricate the thing.

the door exists to prevent the plane from being turned into a weapon, but it assumes that all pilots have good intentions. It was probably the wrong response to 9-11, since nobody will ever again sit meekly while terrorists try to take over a plane.

[papershuffler]

Source(s): years of personal experience as a search officer, exhibits officer, and search commander, working with UK police and other agencies. However, I have only a passing knowledge of French procedures. (I would hope that they have a similar, robust-enough system.)

Recovery/seizure of evidence

When an item is seized/recovered, it is placed in a bag which is sealed with a plastic tag ('bagged and tagged'). IME, electronic devices and possibly-sensitive items were placed in differently coloured bags instead of clear, so it was easier to identify and separate them.

(Notes - Use of PNB (notebook) depends on the search briefing, and the individual proclivity of the officer:
- recording of every item found. Every page should be initialled. If they are discovering large amounts of items, this is not always possible.
- recording of only unusual items found, or items important to the investigation.
We tended towards the latter as the exhibits officer would produce a master list of all the items found, however some officers still recorded everything.)

A label is then completed with a detailed description of the item and location found, signed and dated by the officer who found it.

The item(s) would be taken to the person(s) logging items found and assigned a unique number. Once an item gets this far into the process, it is very, very difficult to remove it without a trace. It is a Very Big Deal if anything is lost, and there would be a trace of it (i.e. description of a mobile would include IMEI). All items would be gathered together, counted, checked and double-checked.

If the item is deemed as potentially important, a senior officer's attention would be brought to it and it would be marked as a priority to process. I would think any recognisable electronic devices would come in this category.

The number one rule for electronic devices is that you do not attempt to operate the device under any circumstances. Forget what you see on TV with the police picking up phones and pressing buttons, or answering calls. Evidence gained in that manner would be unusable in a court of law in England or Wales (Interception of Communications/RIPA/PACE). The fact that a person has operated the device can also damage the integrity of any evidence discovered, and it is likely to leave a trace.
The ONLY exception to that rule that I experienced is for devices that will lock if you leave them for more than a few seconds/minutes, which are renowned for being difficult to unlock. (I know of someone who had to babysit one particular PDA device to keep it locking while the digital forensics team on site ran around looking for the correct cable to begin a download.) This does not apply for this case, as all devices would already be either off or on stand-by/locked automatically.

I can't recall whether the latest procedure is to turn seized phones immediately off, or whether to leave them on - however I've seen them being placed inside metal containers to ensure no further interaction with a mobile network is made.


Processing of electronic evidence

IME, mobiles were often the first things that were processed, especially in the days before universal chargers. (If the matching cable was not seized, the download had to be made before the battery expired.) The item(s) would be signed out by the digital forensic analyst, and data recovery would be attempted in a room or container impervious to mobile network signals. It may be processed further by the forensic analyst, or by a member of the investigative team, or another specialist. The resulting effort would be saved on a shared drive which the entire investigative team may have access to (it depends what permissions have been agreed upon).


Onto the latest reports. Apologies for the source - it was either CNN or the DM. I have quoted the article to directly analyse what has been said, and highlighted the paragraphs relevant to this matter (although I understand the perils of translation may have slightly changed the context).

Video of flight's final seconds?
Reports say a cell phone video shows the nightmarish final seconds of Germanwings Flight 9525, but a police spokesman said the accounts were "completely wrong."

French magazine Paris Match and German newspaper Bild reported that a video recovered from a phone at the wreckage site showed the inside of the plane moments before it crashed.

"One can hear cries of 'My God' in several languages," Paris Match reported. "Metallic banging can also be heard more than three times, perhaps of the pilot trying to open the cockpit door with a heavy object. Towards the end, after a heavy shake, stronger than the others, the screaming intensifies. Then nothing."

The two publications described the video, but did not post it on their websites. The publications reported that they watched the video, which was found by a source close to the investigation. (1)

"It is a very disturbing scene," said Julian Reichelt, editor-in-chief of Bild online.

An official with France's accident investigation agency, the BEA, said the agency is not aware of any such video.

Lt. Col. Jean-Marc Menichini, a French Gendarmerie spokesman in charge of communications on rescue efforts around the Germanwings crash site, told CNN that the reports were "completely wrong" and "unwarranted." Cell phones have been collected at the site, he said, but that they "hadn't been exploited yet."(2)

Menichini said he believed the cell phones would need to be sent to the Criminal Research Institute in Rosny sous-Bois, near Paris, in order to be analyzed by specialized technicians working hand-in-hand with investigators. But none of the cell phones found so far have been sent to the institute, Menichini said.

Asked whether staff involved in the search could have leaked a memory card to the media, Menichini answered with a categorical "no." (3)

Reichelt told "Erin Burnett: Outfront" that he had watched the video and stood by the report, saying Bild and Paris Match are "very confident" that the clip is real.

He noted that investigators only revealed they'd recovered cell phones from the crash site after Bild and Paris Match published their reports.

"That is something we did not know before. ... Overall we can say many things of the investigation weren't revealed by the investigation at the beginning," he said.

Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz reported depression - CNN.com (http://edition.cnn.com/2015/03/31/europe/france-germanwings-plane-crash-main/)

The publications reported that they watched the video, which was found by a source close to the investigation. (1)

Does this incriminate an investigator, or a more senior official on site?

...reports were "completely wrong" and "unwarranted." Cell phones have been collected at the site, he said, but that they "hadn't been exploited yet."(2)

This tallies with the procedures I have experienced.

Asked whether staff involved in the search could have leaked a memory card to the media, Menichini answered with a categorical "no." (3)

IF he is incorrect, someone has short-cutted the entire established recovery procedure by stealing either data (operating an electronic device), or stealing the device itself.

IF the videos are not faked, how many have been found? If they are numerous, what is the chance of one or more being 'stolen', and what is the chance of the stolen device containing usable, relevant footage or other data? Slim? And what happens to physical items that are stolen that aren't deemed to be money makers or relevant? Does the thief just throw them away, or attempt to return them to the site?

In summary, some possible options (not exhaustive):
1. the footage has been faked, or does not exist.
2. an investigator on the ground has found a device, but either taken a copy or neglected to bag and tag it into the evidence chain, and sequestered it away to leak to press.
3. whoever is logging items recovered has sequestered the item or a copy of evidence away.
4. the item has been declared 'sensitive', removed from records but has been leaked at the processing stage.
5. the item has been processed, and the thief has stolen a copy of the information it contains. (Not according to Menichini.)

How to discover the truth? Interrogation of the search officers, exhibits officer and any database should show traces. These are minor figures though, senior officers are the only ones with the power to access much information, and cover their tracks.


IMO, if these videos turn out to be genuine, it irreparably damages the credibility of the entire investigation. Personally, the whole issue makes me feel physically sick, to think there is someone actively damaging such an important investigation, possibly for personal gain. (I've worked shoulder-to-shoulder with people on a 'porous' investigation - it was very detrimental to the case and to the health of the team members to be under suspicion.)

If the integrity of the chain of evidence is damaged, then how are we to trust the rest of the investigative process, including whatever data may be discovered on the FDR?

[ChickenHouse]

I am surprised how many people appear to think an anonymous "Big Brother" regulation authority would be more suited to judge the flight fitness of a pilot then the people working daily in the vicinity. Is this another try to push all personal responsibility for each and every neighbor away? I tend to lean towards pushing the fit to fly judgement to a personal accountability of airlines medical departments, as they are much closer to the person as every regulator ever will be. Who knows whether this tragedy could have been avoided when medical fit to fly judgement would not have been transferred from airline medical centers to the regulator by EU laws?

[cactusbusdrvr]

VAPilot, you are on the right track. What is needed in This industry is what we had at America West - a long term disability program that allowed pilots with a medical issue to have the time off to get themselves taken care of without losing their place on the seniority list or suffering a total loss of income.

We had pilots with a wide variety of issues from substance abuse to heart conditions able to go out on medical leave at 60% of their income. Long term disability kicked in 3 months after the initial short term period. There was no sick leave used in the process, if you had a condition that kept you out longer than 3 months you were placed in the program. Some guys never did get their medical back, they were able to stay on disability until social security retirement age. It was an industry leading benefit, one we fought hard to retain. I know for a fact that guys that may have hid an issue were proactive in getting help becaiuse of this program. I worked on the Aeromedical committee for ALPA when we had that union on the property.

Unfortunately we have lost that benefit in the merger with American. I personally think that this is short sighted on the part of the present union, APA, and the company. Guys that don't have sick bank, which is about 40 percent of the combined pilot group, will not have the money coming in if they have a significant issue. That is disincentive to getting help. We should encourage proactive health fitness, not hinder it.

We self certify our fitness to fly every leg, it's an ACARS entry we make before each flight. The burden is on the pilot to be honest and truthful. The system cannot operate any other way, it is too burdensome to check every pilot every leg. And it would be stupid to do so. This is not a common problem. 99.9 % of us just do our jobs safely and quietly every day. We have a bigger threat from weather and fatigue than we do from mental instability.

[BOING]

Catusbusdrivr
Lot of truth in your post.

When I joined a US major the medical benefits were great and no one argued with time off for sickness. By the time I left, the medical claims were handled by an outside company whose job was to try to reduce company costs to as little as possible and blame any problems you had on your own bad health habits. You could still get time off but with the underlying threat that too much time off could be considered as unreliability and could eventually count against you.

The result was that people, especially junior pilots, dragged themselves into work to fly when they should have been at home in bed. All of this because management cared more about the shareholders dividend than they did about having healthy pilots at work. Until this attitude is changed by regulation I would not trust any airline management with a health care decision.

[Wader2]

Papershuffler, thank you for your analysis. One should consider the reason for any leakage of information. From the initial CVR leak to this one. Obvious reasons are vanity and money. Where it is hard evidence the motive could well be greed.

Very easy to slip a cell phone in your pocket, especially if you know that others have been found. Self-justification would be easy and lots of money could be made. There must be journalists aplenty in the area 'protecting their sources'

[Isotope Toast]

I just read the article from Match and Bild and must say, this investigation (and the accompanying reactions from LH, GW, et.al). are becoming more and more incompetent with each passing day.

A few of you on this thread have said it before, and I'll second, third, and fourth it: the CVR, FDR, outside telemetry data, sim cards, SD cards, phone calls, sick notes, and the like need to ALL be gathered together, analyzed, check and double cross-checked, and only THEN can we come to conclusion as to the how's and why's of what happened.

The leaking of a few seconds of the CVR did nothing to help with the investigation. All it has done is spawned a 1001 conspiracy theories, cause people to rush to judgement of not only the FO, but of LH, of security measures, of pilots, and of flying in general.

That stupid article brings absolutely nothing to the table and in fact, weakens any good solutions/discussions that need to be had.

For example:

1. The article leads off by saying that they have obtained a "video of the final seconds of the crash." Yet other sources say the video is only 1 second long. So the lead sentence is false.

2. "Lubitz is alone in the cockpit. He locks the armored door with the “Lock” button:" Do we know he flipped the switch from CVR data? I've heard conflicting reports about how loud this switch is.

3. "The landing begins" What? Really?

4. "The captain is facing a camera connected to the cockpit: Lubitz sees him on screen but does not react." Wait...this article started off talking about the recovered video, so the way this is written may lead one to assume that we can see this on the video. Moreover, how do we now the captain is facing the camera? How do we know Lubitz sees him on the screen?

5. "The captain grabs an oxygen tank or fire extinguisher in order to break down the door." Again, how do we know this?

6. "Through the cockpit door, the first sounds of passengers running in the aisles can be heard." So, I'm assuming through the CVR, we can hear passengers running the isles? What does that sound like? Why are they running in the isles? Why are they not helping the Cpt. break through the door?

7. Everything under "10:35." Again, how do we know this? Is it from the CVR? if so, why wasn't it originally reported, along with everything else, after the first leak?

8."Despite the deafening noises, Lubitz’s breathing can cleary be heard through an oxygen mask he put on." What deafening noises? And how do we know he put on an oxygen mask? If he's just programmed the plane into a "we're definitely going to hit a mountain" descent, why would he put on an oxygen mask? Do we hear this being put on on the CVR? If so, why wasn't this also reported?


This article is absolute trash. And this investigation is starting to stink, imho.

[mary meagher]

BOEING, your post on medical claims, echoing vapilot and old oberon, puts it succinctly. Medical claims being handled by an outside company...with profit motive. Private insurance for losing your license EXCLUDES mental problems! So no pilot is going to admit having mental problems because it will invalidate his cover.

The insurance companies share the blame. They will not be willing to cover pilots with these problems, until they are REQUIRED to do so by government regulation.

And passengers who want to fly with trustworthy pilots may avoid airlines that do not operate in properly regulated environments. Medical examiners MUST be required to share serious doubt on the fitness of airline pilots. And pilots who are straightforward and truthful about their health must not be punished by insurance companies.

[NigelOnDraft]

Hi CH I am surprised how many people appear to think an anonymous "Big Brother" regulation authority would be more suited to judge the flight fitness of a pilot then the people working daily in the vicinity. Is this another try to push all personal responsibility for each and every neighbor away?I am not saying "Big Brother" regulation is better, just that it is the current way things are done.

I tend to lean towards pushing the fit to fly judgement to a personal accountability of airlines medical departments, as they are much closer to the person as every regulator ever will beSpecifically - what are these "airline medical departments"? I fly for a large airline, and whilst we do have a medical department, it is tiny compared to when I joined, and there is no need for a pilot to go anywhere near them? I suspect most airlines do not have one at all?

Who knows whether this tragedy could have been avoided when medical fit to fly judgement would not have been transferred from airline medical centers to the regulator by EU laws?I might agree, but as I said, I am not sure if all airlines ever had, and most certainly now do not, an "airline medical centre"?

[Isotope Toast]

Regarding knee-jerk reactions, I read this yesterday in the German newspaper Welt Kompakt.

The German version can be found here (http://www.welt.de/debatte/kolumnen/zippert_zappt/article138936680/Aufmarsch-der-Helfer-im-Cockpit-wird-es-voll.html).

And here's my translation:

The investigation into the plane crash constantly bring new details to light. The co-pilot was apparently seriously mentally disturbed. His stealth was so great that it must have been obvious. Talk show hosts wonder how many dangerous Pilots are still flying and how they can be recognized. An incomprehensible announcement during the flight is, however, no clue.

Almost all airlines have now introduced the two-person rule. There must always be two people in the cockpit, and one of them should know how to fly the airplane. Also, two stewardesses should be quite able, according to experts, to land the airplane. Whoever can maneuver a crowded trolley safely through narrow isles, probably can also control an aircraft.

The only question is whether two people are really enough. A psychiatrist, a pastor and a doctor should definitely be present in the cockpit, at best, a medical practitioner, a Feng Shui master and a journalist. Add to that a mediator so there are no arguments.

[ChissayLuke]

To me, all that is relevant here, is the safety of the travelling public, who are obliged to place their trust in whatever FD crew are flying the plane on that particular day. And assume that the airlines, regulators, or whoever, are doing whatever it takes to ensure that this trust is well placed. That the crew are healthy in every particular, and on top of their game for whatever hazard they might have to face.
If a pilot loses his license for any medical, conduct, mental problem, then so be it. It is a risk they accept when signing up, as is the case in many other professions.
And I doubt that any of the friends and relations of the dead 150 or so would say different.

[DespairingTraveller]

Whereas the aim is laudable, the issue is how best to achieve it, surely. Creating an environment where people can lose their careers overnight because of the onset of an unexpected condition that may not be dangerous is at best questionable. Obvious problems include:

1) Deterring good, healthy candidates from embarking on the profession in the first place, because they judge the risk of abruptly losing their careers at some future point too high and they can take their talents elsewhere. That has the potential to depress the overall competence of the pilot pool and so increase flight safety risk.

2) Deterring existing pilots who develop mental conditions from reporting them. No-one has to attend a doctor to seek treatment for anything, and a mental condition is frequently very easy to conceal from casual discovery. You don't come out in a rash or acquire a pronounced limp...

Yes, take action by all means, if it is judged necessary after considered, informed, expert attention. Not in response to alarmist headlines whose sole purpose is to sell newspapers, not to improve flight safety.

[ChissayLuke]

DespairingTraveller, mostly agreed.
Pilots would need to be completely honest, and airlines would need to offer viable alternative employment in such an event, perhaps.
But my main thrust stands.
The travelling public has a right, (not to mention, pays for), the opinion I expressed.
How the airline, regulator, etc. etc. provides this is for them. And it would appear, they failed badly in this instance.

[kcockayne]

ChissayLuke

Agree with your comments, entirely. But, there is much more to all this than meets the eye of the passenger & general public.
What needs to be done needs to be determined soberly & exhaustively - not as a knee jerk reaction which causes more harm than good.
There are so many parameters to examine before something effective can be done. What has been done, up to now, does qualify as a knee jerk reaction & threatens to be largely ineffective, or even counter-productive.

[NigelOnDraft]

How the airline, regulator, etc. etc. provides this is for them. And it would appear, they failed badly in this instance.I have seen nothing to say they did fail badly here? Not saying they did not, but no hard evidence to date.

Pilots would need to be completely honestThere are indications this was the aspect that failed.

There are accounts that the pilot had in the past, "suicidal thoughts/tendencies(?)". I will leave experts to decide if this form is suicide is always a risk, or a particular form? And whether anybody with such thoughts should be permanently barred from flying. Obvious problems with that discussed above.

However, I would add pilots (and Cabin Crew) do commit suicide - no idea of % compared to the rest of the population? However, if any previous history of suicidal thoughts were a bar to a Class 1, then surely every pilot suicide - even well away from work - would merit a high level inquiry as to why they were holding a Class 1?

There's a very big can of worms out there, and I'd rather leave it to the experts to interpret and recommend.

[oldnetd]

If a phone survived the crash, then it is possible that it uploaded a video file to the cloud. I know lots of people whose partners know their passwords and would be able to retrieve a file.

There probably was no signal on the mountain, however if the searchers did not put any phones in metal boxes, it is possible that they uploaded as soon as they got to civilisation.

[ChissayLuke]

Kcockayne - agreed

Nigelondraft- phrases like leaving it to the experts lack relevance to my post; sorry. I expressd a view of what the travelling public might feel entitled to expect. And, I believe, it is hard to argue against this.
Also that 'experts', imho, have a long way to go before they get it right.
Greater scrutiny and openness of both crew and 'expert' is needed.
And genuine accountability. To the travelling public. Who pay.

[DirtyProp]

To me, all that is relevant here, is the safety of the travelling public, who are obliged to place their trust in whatever FD crew are flying the plane on that particular day. And assume that the airlines, regulators, or whoever, are doing whatever it takes to ensure that this trust is well placed. That the crew are healthy in every particular, and on top of their game for whatever hazard they might have to face.
If a pilot loses his license for any medical, conduct, mental problem, then so be it. It is a risk they accept when signing up, as is the case in many other professions.
And I doubt that any of the friends and relations of the dead 150 or so would say different.m
Uhm, no.
The travelling public is not obliged to place their trust in anyone.
The travelling public WILLINGLY CHOSE to place their trust in that particular flight. They chose it because it made economic sense to them. I seriously doubt somebody forced the passengers to get on that plane. They could have gone there by another flight, car, train, etc.
And if - as a pilot - I accept the risks of flying as my profession, so should the travelling public. Flying is inherently dangerous, and not every tragedy can be prevented.

[SLFguy]

Hmm. In the FAA world, if one pilot exits the cockpit while the aircraft is at or above FL250, the remaining pilot must wear the 02 mask. Ref: 14 CFR 121.333(c)(3)

However, I don't think there is a similar regulation in Europe that mandates wearing the O2 mask while cruising at FL380. Maybe someone more familiar with Germanwings ops can comment?

Not sure why you think someone who is about to throw an aircraft into the side of a mountain is going to be concerned with compliance, so kinda irrelevant.

[NigelOnDraft]

however given MH 370 having this scenario as a possibility it has highlighted it far more than previous incidences and therefore it seems the industry is making all the correct moves to pacify the SLF.Trouble with introducing MH370 is we do not know what happened?

I think there is a high probability it was human driven i.e. not a technical problem. But was it the Capt? FO? Cabin Crew? Passenger? How did the door assist (or hinder?) the plan?

There is of course the rather unfortunate possibility that the wash-up of Germanwings makes certain conclusions about Mental Health and the Door policy - and a week later the MH370 CVY/FDR are found and completely contradict the conclusions :{

[parkfell]

The medical regs will be reviewed, with far greater scrutiny of the medical history. Just like epilepsy at any time is a bar, so now will certain mental health issues fall into that category.

Two on the FD at all times will mandatory. A measure of mitigation. The majority were doing this anyway.

Company policies will change so that confidential reporting of colleagues will become far more frequent. Self reporting of significant changes in your private life will be required? Risk assessment by the trick cyclists everytime.

Let the witch hunt begin.........

[ChissayLuke]

Dirtyprop, thanks for your reply.
You epitomise the problem. Especially if you really are a commercial pilot.
Minimilisation of risk, should be the pursuit of all. You seem pretty laissez-faire.

The pax on this flight had no reason to anticipate their death on this particular flight. That you appear to consider such risk acceptable beggars belief.

[Wader2]

Isotope, you didn't mention the crowbar he fetched from the back of the aircraft.

Daily Telegraph (UK) today. Video apparently from the back of the aircraft and people not identified.

[fa2fi]

Yes sick ghouls for whom this tragic event is a form of grim entertainment. Much like the fake CVR recordings. If true I hope that they never make it online. I think those murdered deserve one last bit of dignity. Many of us pilots are against video cameras in the flight deck to avoid our last moments being filmed. In this instance innocent passengers, the ones we are charged with protecting have had their final moments recorded and I for one hope their privacy is protected in the same manner many of us pilots want protected. Nothing can be gained from publishing the video.

[lomapaseo]

Chissayluke

Dirtyprop, thanks for your reply.
You epitomise the problem. Especially if you really are a commercial pilot.
Minimilisation of risk, should be the pursuit of all. You seem pretty laissez-faire.

The pax on this flight had no reason to anticipate their death on this particular flight. That you appear to consider such risk acceptable beggars belief.

A little too hard a response on Dirtyprop

I also support his meaning, maybe not in the same words.

I also agree that Minimilisation of risk should be the pursuit of all.

In my opinion, most passengers don't give a thought to how much risk they live in everyday and do put their trust in others to minimize risk.

This investigation is still in its earliest stages (in spite of the conclusions on this board) and as yet I can not see all the balances of competing risks at play for example medical privacy vs reaction, single pilot vs a locked door etc.

[RedGritty]

Isotope Toast asked:

"Do we know he flipped the switch from CVR data? "

There's no data on the CVR, just separate audio recordings from each pilot's headset microphone and from a general microphone in the instrument panel.

The operation of that guarded cockpit-door switch might not produce much sound at all, it may be unlikely to be audible at the co-pilot's headset microphone or at the instrument-panel microphone.

I've not read of the CVR recording including the sound of the door-open request or override audio-alerts. Either the investigators felt this was not sufficiently important to include in their briefing or perhaps the sound was inhibited by prior movement of the switch to the "lock" position.

The FDR records data including (I believe) some switch activation relating to flight controls. But, so far as I know from what I have read, it does not include the operation of the cockpit door lock/unlock switch. The FDR memory unit has not yet been found anyway.

It does look like the article you refer to (and quite a few others) is very poor quality as you say.

[DirtyProp]

Dirtyprop, thanks for your reply.
You epitomise the problem. Especially if you really are a commercial pilot.
Minimilisation of risk, should be the pursuit of all. You seem pretty laissez-faire.

The pax on this flight had no reason to anticipate their death on this particular flight. That you appear to consider such risk acceptable beggars belief.
The risks have already been minimized.
Proof of that is the outstanding safety record of this industry. Also, the pursuit of all airlines is profit. No profit, no airline.
Which is the same pursuit of passengers (saving) when they freely choose how to travel.
No one can anticipate their own death. But like it or not, death is part of life. It can happen to anyone in any possible way. If you really think you can completely eliminate any risk from your life or when you travel (by plane or other means), you're mistaken.

[hikoushi]

The risks have already been minimized.
Proof of that is the outstanding safety record of this industry. Also, the pursuit of all airlines is profit. No profit, no airline.
Which is the same pursuit of passengers (saving) when they freely choose how to travel.
No one can anticipate their own death. But like it or not, death is part of life. It can happen to anyone in any possible way. If you really think you can completely eliminate any risk from your life or when you travel (by plane or other means), you're mistaken.

DEATH may be inevitable and impossible to eliminate as a risk, but MASS MURDER by someone having a psychotic episode does NOT need to be part of that equation during air travel. Full stop.

[Groucho]

It is interesting - the only other 'bulk' public transportation system I can think of where a single person can be at the controls and the numbers affected 100 or more is the train. We saw the 'suicide/murder' committed at Moorgate station in 1975.

Would it be of value to see what the train systems have done about the psychological profiles of their drivers?

[DouglasFlyer]

The A320 EGPWS has forward looking terrain avoidance capability, so the 'terrain - pull up' could be triggered at that altitude.

Wouldn't the 'Terrain Awareness and Display' in a Airbus call "TERRAIN AHEAD - PULL UP!" ?

[Xeque]

I do not believe this. The chances of an SD card being found in those circumstances is astronomical - so much so that it deserves no consideration at all.
If the remains of a mobile phone CONTAINING the SD card had been reported then I would think differently.
<sentence removed>
The possibility that one of the investigators or recovery people on the ground has found the thing and sold it to the media is also highly unlikely. Given the attention this incident has generated and the number of innocent people murdered, I cannot believe that this is what happened.
If it really did then the action is unconscionable and the gutter press who have published it are beyond the pale.
But then, in the filthy business of peddling innuendo and false information, I suppose anything is possible.

[G0ULI]

There have been many posts regarding the mental state of the copilot, most of which conclude that he was suffering from some form of mental illness. He may well have previously received treatment for depression or other ailments, but it is not necessary to invoke some form of psychosis to explain his actions.

For as long as people have lived in social groups, certain bounds have been imposed on individual behaviour. Unacceptable behaviour was punished by expulsion from the group or by other penalties designed to enforce compliance. Religious beliefs also led to cohesion with a given society, although also responsible for many conflicts with other groups. It was the fear of the consequences of getting caught that kept people on the straight and narrow.

Modern society, the lack of religious belief and the general breakdown of extended family groups has contributed to an overall lack of control over the actions of individuals. indeed many people believe that they should have the absolute freedom to do as they wish, although generally with the caveat that their actions should not harm others.

In a society where murder and serious crime is mass entertainment on prime time TV is it any wonder that people grow up with a skewed sense of what is acceptable behaviour?

Given the above statements, I would propose that someone who has achieved their life's dream and who is faced with losing everything due to a medical ailment or disiplinary action may well rationalise that a spectacular murder/suicide is a logical course of action to take. We all want to leave our mark on the world, either by having children, gaining fame or renown by good works, or perhaps by performing an act so shocking that it will be remembered. You don't have to be mad to consider crashing a plane full of passengers into a mountain. It is a logical solution to an unhappy situation if you are not constrained by morals and ethics.

Just another symptom of the pressures of modern society and the breakdown of morals and ethics.

Constant monitoring of pilots will not prevent someone who is determined to do harm from crashing a plane but instilling a sense of responsibility and pride in the job just might help a bit in preventing the mental processes that lead to a crash being the most logical solution to an individual's problems.

[Basil]

fa2fi,
Many of us pilots are against video cameras in the flight deck to avoid our last moments being filmed.

That has to be one of the most bizarre comments I have heard from a professional pilot (Other than in jest when, amongst professionals, esp mil, anything goes).

I never intended to have my 'last moments' on the flight deck of a public transport aircraft nor, I'm sure, did any of my colleagues.

I have frequently been filmed in the sim and a good training aid it is to confirm that the stude did something which, at debrief, he fails to recollect :rolleyes:

We thought that the CVR would be intrusive but everyone now accepts it as a great diagnostic and I don't recollect it repressing robust social comment on the flight deck.

Provided that the use of audio and video recordings is rigidly controlled ONLY to be used by accident investigators then I have no objection to either. Simply make it a criminal offense for the operator to intentionally view or listen.

[DirtyProp]

DEATH may be inevitable and impossible to eliminate as a risk, but MASS MURDER by someone having a psychotic episode does NOT need to be part of that equation during air travel. Full stop.
And according to the statistics it is NOT.

ASN News » List of aircraft accidents and incidents intentionally caused by pilots (http://news.aviation-safety.net/2015/03/26/list-of-aircraft-accidents-and-incidents-deliberately-caused-by-pilots/)

You can all stop freaking out.
Or you can provide for your own transportation so you will be totally sure to know the driver.

[WillowRun 6-3]

To ChissayLuke:
I have to voice disagreement with your assertions about - if not also your overall approach to - the presence of risks in civil aviation. It is a given, a bedrock, foundational, immovable, irrefutable and undeniable building block of the entire international civil aviation system that, because flying is an inherently dangerous activity, provisions must be set in place for the handling of compensation to victims of accidents. The Warsaw Convention, the most foundational and bedrock piece of the system of international agreements, was entered into....in 1929. So to say that the flying public is unaware of risk, really is to say something quite different: some individuals (and perhaps, some groups within some segments of some cultures or societies or even, regions of the world) prefer not to think about the risks, preferring instead just to wish that everything will work out fine on their particular trip. But to assert that somehow the flying public is entitled to some pristine atmosphere above the earth where the laws of physics do not apply, and flying can be made inherently safe, is to ignore what cannot be ignored - the international legal system on which the present day's world airline community was built. It was not so long ago, as you may or may not recall, that the back of ticket stock contained a summary of the terms of the Warsaw Convention - yeah, the print was small, and IIRC was printed in red ink, but as recently as 1972, if a member of the flying public was interested in how the law acknowledged the inherently dangerous nature of flying, it was there, in red and white.

[ChissayLuke]

Dirtyprop, your comments are, indeed, 'off the map'. imho.

[DespairingTraveller]

@ChissayLuke, what is it you actually want to be done?

It's very easy after an event like this to rail against the participants and the authorities and say, "This is dreadful, it shouldn't have happened. Somebody's to blame, something must be done."

I doubt if anyone would argue with the general sentiment. The real issue is "What should be done?" And to arrive at an answer to that question, you have to determine exactly what did happen, why it happened, whether anything could have been done to prevent it, and, if so, what. Then, crucially, whether that proposed preventative action would actually increase total risk through some unwanted consequence.

Which is why leaping to conclusions and taking actions based on early reports and hysterical newspaper headlines is so, so dangerous.

For example, suppose someone issued a binding directive that no-one with a depressive episode on their medical record could fly henceforth. What are you going to do in due course when several hundred, perhaps several thousand, existing pilots cannot turn up for work and fly aircraft, because they suffered depression sometime in the past, even if they have now been treated and recovered?

Basically, you have only a few choices. Promote pilots from further down the food chain and fly with them; increase the allowed flying hours of remaining crew to cover the shortfall; or cancel the flights.

The practicality and net safety consequence of the first two is not clear and would require evaluation, but could easily be negative. The third one almost certainly increases the passengers' total risk of accidental death. It is well documented that road fatalities in the US rose substantially in the aftermath of 9/11 because people were afraid of flying so drove, and that the increase outweighed any conceivable consequence of further terrorist action had it occurred (which, of course, it didn't).

Carrying on as though this incident never occurred and never thinking about it again is not an option, and I seriously doubt that the relevant authorities will do that. Determining what appropriate action to take is not so straightforward and requires careful, informed consideration.

[DirtyProp]

Dirtyprop, your comments are, indeed, 'off the map'. imho.
You are certainly entitled to your opinion.
I feel the same towards the paying public that always wants to get the cheapest airfare but at the same time the highest safety standards with no risk whatsoever.

[papershuffler]

Wader2

Papershuffler, thank you for your analysis. One should consider the reason for any leakage of information. From the initial CVR leak to this one. Obvious reasons are vanity and money. Where it is hard evidence the motive could well be greed.

Very easy to slip a cell phone in your pocket, especially if you know that others have been found. Self-justification would be easy and lots of money could be made. There must be journalists aplenty in the area 'protecting their sources'

Any investigators searching should have been briefed on the correct way to handle electronic evidence ("EE"). There may even be a specialist on site to handle/secure anything found, to ensure no data is lost. (This was standard procedure for the cases I worked on. A device could be 'imaged' - a digital copy made - and left in situ if the correct equipment was available, but I don't consider that would have been practical in this case.)

As an example of how EE is dealt with: on one of my first operations, I found a mobile phone. I reacted as you would on finding a poisonous snake - I stepped back, swore, and yelled for help. I then wrote the discovery in my notebook, and left the arriving geek to deal with it. It had been hammered into us to not do anything which may compromise the data. e.g. If it was the execution of a search warrant, it's possible the phone owner had been attempting to send a text to warn someone else that a raid was on, and touching that phone or moving it may have sent the message. If multiple items were found at the same time, it would greatly impede a search, especially if there were limited staff. You could not move on until it had been dealt with/handed over.

On the side of a mountain/bottom of a gully, recovery procedures are probably slightly different. I would however hope that investigators would still have the presence of mind to not interfere with devices, and to keep them isolated.


What really, really concerns me is that if any of the clips are real, it's also likely valuable evidence has been lost forever. When a device is forensically analysed, they can find often find 'that little bit more'. When a device is operated under non-sterile conditions, some of this data is irretrievably written over.

That's why picking up a device 'to see if there's anything on it' is so damaging. How easy would it be to hit the wrong button on an unfamiliar device? To power on an already-damaged device which then short circuits and wipes the memory?

Also, do you think that anyone who has already stolen something from the deceased would respect any last messages to their friends or family that have been left? Or photos taken while on holiday which relatives may treasure forever?

I don't think such an action can be justified in any way. In fact, it disgusts me. And it disgusts me that any organisation would pay someone for such 'information', or even provide an outlet for them. All involved should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.


Isotope Toast

1. The article leads off by saying that they have obtained a "video of the final seconds of the crash."

IF they have obtained a video, it was likely to be by nefarious purposes. And likely to have destroyed other evidence in the process.

oldnetd

Phone video might auto upload
If a phone survived the crash, then it is possible that it uploaded a video file to the cloud. I know lots of people whose partners know their passwords and would be able to retrieve a file.

There probably was no signal on the mountain, however if the searchers did not put any phones in metal boxes, it is possible that they uploaded as soon as they got to civilisation.

The three immediate limitations that occur to me are:
- battery length
- recovery procedure
- sterile forensic atmosphere

However, IF devices are not being secured or processed in a sterile atmosphere, it is possible.

[Mark in CA]

Found this here: The world will only get weirder | Steve Coast (http://stevecoast.com/2015/03/27/the-world-will-only-get-weirder/)

The world will only get weirder

by Steve Coast on March 27, 2015

Another month, another terrible and bizarre aircraft incident.

As far as the media are reporting, Andreas Lubitz decided it would be a great idea to fly a fully functional A320 in to the side of a mountain and kill 150 people a few days ago.

Six months ago a fully functioning 777 was flown in to the sea wall at SFO.

A year ago a fully functioning 777 made some interesting maneuvers and disappeared in the South Indian Ocean with 239 people on board.

Aircraft are an interesting set of examples because they’re so well studied and corrected. We don’t spend time correcting hospital mistakes with nearly the speed and detail we do aircraft accidents, for example.

It used to be that airliners broke up in the sky because of small cracks in the window frames. So we fixed that. It used to be that aircraft crashed because of outward opening doors. So we fixed that. Aircraft used to fall out of the sky from urine corrosion, so we fixed that with encapsulated plastic lavatories. The list goes on and on. And we fixed them all.

So what are we left with?

As we find more rules to fix more things we are encountering tail events. We fixed all the main reasons aircraft crash a long time ago. Sometimes a long, long time ago. So, we are left with the less and less probable events.

We invented the checklist. That alone probably fixed 80% of fatalities in aircraft. We’ve been hammering away at the remaining 20% for 50 years or so by creating more and more rules.

We’ve reached the end of the useful life of that strategy and have hit severely diminishing returns. As illustration, we created rules to make sure people can’t get in to cockpits to kill the pilots and fly the plane in to buildings. That looked like a good rule. But, it’s created the downside that pilots can now lock out their colleagues and fly it in to a mountain instead.

It used to be that rules really helped. Checklists on average were extremely helpful and have saved possibly millions of lives. But with aircraft we’ve reached the point where rules may backfire, like locking cockpit doors. We don’t know how many people have been saved without locking doors since we can’t go back in time and run the experiment again. But we do know we’ve lost 150 people with them.

And so we add more rules, like requiring two people in the cockpit from now on. Who knows what the mental capacity is of the flight attendant that’s now allowed in there with one pilot, or what their motives are. At some point, if we wait long enough, a flight attendant is going to take over an airplane having only to incapacitate one, not two, pilots. And so we’ll add more rules about the type of flight attendant allowed in the cockpit and on and on.

There's more, and it's interesting, but not about aircraft.

[ensco]

I suspect a list of possible transportation "driver" murder/suicides, as opposed to just pilot murder/suicides, would be quite long ....

Ottawa bus-train crash kills 6 in commuting horror - Ottawa - CBC News (http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-bus-train-crash-kills-6-in-commuting-horror-1.1858868)

Thirty-five years after Britain's worst Tube crash one victim's son asks: Did a suicidal driver kill 42 innocent passengers? | Daily Mail Online (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240625/Thirty-years-Britains-worst-Tube-crash-victims-son-asks-Did-suicidal-driver-kill-42-innocent-passengers.html)

[jimjim1]

@ChissayLuke, Chissay en Touraine, France.

"To me, all that is relevant here, is the safety of the travelling public"

This is all very nice. However do you apply the same standard to other aspects of your life? I presume that you do not travel on the roads since on the roads of France 3250 people died in latest year for which figures are available. About 150 people have died in this latest crash which gets headlines all round the world but that is just over 2 weeks of French road deaths about which essentially no one cares[0].

It seems almost certain that tens of thousands of people die in France from medical errors every year, and in every other modern large country. Unlike the aviation industry there is no formal investigation of most fatal events in medicine[1].

In terms of total preventable deaths in France this is a minor event (not for those directly involved of course) from which lessons will be learned and if necessary changes made by the aviation industry. Many European airlines have already changed their practises.

Please get your comments (and your thinking) into a reasonable perspective.


[0] France is successfully reducing road deaths rapidly after a multi-year campaign but the present figure is still a higher rate than for example the UK. "The rate of fatalities has been falling gradually since 1972, a black year on France's roads when 18,000 people were killed."

[1] Here is an example from year the 2000 of how poorly the medical industry monitors the performance of medical personnel.

(I now notice that I have chosen perhaps an unfortunate example under the circumstances, however it is well known, documented publicly and makes my point regarding the monitoring of outcomes. Please do not read into it any further comparison with the recent events in France. No further comparison is intended by me. If I was being paid to write this I would probably look for another example.)

"The Shipman Inquiry concluded Shipman was probably responsible for about 250 deaths."[2]

A General Practitioner killed people over decades and no one in the profession noticed because no meaningful monitoring was done.

[2] Harold Shipman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Shipman)

[susier]

Mark in CA, that is indeed an interesting article.


As an upshot to what he discusses, may I suggest the following:


Rules and protocol and checklists are very effective against predictable things, (chemical reactions, metal fatigue, pressure differentials) but they are ineffective against unpredictable things (humans) ?

[west lakes]

Regarding the SD card.
It seems the only folk allowed into the area are French police & Fire Service personnel, do you really think any of those would release the card to the press?

Just as with a lot of other "evidence" that has apparently been passed to the media I call fake!

Strange really that the media is often seen as poorly reporting aviation matters and ignorant of the reality of aviation

UNTIL

An incident like this occurs and everything they say is seen as totally accurate and above board by some.

Interestingly the French police have made a statement

The French Gendarmerie is unaware of any video (memory card) recovered from the crash site as claimed by some French and German media.

Somehow I believe them!
From The Aviation Herald report update of today

[WillowRun 6-3]

The insight and information provided within the past few pages by papershuffler on chain of custody and proper handling (and thank you for providing them, pprshfflr) have provoked a question or two. Most all reasonable observers - and also all officials involved, we wish - seek to avoid the knee-jerk reaction. This is not a problem, though, where reform or addition to ICAO's regulatory system is concerned - ICAO's knee moves very, very gracefully, never jerkily.


Is it time to specify, in some form, whether a SARP or a lower-hierarchy official pronouncement, the scope of agreement which should be in place, and be publicly and officially known and disseminated, between the AAIB on the one hand, and the law enforcement community on the other? While France may have a somewhat different point of departure for this collaboration - between AAIB and the law enforcement officialdom - nonetheless, coordination still needs to happen, and does happen....but is there an advantage to be gained by placing the subject under the "uniformity" rubric by which ICAO operates and moves forward? Spell out how they should work together, in every member State. Plus:

Then, add in the need to assure proper handling of electronic media containing perhaps crucial evidence - and in the case of pax, clearly containing data files of utmost intrinsic value to families of accident victims - and does the question become one of need, of necessity to move toward uniformity? The pace of change in society at large brought about by electronic and social media is, if anything, increasing; the need to address this type of evidence, in the context of joint-authority enquiries, thus also is becoming more urgent (at least, more acute).

And then, add in the need to assure that the slime-balls who would purvey faked footage - if that is what has happened - have less room to move within the context of a coordinated AAIB-law enforcement action plan. The higher-profile the disaster, the more ambulance chasers will lie, cheat or steal their way to an upper hand in the lawsuit lottery games.

[Mac the Knife]

jimjim1 points out that "The Shipman Inquiry concluded Shipman was probably responsible for about 250 deaths." and further that "A General Practitioner killed people over decades and no one in the profession noticed because no meaningful monitoring was done."

Now I'm an old PPRuNer and I've been following this D-AIPX thread with some interest (as regular SLF).

There are interesting parallels between Shipman and 9/11 (both Black Swan events).

After Shipman British medicine was never the same again and after 9/11 air travel was never the same again.

British doctors are now the subject of such close & ongoing scrutiny and automatic suspicion (every doctor is a potential Shipman) that the profession has become quite unattractive. Add the proliferation of (usually baseless) lawsuits and complaints to the GMC and no sensible man or woman would take up medicine. My brother, after a spotless medical career and with many years to go has just retired early because he can't take the atmosphere and the crap any longer. The GMC now openly states that it's main job is to protect patients rather than regulate, licence and represent doctors.

We have moved from the era of ethics-driven medicine to the era of legally-driven medicine and from the era of ethics-driven ethics to the era of legal-driven ethics. The so-called safeguards are now making medicine less, rather than more safe. It is said that in the USA medical "mistakes" are the third leading cause of death - leaving aside the fact that many of these are not mistakes in the commonly understood meaning and that most of these take place in very old and ill patients - many of these are the result of legally-driven medicine with it's lack of holism and compassion.

9/11, and now D-AIPX will, I fear, drive air-travel in the same direction. Every pilot will now be regarded as a potential Lubitz and so ceaselessly scrutinised that even the slightest deviation from SOPS will be grounds for suspension and an enquiry, let alone a divorce, an affair or a bereavement.

One of my friend's daughter has just gained her full PPL and is now entering flight school for her ATPL.

Obviously she does not know what she is letting herself in for (and I'm so glad my son chose pure science over medicine).

[Chronus]

On 30th March 2015 the Eurpoean Commission published a fact sheet on security measures in civil airliners. Included in this fact sheet is the following.

What are the current rules on the minimum crew members required in the cockpit?

On 27 March 2015, EASA (the European Air Safety Agency) has issued a recommendation for airlines to observe the “four-eye-rule” in the cockpit; stipulating that in the case of the Captain or First Officer leaving the cockpit, a member of the crew should be present in the cockpit with the remaining pilot.

European safety regulations require that pilots shall remain at the aircraft controls unless absence is necessary for physiological or operational safety needs.

There is no European requirement that a member of the cabin crew must enter the cockpit in the event a pilot needs to take a short break for such needs. There is however a requirement that the cockpit door can be opened from the outside in case of emergency.

The question is therefore as to why the cockpit door could not be opened from the outside in this instance.

[PrivtPilotRadarTech]

Not neccessarily.

13,000ft is barometric altitude, but the GPWS uses the radio altimeter. There could be mountain peaks in that area which triggered it. I don't know that to be the case, just offering a possible explanation.


I looked it up and found a page of "a320 flash cards" which details the GPWS modes and alerts.

GPWS BASIC MODES
MODE 1: EXCESSIVE RATE OF DESCENT

Mode 1 has two boundaries. Penetration of the first boundary (2450 feet radio altitude) generates a repeated "SINK RATE" aural alert...

So a peak of 10550' would trigger the "Sink Rate" alert at 13000'.

[slicer]

Well said Mac. I speak as a recently retired NHS surgeon and you are spot on about the utterly disproportionate and corrosive effect Shipman has had on British medicine. Shipman was basically a murderer who happened to be a GP and therefore had the means and opportunity to carry out his crimes. In fact, he was a much respected family doctor, and would almost certainly have passed his compulsory revalidations with flying colours. I fear that the same repressive attitude may spread to the airline industry as a result of this tragedy, and the knee-jerk reactions of those itching to regulate your profession.

[PrivtPilotRadarTech]

fa2fi,
We thought that the CVR would be intrusive but everyone now accepts it as a great diagnostic and I don't recollect it repressing robust social comment on the flight deck.

Provided that the use of audio and video recordings is rigidly controlled ONLY to be used by accident investigators then I have no objection to either. Simply make it a criminal offense for the operator to intentionally view or listen.

I agree. The cause of the recent SpaceShipTwo breakup was immediately and unambiguously evident because they had video of the pilot's actions. CVR and FDR data would not have been conclusive.

[west lakes]

West Lakes, the French personnel are drawn from the population as a whole. From the same Aviation Herald story

On Mar 25th 2015 more than 300 policemen and 380 fire fighters departed Seyne-les-Alpes, the base for the search and recovery, to continue the recovery efforts, that were suspended during the night. Weather conditions are better than expected, no precipitation and less strong winds than forecast.

On Mar 26th 2015 first human remains were recovered from the crash site and airlifted to Seyne-les-Alpes, where relatives have been taken to too.

On Mar 27th 2015 soldiers of the French Army joined the recovery teams providing tracked vehicles. The efforts to recover the bodies of the victims resume after being suspended during the night.

On Mar 28th 2015 Recovery Services, while continuing to recover human remains, still focus on the search for the flight data recorder.

On Mar 29th 2015 the States Attorney of Marseille reported, that the human remains of 78 people have been identified using DNA testing. The Prosecutor said in response to media reports surfacing in Germany, that the first officer's remains have been identified, that those reports were false.

On Mar 31st 2015 Recovery Services reported that an access road to the crash site has been finished and opened, first heavy recovery machinery is on the way to the crash site.

On Apr 1st 2015 the French Gendarmerie reported that all human remains have been recovered from the crash site. Recovery personnel is now collecting personal belongings, the search for the flight data recorder is continuing. The French Gendarmerie is unaware of any video (memory card) recovered from the crash site as claimed by some French and German media.No mention of members of the public, don't forget there is a guarded exclusion zone around the site as mentioned on here

[Chronus]

Delta flight1651 of 01/02/2015, Minneapolis to LA. The Captain was locked out of the cockpit and the F/O landed the plane. Less than two months later we have another lock out, but with disasterous results. Did the incident of Flight 1651 not prompt the need to consider emergency access to cockpit.

[gmorton]

I think people need to understand that if you shoot some video footage on your Iphone and have iCloud storage and sharing, then that footage can be retrievable immediately in multiple ways , regardless of whether the phone itself is found or not, or regardless of what condition it's in.

We don't need to blame a shady member of the search teams or investigative crew as having 'stolen' a phone from the site of the crash, nor should we be imagining a shifty villager from Vernet selling a memory card to Paris Match.

It's quite possible the video images were accessed/recuperatd via a victims home or office computer. This recuperation may have occurred
a) by a spouse or family or colleague
b) by a shifty computer hacker who works for Paris Match who has penetrated into the iCloud account of a victim

The Police may be quite correct in saying that they have no knowledge of the images.

What is awful is that theses images have not been delivered to the investigative authorities, or so it seems.

[Lonewolf_50]

Did the incident of Flight 1651 not prompt the need to consider emergency access to cockpit. As has been pointed out previously, that opens another vulnerability, and also as has been pointed out, there is such an emergency access provision.
(Curious: was the issue resolved as to cause? It appears that the NTSB does not have a file on that, but I may have used the search function incorrectly on their site).

[Tiennetti]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Linerider
Not neccessarily.

13,000ft is barometric altitude, but the GPWS uses the radio altimeter. There could be mountain peaks in that area which triggered it. I don't know that to be the case, just offering a possible explanation.
I looked it up and found a page of "a320 flash cards" which details the GPWS modes and alerts.

GPWS BASIC MODES
MODE 1: EXCESSIVE RATE OF DESCENT

Mode 1 has two boundaries. Penetration of the first boundary (2450 feet radio altitude) generates a repeated "SINK RATE" aural alert...

So a peak of 10550' would trigger the "Sink Rate" alert at 13000'.

Ok, have you checked if there are such elevations? The answer is no, there aren't
Pull up 3 minutes in advance? (if you only had looked at the article...)

[Go2matt]

As it seems we have crew members killing as many people now as the terrorist have done, maybe it is time to re-think the door.


If you forget nearly 3000 during 911

[Lookleft]

After Shipman British medicine was never the same again and after 9/11 air travel was never the same again.

Very true MtK. Not only air travel but as you allude to the profession of airline pilot. Unless I go to work with a smile on my face I will be considered suspect. If someone wants to get back at a pilot all they have to do is put in a confidential report that the pilot was behaving strange. I still have a few years to go until I retire but thankfully I have more years behind me than in front of me.:O

[Rushed Approach]

In the USA, depressed pilots could continue to fly if their depression was treated by medication as of around 2010 (Don't know off the top of my head, when it became the case in Europe). The problem is, most depression now is treated by an SSRI, such as Prozac. As has been pointed out before in this forum, Prozac and drugs like it, occasionally cause people who may not otherwise take their own life or the lives of others, to do just those things (Not often, but often enough to be a public safety concern). I'm not thinking that depressed pilots shouldn't fly. In many cases of depression, one of the best treatments is to immerse yourself in your work, to get your mind off of of the depression or it's cause, whether it be piloting or playing football (after any needed time off).

It is too risky for a pilot to take Prozac or similar SSRI's. If depressed pilots must be medicated, they should take an amphetamine such as Dexedrine or Adderall, or an amphetamine analog, like Methylphenidate (Ritalin). These drugs may not help depression as much as Prozac and the like, but they don't have the danger to public safety side effect of suicide, while taking others with you.

A depressed pilot might not quite be "on his game". Crewmates and automation can make up for that, but a pilot on Prozac might be hell on wheels (or wings), while he flies the aeroplane into the mountainside.
Of course, the public may never know if Lubitz was on an SSRI, such as Prozac (aka: Fluctin, Fluoxetine HCL), but it seems likely he and many past mass murderers were on them.

I wonder if Jet Blue pilot, who went crazy on a flight and had to be restrained by passengers, was on an SSRI (Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor)?

Change the regulations. Prohibit the use of SSRIs for commercial pilots. Pilots and passengers are better off with an un-medicated depressed pilot than one on Prozac!

In the UK your General Practitioner decides what drugs you are prescribed. Your Aeromedical Examiner (AME), who is the CAA (and hence EASA) approved doctor who examines you is not allowed to prescribe drugs and hence simply responds to your admissions (or not if you choose to cover them up) of what conditions you have and what you have been prescribed. Hence as a pilot you get what your GP prescribes you, without any CAA/AME input. Since your average GP has no clue what drugs are compatible with flying, therein lies the problem.

[Ian W]

Isotope Toast asked:

"Do we know he flipped the switch from CVR data? "

There's no data on the CVR, just separate audio recordings from each pilot's headset microphone and from a general microphone in the instrument panel.

The operation of that guarded cockpit-door switch might not produce much sound at all, it may be unlikely to be audible at the co-pilot's headset microphone or at the instrument-panel microphone.

I've not read of the CVR recording including the sound of the door-open request or override audio-alerts. Either the investigators felt this was not sufficiently important to include in their briefing or perhaps the sound was inhibited by prior movement of the switch to the "lock" position.

The FDR records data including (I believe) some switch activation relating to flight controls. But, so far as I know from what I have read, it does not include the operation of the cockpit door lock/unlock switch. The FDR memory unit has not yet been found anyway.

It does look like the article you refer to (and quite a few others) is very poor quality as you say.

It is not what was on the CVR recording - it is what is NOT on the CVR recording. There are no buzzer sounds from entering the correct code nor the continual alarm from entering the emergency code. Therefore, as the captain was trying to get in with the assistance of the cabin crew one has to assume that the override switch had been activated muting both the buzzer and the alarm. As the period was 8 minutes and the override (apparently) has a 5 minute time out the override would have needed to be operated at least twice which falsifies hypotheses about an incapacitated first officer.

[hawkerjet]

i am curious about his training. He started with Lufthansa training in 2008, took a break in 2009, then started work for Germanwings in 2013. how long was his break away from training and how long is training when completed alll at once?
to me it seems like a long time between starting training in 2008 and 2013.
:confused:

[RYFQB]

As the period was 8 minutes and the override (apparently) has a 5 minute time out the override would have needed to be operated at least twice which falsifies hypotheses about an incapacitated first officer.
I thought it was the descent that lasted 8 minutes; do we know for how long the captain was at the door?

[oldoberon]

RYFQB

http://www.parismatch.com/Actu/International/Exclusive-The-final-moments-before-the-crash-736774

this link refers to the alleged video (article not video) which is accompanied by the timeline from BEA.

10.30 captain has left flight deck, lock is operated?

10.33 captain heard telling FO it was him trying to enter

10.40 right wing clips the mountain.

that is a minimum of 7 minutes, CEO GW confirmed their reset period is 5m (can be 5-20m).
Think it is fairly safe to assume he had tried the code 1st, didn't spend long in toilet again fairly safe to assume he recognised they were in descent.

[Smokie]

3 Minutes......really ?????

BS........... Go figure......

[737er]

Not really. Nor will be the reluctance some pilots might have to go on an inflight potty break now (re: passenger perception) and instead try to hold it. That in turn creates a cockpit distraction witn a net safety detriment of far more than trying to mind-read potentially nutty crewmembers.

[Pace]

Surely this is all about probability and risk factors? We all know the accident statistics! High on the list are CFIT and pilot error or system mismanagement.

I very much doubt that a pilot controlled crash hardly enters statistics for being a risk factor so would not have been considered until it happened.

Bird strikes and double flameouts probably ranked higher as a perceived risk factor.

Take the ditching into the Hudson? Thankfully the result was Ok and the pilot was hailed as a hero, but if not what would have been the public reaction had that plane come down into the City!

What could the authorities have done to prevent further double flameouts due to Bird strikes?

This is an exceptionally rare occurrence but it has happened so We have the two crew on the flight deck fix, probably more for public consumption, public confidence than anything like a real safety benefit.

Adding a low experience CC more access to the flight deck and at times when they are alone with one flight crew member is adding another low risk of giving access to a terrorist in the guise of CC with only one person to deal with and an ability to lock everyone else out.

The probability of that is "probably" equally low as an FO taking out an aircraft so you add an equal risk factor to remove another low risk factor?

That doesn't make sense unless you have already changed opinion to considering pilot suicide mass murder as a much higher risk factor than before which i Doubt it is. It will be public perception which will have changed not the risk factor.

My concern is a witch hunt with every pilot now being regarded as a potential mass murderer when really the best people to note his/her daily actions and moods should be the people he /she works with on a daily basis.

There could be real benefit in training colleagues to notice problems with another pilot and to be more forthcoming to that pilot and his superiors! But even there the most dangerous will be the ones who are good at hiding their emotions not the open book variety?

[Severe Clear]

@Lonewolf: "@SevereClear: I detect a bit of "filling in the blanks" in the breaking news story that you linked to. Thanks for the link anyway. If one ever needed an illustration of "if it bleeds it leads" in journalism, this one seems a textbook case."

Not just the video links @parismatch.com, but the text below them of supposed FD step-by-step...if not fully fabricated, it and the linked writings are surely subreption.

I hesitated posting the links, but there are data out there + or -. There is so much that disgusts.

The video and image libraries though are illustrating the enormity of the efforts needed in this recovery and investigation. Few if any ever know or see the number, skill sets, physicality and mental grit recovery and investigative teams attain, let alone in terrain of such extreme difficulties. French officials seem to me to be providing plenty of logical information and the recovery teams are professional not voluntary. Having been fortunate to trade stints at respective areas with French mountaineers/SAR/ski patrol, I learned from interaction that France has highly skilled mountaineers who are also police and a very different system than we deploy in the Rocky Mountains --that is why I agree with another of your points that it is unlikely anything would be purloined, equally because of professional integrity, site/scene protocol, checks and triple checks, and the severity of punishment if discovered. That said, of course anything will likely happen, given the need for immediate gratification of our present Internet Culture...real or made up.

[sharksandwich]

When you think of it, it was stupid devising a system whereby a captain could be denied access to his flight deck.
The one key person you want in charge in an emergency,doesnt have access to all of his aircraft.

[RYFQB]

oldoberon

Diolch; I had missed that, somehow! Add that the FR24 data shows actual descent began at 10:31 + captain shouting at 10:33 and impact at 10:40-10:41 per cvr, he must indeed have been at the door more than 7 minutes, perhaps more than 8.

[deefer dog]

It seems that in Germany one could take an EASA medical and fail it, without the repercussions of the failure being reported to the Aviation Authority (LBA)! Would anyone from Germany please advise if this is indeed the case.

I understand also that EASA had been looking into this potential breach of protocol, and "discussions" with te LBA were headed in the direction of the courts....all prior to the incident in question.

[Denti]

It seems that in Germany one could take an EASA medical and fail it, without the repercussions of the failure being reported to the Aviation Authority (LBA)! Would anyone from Germany please advise if this is indeed the case.

Not in my experience. Medical results and medical history will be transmitted online to the LBA. If one is denied a medical, the LBA does know about it the same minute. However, it takes around one or two weeks until the pilot gets a letter that tells him that he has to submit his license (and any prior issued licenses that are still valid) as well to the LBA and that he is not allowed to use the privileges of said licenses within the reach of the federal aviation law of germany. That is at least my personal experience, corrobated by the experienced of my colleagues. As i use one of the Lufthansa AMCs i would guess that it would be the same for most lufthansa pilots.

Anyway, it seems that that was not a factor here as the FO in question apparently held a valid medical and his next medical examination was due in june.

[svhar]

When you think of it, it was stupid devising a system whereby a captain could be denied access to his flight deck.The one key person you want in charge in an emergency,doesnt have access to all of his aircraft.

Totally agree.

[CloudB]

Lufthansa Flight Training switched from Ab-Initio ATPL to MPL in March of 2008, so he had an MPL, not a frozen ATPL. Need to ask an MPL trainee, how long that program really takes.

[CogSim]

That doesn't make sense unless you have already changed opinion to considering pilot suicide mass murder as a much higher risk factor than before which i Doubt it is. It will be public perception which will have changed not the risk factor.

Excellent post. Any sensible response to this event has to come as a self instituted change in the way we function not as some cursory change in SOP.

Having said that I have been thinking about the above quoted point. Can deliberate pilot action incidents (if that is what this is) be considered truly independent events (statistically speaking). Probably not, but even if they are not independent events, I agree that the probability might not go up much more.

(Cue statisticians on the forum)

[BOING]

When you think of it, it was stupid devising a system whereby a captain could be denied access to his flight deck.The one key person you want in charge in an emergency,doesnt have access to all of his aircraft.

The alleged reason for giving no crew member an absolute door lock override from the cabin side is because the code, card, magic wand, whatever, could be obtained under duress by an hijacker. We can question that logic but to the designers of the system it probably seemed eminently sensible.

I remember a briefing on use of the security door. We were told in no uncertain terms that the door must not be opened for any reason in the event of a hijacking, even if the hijackers were murdering passengers one-by-one to force the door to be opened. No heroics, no negotiations. Remember, the armoured door was never designed to save the lives of passengers or even to stop hijackers destroying the aircraft. The purpose of the door was purely to prevent hijackers accessing the cockpit and using the aircraft as a missile.

[AllAboutTheView]

The way I see it, the system needs to cater for the following:

1) Prevent unauthorised access to the flight deck
2) Give access to flight deck in emergency such as incapacitation of both pilots
3) Access to flight deck by person who SHOULD HAVE ACCESS - the pilots!

Point 1 and 2 are already catered for by the current system. Which leave us with point 3, highlighted by recent events. To overcome this, before the flight each member of the flight deck sets a personal code that will give them access to enter. A bit like setting the code on a safe in a hotel room.
Whereas the code that gives access to authorised cabin crew (emergency point 2) does not have the power to override the Manual lock (set by the flight crew -current functionality), the individual flight crew member code does.
This ensures that neither of the flight crew can 'lock' the other out of the cockpit whilst at the same time maintaining the current functionality.

I hope that makes some sense

[Airbubba]

Anyway, it seems that that was not a factor here as the FO in question apparently held a valid medical and his next medical examination was due in june.

And where I work several colleagues have a history of major depressive episodes lasting up to two years and they are somehow certified fit to fly. Others have a condition that it is claimed increases the chances of suicide nine fold and they are able to hold a first class medical.

[Gauges and Dials]

When reasoning about risk mitigation, it's important to keep in mind a few numbers:


How significant is the risk (likelihood of occurrence times how bad it is when it occurs)
How effective is any given mitigation strategy at reducing the risk?
How much does the mitigation strategy cost? Not only in raw dollars, but also in terms of other risks it introduces?


I would like to see a comparison of the number of commercial passengers killed, over the past 10 years, say, by suicidal/homicidal pilots versus the number killed over the same time period by, say, falling down the stairs and breaking their necks while boarding at non-jetway airports, or by being struck by vehicles in the passenger pick-up / drop-off area, or from allergic reactions to some food consumed on board aircraft.

it's entirely possible that, compared to other risks facing the travelling public, deadly action by insane cockpit crew is not actually very high on the list of things to worry about, and may not warrant complex or costly solutions that in turn introduce other risks.

[Toruk Macto]

If MH370 is one day proven as suicide and this one then industry has to start looking at it more closely . With FTL's getting tougher in many countries , T&C's being eroded daily . P2F becoming the norm then pilots minds will become a bigger factor going forward . A/C are being manufactured with pilots seats still so the medium term requires humans to be still up front .
So as stresses increase , all the usual suspects of not coping get pushed further away from being talked about . Alcohol , drugs and mental health still are only mentioned in whispers away from the CVR . Can we expect more of the same ?

[Denti]

When you think of it, it was stupid devising a system whereby a captain could be denied access to his flight deck.
The one key person you want in charge in an emergency,doesnt have access to all of his aircraft.

More of two persons, remember LAM 470 where the captain locked the FO out and killed all on board by crashing the plane?

Interestingly enough some high ranked security officials in germany are now talking about removing the door again as the safety case is not as easy and one dimensional as originally thought.

[mseyfang]

When reasoning about risk mitigation, it's important to keep in mind a few numbers:

<LI abp="1347">How significant is the risk (likelihood of occurrence times how bad it is when it occurs) <LI abp="1348">How effective is any given mitigation strategy at reducing the risk?
How much does the mitigation strategy cost? Not only in raw dollars, but also in terms of other risks it introduces?

I would like to see a comparison of the number of commercial passengers killed, over the past 10 years, say, by suicidal/homicidal pilots versus the number killed over the same time period by, say, falling down the stairs and breaking their necks while boarding at non-jetway airports, or by being struck by vehicles in the passenger pick-up / drop-off area, or from allergic reactions to some food consumed on board aircraft.

it's entirely possible that, compared to other risks facing the travelling public, deadly action by insane cockpit crew is not actually very high on the list of things to worry about, and may not warrant complex or costly solutions that in turn introduce other risks.


You should also throw into this calculation the most dangerous part of any air journey: the drive to the airport.

[nsmith]

@slicer

Well said Mac. I speak as a recently retired NHS surgeon and you are spot on about the utterly disproportionate and corrosive effect Shipman has had on British medicine. Shipman was basically a murderer who happened to be a GP and therefore had the means and opportunity to carry out his crimes. In fact, he was a much respected family doctor, and would almost certainly have passed his compulsory revalidations with flying colours. I fear that the same repressive attitude may spread to the airline industry as a result of this tragedy, and the knee-jerk reactions of those itching to regulate your profession.

The astonishing thing with these kinds of checks is that they seems to rarely be tested, when this is comparatively easy to do, and the results are so useful. I recall reading a story before 9/11 about a middle ranking TSA employee at SFO who decided it would be a good idea to test how well airport security was. As I recall they were concerned mostly for Lockerbie type bombs. So he started a set of well planned luggage tests that would evaluate not only SFO but several other hubs. The results were far worse than anyone expected, and so what did they do? They told the guy to stop the tests and never do anything like this ever again. It is all a little reminiscent of the dark humor of one of my instructors when I once asked how he would deal with a engine failure at night in the countryside. He replied that he would head for the biggest blackest area that was vaguely into wind and fly a few knots above the stall and when he got within 100 feet he said: "I would turn on the landing lights. If there was something really big in front like a house or a barn or something,... I'd turn them off again!"

[GXER]

Still reading the backlog but amazed at the lack of critical reasoning of the many who have argued that a two person cockpit rule is a knee jerk response and not guaranteed to prevent a repeat. Of course not guaranteed but consider this simple, obvious but (so far not stated) conclusion that can be made if a two person cockpit rule had been applied - at the moment the captain left the cockpit, the FO was in SOLE control of the aircraft. If a FA or any person had been substituted for the absent captain, the FO would NOT have had SOLE control and would have had to overpower the substitute by force or persuasion to prevent him/her opening the door to the returning captain.

[nsmith]

@Pace

Surely this is all about probability and risk factors? We all know the accident statistics! High on the list are CFIT and pilot error or system mismanagement.

I very much doubt that a pilot controlled crash hardly enters statistics for being a risk factor so would not have been considered until it happened.

This is something I have thought about a lot WRT to things like the Space Shuttle, but it seems just so hard to solve. I recall reading somewhere that when they designed the Shuttle they thought that it would have a 2% failure rate, and this proved to be pretty close. Notwithstanding, communicating the "success" of this design proved virtually impossible after the two disasters. If this problem cannot be solved it will only mean that the US will fall behind in space exploration because we can't stomach a very small number of astronauts dying (while of course at the same time ignoring the huge number of other deaths that matter far more to all of us personally). I guess that the basic problem is that homo-sapiens and statistics are fundamentally incompatible.

There could be real benefit in training colleagues to notice problems with another pilot and to be more forthcoming to that pilot and his superiors! But even there the most dangerous will be the ones who are good at hiding their emotions not the open book variety?

Is the problem here that 90% of the time the crew have never worked together before? ISTM that this whole thing just boils down to: who do you trust, and why?

[Tom Bangla]

GXER

With respect, I think that has been discussed at length, the conclusion being that the additional two FA eyes introduces other potential risks. The key issue to be resolved (and I don't know if it ever can be, satisfactorily) is how to weigh and balance the many risks.

[BOING]

Interestingly enough some high ranked security officials in germany are now talking about removing the door again as the safety case is not as easy and one dimensional as originally thought.

I can see some sense in this. Currently if hijackers gain access to the cockpit they can lock themselves safely inside until they destroy the aircraft. However, now that passengers realise that their death is almost certain if they take no action it is more likely that they will attack the hijackers en masse and the removal of the armoured cockpit door would facilitate this. Sheer numbers will overcome the hijackers - just hope there is a dead-heading pilot on board.

Pretty certainly a weak cockpit door could have helped in the recent situation but only because the aircraft was an Airbus with flight envelope protection. (Disclaimer, since I never flew the 'bus I do not know how effective the system is). Quite likely, on an aircraft without this protection the wayward pilot would simply have rolled the aircraft upside down and it would have been game over.

.

[DaveReidUK]

Still reading the backlog but amazed at the lack of critical reasoning of the many who have argued that a two person cockpit rule is a knee jerk response and not guaranteed to prevent a repeat.

The argument isn't that it won't prevent a repeat, but that the two-person rule may have other potential, unintended consequences.

There's nothing "simple" about it.

[ana1936]

How do we know that the right wing of the plane hit the mountain some time before the final crash? Where is this information coming from?

Is it from the "video"? How could we see that it is the right wing?

There does not seem to be any high mountains or jutting cliffs down the crash valley on the right hand side as you fly up it to the impact point. Is there a scrape somewhere on the ground?

[GXER]

Hi Dieseal8I am giving, I admit, a rather extreme example. But it does get to the basis of the issue.

So if my example is invalid, maybe you can give the most extreme scenario where the CC could be trained in when and how to intervene and countermand the actions of the (acting) aircraft Commander?
Reading the backlog so not sure if this is already answered. My answer is that CC is not there for that purpose so needs no training whatsoever. Simply there to open the door for returning crew.

[Denti]

Reading the backlog so not sure if this is already answered. My answer is that CC is not there for that purpose so needs no training whatsoever. Simply there to open the door for returning crew.

We didn't need them for that the last 13 years. So they have to be there for another reason.

[GXER]

The argument isn't that it won't prevent a repeat, but that the two-person rule may have other potential, unintended consequences.

There's nothing "simple" about it."Sole control" and "Not sole control" is indeed very simple. It is binary.

What are the unintended consequences of simply requiring a temporary FA/CC substitute for an absent captain (or FO)? Of course there is potential for intrusion every time the cockpit door is opened but that was going to happen anyway, so no change.

[vapilot2004]

VAPilot, you are on the right track. What is needed in This industry is what we had at America West - a long term disability program that allowed pilots with a medical issue to have the time off to get themselves taken care of without losing their place on the seniority list or suffering a total loss of income.

We had pilots with a wide variety of issues from substance abuse to heart conditions able to go out on medical leave at 60% of their income. Long term disability kicked in 3 months after the initial short term period. There was no sick leave used in the process, if you had a condition that kept you out longer than 3 months you were placed in the program. Some guys never did get their medical back, they were able to stay on disability until social security retirement age. It was an industry leading benefit, one we fought hard to retain. I know for a fact that guys that may have hid an issue were proactive in getting help becaiuse of this program. I worked on the Aeromedical committee for ALPA when we had that union on the property.

Unfortunately we have lost that benefit in the merger with American. I personally think that this is short sighted on the part of the present union, APA, and the company. Guys that don't have sick bank, which is about 40 percent of the combined pilot group, will not have the money coming in if they have a significant issue. That is disincentive to getting help. We should encourage proactive health fitness, not hinder it.

We self certify our fitness to fly every leg, it's an ACARS entry we make before each flight. The burden is on the pilot to be honest and truthful. The system cannot operate any other way, it is too burdensome to check every pilot every leg. And it would be stupid to do so. This is not a common problem. 99.9 % of us just do our jobs safely and quietly every day. We have a bigger threat from weather and fatigue than we do from mental instability.

All very interesting Cactus and I agree with your thinking. What a great outfit America West must have been. You and your group were incredibly wise to fight for pilot benefit packages and policies that were humane and sane - particularly in light of what's happened here. This is exactly the kind of progressive thinking that is needed today and I see it as the only sensible way forward.

If we're lucky, at the next board meetings of the US majors, there will be news from the boys in accounting of a cost-benefit study favoring such a plan. It may take some regulatory prodding to fully get there, but once they factor in the costs of what the Germanwings FO had (allegedly) incurred upon the parent, Lufthansa, there should be plenty of black ink to convince the board of the *cough* 'right way' forward.

It would be ironic if AMR Corp, now American Airlines Group, led the way domestically. I believe we all know which airline should be out in front in Europe on this.

[Pace]

ow significant is the risk (likelihood of occurrence times how bad it is when it occurs)
How effective is any given mitigation strategy at reducing the risk?
How much does the mitigation strategy cost? Not only in raw dollars, but also in terms of other risks it introduces?

There are basically two types of risk

Demonstrated Risk / This is where accidents or incidences are occurring and that safety hole needs to be plugged

Perceived Risk / where there is as yet or insignificant demonstrated risk but where the authorities feel there could be a threat.

Perceived risk was shown in the Volcanic ash eruption.No aircraft had ever been brought down by ash in the history of aviation although a few were close but huge chunks of airspace were closed with inaccurate ash flow charts

Bird strikes had demonstrated risk but large chunks of airspace were not closed in the migration season.

in this case there is an element of both demonstrated on the fact that this tragic crash has happened but also perceived as the general public in the same way they did in the ash drama need reassurance! In this case that a mad pilot isn't in the front of their aircraft alone free to do his worst

for me the biggest issue in this dreadful crash was the door that door system has now been shown to be a demonstrated risk but in the opposite way that it was intended and the the reason it was originally fitted that way! as with all demonstrated risk that risk needs to be reduced so no ability to lock a flight crew member out of the flight deck! how you do that ??

No one has mentioned how that poor Captain must have felt realising that he had been duped, what was going on and the fact that he could do nothing about it because a locked door stood between him and saving the aircraft and its passengers

[StuntPilot]

I do not understand the confusion about the door discussion.

Rationally, the situation is very simple: there is a high degree of (anti)symmetry between 911 and this case. It also does not make sense to look at death counts:in a Bayesian sense the posterior probabilities for this case are at least the same and probably worse. This guy could have flown into a sky scraper if he would have chosen to do so, just as many non-911 hijackers chose not to. One can even argue that a professional pilot will be far more effective at killing given that the person up front, pilot or hijacker, chooses to. The 911 event was peculiar in a sense that the hijackers actually were (partially trained) pilots with some (quite a bit actually) effectiveness in crashing the plane. Surely one of them at that time could, in principle, have made it into the cockpit professionally but with with evil intent.

Given this symmetry, the question then becomes one of anterior probability: what is the likelyhood of a hijacking vs the likelyhood of pilot mass murder, given that the latter may have an even worse outcome. This is measured purely on a 'number of events' basis. I think that the easy way out that many propose, stating that one is negligible with respect to the other, has no basis in reality. Therefore 'door mechanics' is an important part of this problem and the system does need modification.

The 'CC on FD' can help in certain cases but it also opens a whole new set of issues that should be properly evaluated before a good system can be designed.

The solution to this issue should be one of carefully weighing 'knowns' without introducing adverse 'unknowns'. A rush to judgement will turn out to be counterproductive.

[DIA74]

Hi Ana, where did the right wing impact rumour originate please? Has a heart attack or seizure been ruled out as possible explanation for the disaster? Seizures often include involuntary movements and extreme confusion.

[Go2matt]

Isn't there an argument that in this case, The FO commited suicide he didn't actually murder the PAX. His actions may have led to the death of 150 people but he would have disassociated himself from that.

After all he waited until the captain was out of the FD. He didn't grab the AXE and kill him personally.

[Pace]

sn't there an argument that in this case, The FO commited suicide he didn't actually murder the PAX. His actions may have led to the death of 150 people but he would have disassociated himself from that.

After all he waited until the captain was out of the FD. He didn't grab the AXE and kill him personally.

If the voice recordings are accurate and the girlfriend statements too this would appear to be a pre meditated murder, thought out and coldly planned awaiting the right time which would mean also thought out over the loss of life his actions would cause.
very different to an on the spur of the moment action by an individual flipping and not considering the outcome on others in his care

[kcockayne]

GXER

The decision to impose a "2 in the cockpit at all times" policy is, though understandable, a thoroughly "knee jerk" reaction by authorities etc. who "have to be seen doing something" - no matter that it only complicates the situation & does not, necessarily , do anything to increase cockpit security.
It is, for the reason that it does not guarantee anything effective to avoid or overcome the problem, & for the fact that it was hastily (& unthinkingly) set up," Kneejerk".
It is unthinking because 1) it introduces another person to the cockpit (who might, in fact, be the perpetrator of this kind of action), 2)that person may be physically unable to overcome the remaining pilot, 3) that person is totally unqualified to recognise a problem caused by the remaining pilot's actions 4) &, unable to take corrective action, 5) make matters worse, 6) far from your simple explanation of being able to open the door for the returning pilot- be totally incapable of doing even that.
Indeed, I should imagine that such a person's presence & influence would be limited to a very slight deterrent to a pilot with such intent.
What do you really expect a lady stewardess, or a weakly built steward, or a lady pilot to physically be able to do to stop a more powerful (& technically capable) pilot from doing what he is suicidally bent on doing !?
The only way a third person in the cockpit would be reliably capable of stopping such actions would be if HE was a type rated, physically superior, pilot ( & then preferably if there were 2 of them - one to overcome the "suicidal pilot" & the other to correct his actions & fly the a/c).
Otherwise, forget it !
These sort of problems need calm, careful, reflective & exhaustive examination & problem solving to overcome. The whole history of the reaction to this terrible disaster & the piecemeal release of information by the investigators have complicated the very investigation that is taking place. It may even have jeopardised an eventual objective outcome ! (By releasing facts & info. ehich should not be in the public domain.
Certainly, I prefer the DLH Chief Executive's more measured approach & reaction - even if he may have appeared a little insensitive at times !

[DespairingTraveller]

the ONLY reason (repeat ONLY) for the presence of a 'replacement' person during any brief absence by one of the two pilots would be to over-ride the authority of the pilot-in-command at the time regarding door operation.

Is that what all these folk intend? Making a member of cabin crew 'Captain' seems a strange, illogical solution.Not least because it requires that CC member to make a quick, accurate, on-the-fly diagnosis of the difference between a calm co-pilot intent on crashing the aircraft while the captain hammers on the door overcome by desperation (GermanWings, apparently) and a calm co-pilot intent on saving the aircraft while the captain hammers on the door overcome by delusion (JetBlue, as I understand).

How? Why would someone with those skills be CC, not printing money in Harley Street?

[Hotel Tango]

What if there had been a cabin crew in with Lubitz and he told her the captain was being weird and not to let him back in....

Interesting point! He then tells her/him that he's going to divert and commences a descent. By the time she/he realises what is really happening it's too late!

[jientho]

@BOING

We can question that logic but to the designers of the system it probably seemed eminently sensible.

Of course the assumption on which that logic was totally based, now shown to be incorrect, is that "hijackers" always start out outside the door. Obvious in retrospect (and not impossible to imagine prospectively) is that mental illness, post-hypnotic suggestion, the deception of a sleeper, and other such non-physical (mental) methods of incursion are impervious to a physical lockout.

That realization is also why the 2-person rule is at best a half-measure of address -- once a mental danger enters the cockpit by any means, all bets are off.

[Isotope Toast]

Unless we all get together, pilots, crew, unions, and passengers, our rights will be only a faint twinkle of the freedom they once held.

Now the German Interior Minister wants to require passports of all passengers flying in the Schengen Zone. Of course. Because this has absolutely nothing to do with the Germanwings flight. I'm sure if we put small cages over the seats and only allow people to move about when connected to a random stranger, the skies will be safe once again.

*Facepalm*



Nach Germanwings-Unglück - De Maizière erwägt Ausweispflicht bei Schengen-Flügen - Politik - Süddeutsche.de (http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/nach-germanwings-unglueck-de-maizire-erwaegt-ausweispflicht-auf-schengen-fluegen-1.2420925)

[helimutt]

Having read most of the posts on here over the last few days, I cant remember seeing anywhere an idea which, although another knee-jerk reaction, just may be useful in the future.

At the moment, in the UK for example, I can go to my GP and be deemed quite unwell and be signed off from work. Now, if I don't tell my employer, and have a valid, recent Class 1 medical, then I can continue to fly as long as I am able to do so (valid class 1 medical) until either I die, or i'm caught out somehow.
Now I may be able to pass the Class 1 medical because they arent necessarily looking for things which may not flag up on the Class 1. So, as professioanl pilots, why cant we have something akin to taxing a car in the UK. To tax your car you need to have valid insurance and a valid MOT (roadworthy condition report). Without them you cant get the road tax.
So, why not have a stipulation added. Say at a cost of approximately £20 per letter, whereby a professional pilot has to go to his GP and request a letter stating that for the previous 12 months he has had no visits to the doctors for what could be a set of issues ie mental/serious physical. This letter can be emailed by the gp, using the pilot ref number, to the CAA medical branch and entered onto the file of the pilot in question.
Then when going to have the Class 1 medical, (nowadays the AME has access to the CAA information) they can issue that Class 1 medical after checking the letter is all satisfactory and there have been no issues which may preclude you from being deemed fit enough to fly.
If it transpires that there may be something which needs further clarification, then the Class 1 could be witheld for say 14 days until the facts are found or if it warrants further investigation.


I know it isnt a fix for the issue if someone really wants to take out an airliner, but as a professional pilot, i'd quite happily sign up to this, I have nothing to hide, and it just adds another layer of assurance to the system at minimal cost.

[Pace]

Another poster saw no difference between this flight crew member and a terrorist
in many ways he is correct, both through their actions one a badly disturbed mind the other radical religious beliefs have carried out evil deeds with similar consequences.
The door designed and placed there to protect the flight crew from intrusion by a terrorist has worked in the opposite direction by allowing a flight crew (terrorist) to refuse entry to the Captain who could have saved this situation had it not been for the door.
There was probably little perceived threat that the terrorist would be within and the door systems were designed around the fact that the terrorist would be outside the flight deck in the cabin.
This act has highlighted a demonstrated threat and as with all demonstrated threat the authorities have to minimise that risk.
that demonstrated threat has shown that terrorism can and has worked both ways so the system has to be redesigned to take into account a threat from both directions and this is probably the biggest lesson to learn from this awful crash not so much the nature of the terrorist whether radical religious or disturbed flight crew. We are talking about the same thing! A terrorist on an aircraft.

[rideforever]

I was just remembering that the Captain of AirAsia 8501 had deactivated the flight computer before crashing, possible as a response to AF 447 where the interaction of pilot and computer made the aircraft difficult to comprehend.

Perhaps Lubitz is responding to MH 370 (theory of high altitude decompression), by putting the oxygen mask on after something happened up there. And then it all went wrong.

Is there confirmation that Lubitz is actively locking the door with the switch every time there is an entry code? Or is there no such confirmation?

With all the high visibility reporting and hypothesising of these events, perhaps pilots are trying to learn and respond differently.

[NigelOnDraft]

So, why not have a stipulation added. Say at a cost of approximately £20 per letter, whereby a professional pilot has to go to his GP and request a letter stating that for the previous 12 months he has had no visits to the doctors for what could be a set of issues ie mental/serious physical. This letter can be emailed by the gp, using the pilot ref number, to the CAA medical branch and entered onto the file of the pilot in question.But the pilot will just go private (as used to happen in, say, the military) for "concerns" he wishes to keep off the radar?

[Ian W]

I have been watching the hamster wheel for the last few pages, only Pace seems to have alluded to the one thing that really matters and that is 'Perception' by the SLF that pay the airline's operating costs including front and rear crew wages.

Whether the aviation industry likes it or not ( and "not" seems to be the flavor here) the traveling public is starting to mistrust the industry. It is unfair but TSA and security worldwide is lumped into 'the industry' too. Now they have seen that one of the skygods has feet of clay and has apparently killed a planeful of people around the 1st anniversary of MH370 which seems to be a similar event. They are scared by all this whether you think that is unreasonable or not and you can quote statistics and Bayesian priors at them as much as you like they will just become more scared.

Something else that is with that feeling of unease is a creeping loss of trust in the flight crew. Repeated arguments against video recording or streaming recording data (regardless of the merits of the arguments as this is perception) add to the loss of trust. This is the same illogical loss of trust that some people here are exhibiting against flight attendants in the cockpit who also make your coffee and bring you water which you happily drink.

The problem with trust is you cannot 'take someone's trust' they have to give trust to you. Once the industry loses the trust of the public it will be extremely difficult to get it back. So some of the positions taken here such as only 6 aircraft have crashed killing pax in the last few years because of pilot action this is a minute number compared to the number of flights - are unassailable logically but do not regain trust because the passengers are thinking about sitting in a seat knowing they are going to die in the next few seconds and being unable to do anything about it. They put this in the group of hazards that may be very low risk but which are totally unacceptable. As alluded to further up-thread, the GW event also means that had he wanted to he could have flown on and chosen a town to crash into - so the locked door actually allows another 9/11.

The point of this post is that glib - its the SLF/management/politicians/regulators not understanding or making knee jerk reactions and it's not a problem ... miss the point entirely. I think that this crash is going to have a big effect on the industry. So, it is essential that sensible decisions are made but the professionals will not be there to help that decision making process if they abstain from it because they don't realize how far reaching it could be and that they cannot stop that decision process happening that will affect everyone in aviation especially front and rear crew.

I think that Lubitz was right when he said his actions will change aviation. Think about perception and trust and be there to make sure the changes are sensible from that viewpoint too.

[rideforever]

one thing that really matters and that is 'Perception
It's not just an air travel thing, the internet has changed everything. Society goes from scandal to scandal. And there are many alternative views of events; for instance a cargo of highly flammable Lithium Batteries on MH 370.

Recently even mainstream media have been gently probing the flight computers of Airbus. It is important for Airbus to wrap up any crash investigations quickly before the media's interest snowballs.

[Denti]

Can we completly discount the benifit of the deterrent effect on an unstable mind of a second person in the cockpit?

No, we can't. In this singular case. The next case will be different.

So, it is essential that sensible decisions are made but the professionals will not be there to help that decision making process if they abstain from it because they don't realize how far reaching it could be and that they cannot stop that decision process happening that will affect everyone in aviation especially front and rear crew.

I do agree. And yes, of course the professionals will be in that process, or at least try to be heard. Interestingly enough the relevant minister in germany is already talking about removing that dreaded door altogether. That of course will never be possible in the US and probably the UK neither. As always, the decision process will take a lot longer than the limelight of the public will on it and there is a chance that cooler heads will prevail once the politicians and the press have something juicier to talk about.

[NigelOnDraft]

Can we completely discount the benefit of the deterrent effect on an unstable mind of a second person in the cockpit?I would say no - it cannot be completely discounted, but nor should it be over-emphasised. It is but one factor to add to the "mix" that a complete risk-assessment requires, and would need expert opinion.

I agree with Ian W that the ramifications of this will be felt and perception will play a part. The press are publishing some more balanced articles, including that "2 on Flt Deck" is not necessarily a good thing. Both the BEA, and now Germany, have announced "reviews" of the main factors.

What I am awaiting is the realisation that the basis for this Co-Pilot being on the aircraft was the regulator, not the airline ;) Eventually LH will get bored of being blamed, and state who is responsible for, and issued a certificate for, his medical "fitness".

[Pace]

So, why not have a stipulation added. Say at a cost of approximately £20 per letter, whereby a professional pilot has to go to his GP and request a letter stating that for the previous 12 months he has had no visits to the doctors for what could be a set of issues ie mental/serious physical. This letter can be emailed by the gp, using the pilot ref number, to the CAA medical branch and entered onto the file of the pilot in question.

Helimut

Do you not think that where a persons livelihood career could be at stake that making such moves would not drive these pilots away from the GP?
Surely such highlighting would create a situation where a pilot dealing with a divorce or financial problems will go through it on his/her own by being forced into alternative medicine, Hypnosis or other secret treatments so as to keep their GP records clean when the system should be encouraging the opposite a witch hunt against pilots using a broad brush is NOT the answer. We do not even know what specific mental issue the FO had which would allow him to premeditate a suicide and murder of [ 150 ] people? I would think that was unusual
I am not medically qualified but imagine you need to identify the personality trait that can commit mass murder,identify and target that specific condition and yes remove those people who can harm others from the pilot bank

[DaveReidUK]

There are lots and lots of possible outcomes other than the FO.

Decompression incapacitation (is a320 O2 generators in cabin, perhaps wreckage can establish if they had activated). Perhaps forgot to put mask on before initiating descent, planning to not open door till MSA or 10k as per SOP (if that is SOP) captain banking on door to come in might not be SOP to come in in a decomp. If more genuine footage does materialise then state of cabin can help asses if rubber jungle was down.
Medical incapacitation of FO
Door mechanism not working - why haven't they released CVR of door alert opening tone ?
Captain not knowing correct code for re-entry ?
Aircraft doing an uncommanded descent as per other recent A320 ?
Perhaps an electrical situation which reset the MCP modes and altitudes (I dont know what MCP default alt is on airbus when powered up)
A/P disconnect
Defect Situation that threw a/p out
Coffin corner
Window blow out
Another technical defect
Highly stressed FO due to a distraction, not hearing door re-entry (hearing goes first under stress)


Even though there are relatively few undisputed facts known so far, they are already sufficient to cast doubt on at least some, if not most, of those scenarios.

[McRotor96]

For all those putting up theoretical reasons not to make any changes to the "one person in the cockpit" situation, two facts:

1. All 6 of the most recent pilot killing / suicides took place while one person was alone in the cockpit.

2. In the same time period not a single pilot killing / suicide has taken place on a US airline where "one person in the cockpit" is not permitted at any time.

Adopting a policy that has clearly worked is a sensible, measured and appropriate response to this, the sixth mass pilot killing since 1994 and the third in three years.

[Tom Bangla]

@IanW

I think that this crash is going to have a big effect on the industry.

I wonder if it will. It will have, and already has had, a big effect on the psyche of SLF and crew alike. From a crew perspective, people will be thinking about those they have flown with in the past and those they do fly with now (I always had misgivings about X...., etc). And from a pax perspective, people will imagine themselves in the situation of those unfortunate GW passengers and think, there but for grace of God go I. As you say, it's all to do with perceptions.

The way news is consumed these days means that it won't be long before such fears are subsumed and softened by the next major story of relevance to its audience. And the severity of those perceptions - although they won't disappear entirely - will reduce and be filed, mentally and emotionally, with all the other flotsam and jetsam that litter the horizon of daily life. Which leaves a clear field for mature, considered examination of what, if any, changes can and should be made in response to the GW crash. This thread suggests that few would argue against no changes being made to SOP (with the possible exception of four eyes versus two in the FD), while the spotlight may ultimately turn its attention as much on the medical profession as on pilots.

Separately, regarding Lubitz's reported prediction that his actions will change aviation -- what changes might he have thought necessary, and what changes would he have envisaged or wanted?

[Seat 32F]

@Chronus

Delta flight1651 of 01/02/2015, Minneapolis to LA. The Captain was locked out of the cockpit and the F/O landed the plane. Less than two months later we have another lock out, but with disasterous results. Did the incident of Flight 1651 not prompt the need to consider emergency access to cockpit.

I'm confused. It's been stated that in the US there is a two-person in the cockpit rule already in place, in which case if this happened, it must be an ineffective policy, at least in this instance.

[Sublogic]

The safety record of the airline industry is indeed impressive. However, one should not get too carried away with it. The fact that once airborne, miles are quickly flown makes any statistics that counts fatalities versus distance traveled look very good. It seems to me more honest to compare numbers of "transport cases". Meaning that a trip to the supermarket by car counts the same as a non-stop intercontinental flight. These numbers are hard to find, but the ones I saw show that car and plane transport are about equal in safety. This means that it does not harm to work towards even safer air travel and not give up on that subject even when faced with "impossible" cases like this one.

[superq7]

BBC news second recorder found.

Germanwings crash: Second Alps flight recorder found - BBC News (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32159602)

[ensco]

From the BBC story:

"In a separate development, German prosecutors have revealed that Lubitz had researched suicide methods and cockpit door security."

Odds of any other explanation are vanishingly slim now (probably nonexistent).

[londonman]

Anybody looking at my computer's browsing history would show the same searches.

Searching 'cockpit door security'? Why would he need to do that as I'm sure they must cover it in Airbus 320 101 course.

[Isotope Toast]

"Searching 'cockpit door security'? Why would he need to do that as I'm sure they must cover it in Airbus 320 101 course."

That was my first thought exactly. Wouldn't he know more about it than most anything he could find on the internet?

[GHEVY]

As reported today, the German Justice department released information that Lubitz was searching for methods to commit suicide as well as cockpit door systems between the period of March 16th - 23rd. I'm not sure how much proof the doubters require.

[ThoddyEADS]

Yes, suicide is a possibility, but by no means the only possible cause of this tragedy.Yes. There are other possible causes in such a case. But not in this case. The blackbox 2 has been recovered. Then you will learn:

Denial -> you are still here
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance

Most of us have analyzed all data released and have accepted the hard and cold truth: suicide. And it will change the industry. And that is what Lubitz has told to his girlfriend.

[seafire6b]

Delta flight1651 of 01/02/2015, Minneapolis to LA. The Captain was locked out of the cockpit and the F/O landed the plane. Less than two months later we have another lock out, but with disasterous results. Did the incident of Flight 1651 not prompt the need to consider emergency access to cockpit.

Therefore in view of the pre-existing USA "always minimum two crew per cockpit" rule, in the above case was it actually the FO plus an accompanying CC who became locked in the cockpit during flight?

[BOING]

Frankly I doubt if this will cause more than a tiny blip in airline travel bookings.
The public is desperate to travel for various reasons and has soon learned to accept all sorts of mechanical and training incidents as the cost of convenience.

Did people stop flying in 747s when cargo doors blew off, did people stop flying in DC10s after a #2 motor broke up disabling all primary flying controls, have people stopped flying with Malaysian after two major losses? Did people stop flying after 9/11?

[DaveReidUK]

Delta flight1651 of 01/02/2015, Minneapolis to LA. The Captain was locked out of the cockpit and the F/O landed the plane. Less than two months later we have another lock out, but with disasterous results. Did the incident of Flight 1651 not prompt the need to consider emergency access to cockpit.Therefore in view of the pre-existing USA "always minimum two crew per cockpit" rule, in the above case was it actually the FO plus an accompanying CC who became locked in the cockpit during flight?

Reportedly, yes.

[DIA74]

It will be interesting to hear, eventually, what the FDR reveals. I keep thinking, Lubitz operated into BCN that morning. It seems his Capt saw no reason to be concerned by his mental state or actions on that sector, or on the turnround. Initial phases of the return leg also appear to have been routine. They had been working together several hours that day. If he had had any doubts as to Lubitz's mental state,or ability to operate, he surely would not have handed him control and left him alone and unsupervised on the FD.

[xtp]

Maybe uncertainty and speculation will reduce now they have found the FDR.

Germanwings crash: Co-pilot Lubitz 'researched suicide' - BBC News (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32159602)

[ACMS]

There is a very good reason why the crew inside the cockpit can override the emergency code, the event someone under duress is using it.

So, how do you stop one of the cockpit crew using this "special code" under duress??

Can't can you.

The cockpit needs to be kept safe, end of story.

[peekay4]

despegue:
you want facts?

Here is one: IT IS BLOODY IMPOSSIBLE to hear breathing on a CVR unless oxygen masks are worn! Any mention aboutnhearing breating on the cvr is pure fantasy unless mr. Lubitz was wearing his mask. ( and if he was wearing it, why?!)
On modern CVRs, pilot headset microphones are HOT microphones -- they are always on (whether the PTT button is pressed or not) and are always recorded on the CVR.

Breathing can be heard on these hot channels.

On these CVRs, four channels are assigned:

Channel 1: Captain HOT microphone
Channel 2: FO HOT microphone
Channel 3. Cockpit Area Microphone (CAM)
Channel 4: Public Address

Per regulations, large turbine aircraft installed after October 1991 must use hot microphones. CVRs on older aircraft must be retrofitted to comply with the new requirements by April, 2012.

[Me Myself]

" What I am awaiting is the realisation that the basis for this Co-Pilot being on the aircraft was the regulator, not the airline ;) Eventually LH will get bored of being blamed, and state who is responsible for, and issued a certificate for, his medical "fitness".


Who did employ him in the first place after a burn out during initial training ? Abinitio pilot training isn't exactly Navy Seal training and to experience a severe depressive syndrom during that time at age 22/24 isn't very promising for the future. The guy should have been sent packing. Lufthansa isn't a charity, nor is any major airline.
So, maybe the German authorities gave him a medical, but LH decided to employ him and I am sorry......but I see grounds for loss of trust, medical or not.
This job is demanding enough as it is with life throwing its load of divorces, messed up kids and God kows what....to allow someone with a mental problem at such a young age to be employed by an airline.


Everyone seems to forget that the threat is outside the cockpit, not inside for crying out loud !!
What good does it make to have a cabin crew who only gets assed every couple of years, with a big chunk of that demographic toeing he sanity line, be alone with the remaining pilot, the very one everybody wants to have his crack examined at every angle ??

[Gauges and Dials]

Denial -> you are still here
Anger
Bargaining
Depression
Acceptance


Alternatively, some of us are at, "We don't have any real facts yet; we don't even know if the leaked CVR transcripts are real or not."

Most of us have analyzed all data released
Bear in mind that newspaper accounts of leaked CVR transcripts, reports of cell phone flash cards with audio recordings having been found, etc. are not necessarily valid.

[IBMJunkman]

All this talk of psychological testing and number of possible victims had me thinking. I had a co-worker who literally had his finger on the button. He was a member of a Missile Combat Crew in the 70s. I figured someone with the power to kill millions would have to have a bunch of psychological testing. Granted, he could not physically do it alone but with the right personality the other crew member might be convinced. I put the question to him. He said he does not recall any such testing. He needed a top secret clearance and some kind of nuclear rating. But no psychological testing.

So, which pays off more? Testing or 2 person crews? Or a mix?

[NigelOnDraft]

Who did employ him in the first place after a burn out during initial training ? Abinitio pilot training isn't exactly Navy Seal training and to experience a severe depressive syndrom during that time at age 22/24 isn't very promising for the future. The guy should have been sent packing. Lufthansa isn't a charity, nor is any major airline.
So, maybe the German authorities gave him a medical, but LH decided to employ him and I am sorry......but I see grounds for loss of trust, medical or not.
This job is demanding enough as it is with life throwing its load of divorces, messed up kids and God kows what....to allow someone with a mental problem at such a young age to be employed by an airline.
As an employment prospect, I might agree.

With regards to safety & medically I do not - you are either fit, or unfit, and that is determined by whether or not you hold a medical. I know of many colleagues in my airline who have had "events" in their past - personal, medical, mental, physical - some prior joining, some after. I am sure all airlines are the same - pilots are human after all ;)

[RatherBeFlying]

The aircraft smashed into the mountain at 435mph, exploding instantly and scattering aircraft and human debris over at least two hectares of precipitous rock.

Since Wednesday, the day after flight 4U9525 crashed into the southern Alps, aerial pictures have shown gendarmes picking through what looked like small pieces of litter.

The French described the painstaking task as the “travail de fourmi”, literally the work of an ant, suggesting patience and perseverance.

It was difficult to use ordinary words to describe their grim findings, words that would not cause further distress to already grief-stricken families.

Touron admitted that even for those used to dealing with death, the search had been emotionally charged. “When you have a body to examine, you know what you’re dealing with, but you become technical and get on with it. But the effect is cumulative and exhausting,” he said.

“We’ve had some people join us who are not used to working with body parts and it’s been difficult for them. We have a team of psychologists on hand, and we also make sure we all eat together and speak about what has shocked us.”

Germanwings crash: ?the overriding feeling is one of injustice,? says officer with grim task of retrieving the dead | World news | The Guardian (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/28/germanwings-rescue-worker-interview-recovery-49525)

Thank you Colonel Touron and all those with you.

[Pace]

As an employment prospect, I might agree.

With regards to safety & medically I do not - you are either fit, or unfit, and that is determined by whether or not you hold a medical. I know of many colleagues in my airline who have had "events" in their past - personal, medical, mental, physical - some prior joining, some after. I am sure all airlines are the same - pilots are human after all

Nigel I agree 100% with you but would further add that we do not know if what has been published so far if correct answers the question of what exact mental condition leads to someone planning a suicide but also planning to leave their name in history by carrying out an awful murder of 150 people?

By all means identify that specific mental illness and if you can identify people with the trait to wipe out a school yard of kids with a gun or down an aircraft with 150 innocent people on board then do so as they have no place in aviation.

But not a Witch hunt on responsible caring people who have gone through a life event! We still do not have a diagnosis as to what was wrong with this guy that he can do such an evil act only a broad brush ?

Touron added: “The overriding feeling among the teams is of injustice; that these people who didn’t deserve to die were killed intentionally seems so unjust. We cannot do anything for them, so we are making a very big effort for their families.”

[flyingchanges]

This job is demanding enough as it is with life throwing its load of divorces, messed up kids and God kows what....to allow someone with a mental problem at such a young age to be employed by an airline.

Not to mention bankruptcies, contracts, stagnation, base closures, lost pensions, strikes, crappy schedules, circadian disruption, crappy hotels, reserve, on and on...

[last747fe]

In 39. Years as a flight engineer before ,CRM numerous times found myself being the third man out that provided necessary insight to defuse a hostel situation between Capt & Fo

[Kbboca]

The Assoc. Press is reporting today that body parts from all 150 passengers & crew have been found

Plane crash co-pilot eyed suicide methods, cockpit security | Miami Herald Miami Herald (http://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article17190416.html)
PARIS French investigators have identified body parts from all 150 people aboard the Germanwings flight that crashed more than a week ago, a prosecutor said Thursday.
Investigators have found and studied 2,854 body parts, Marseille Prosecutor Brice Robin said.
But he said it will still take a long time for investigators to match the body parts with DNA samples from families of the victims.

I hope there will be enough tissue from the remains of the co-pilot to do a thorough toxocology analysis to determine what meds he may have been taking.

Also of interest, the same article notes that 40 cell phones have been found - most "very very damaged." I can only pray that incredible care will be exercised with these and that there will not be further (?) release of the passengers' videos to the media. I can't imagine what the families must be facing and feeling given what has already been released (assuming the video purportedly viewed by Paris Match & Bild is real.)

[TheInquisitor]

IT IS BLOODY IMPOSSIBLE to hear breathing on a CVR unless oxygen masks are worn! Any mention aboutnhearing breating on the cvr is pure fantasy

I would like to know how many CVRs this poster, and others making similar claims, have actually analysed?

With the tools available to investigators, an enormous amount of information can be gleaned from a CVR audio recording alone.

Standing by for the continuation of the deniers after FDR is analysed... my guess is it will reveal little, if any, new information...

[peekay4]

Answer. If one pilot only is left in cockpit he/she required to put on oxygen mask!
That is true in the FAA world (at or above FL250), but not necessarily true in Europe / other parts of the world.

[Gauges and Dials]

The cockpit needs to be kept safe, end of story.

Not really 'end of story' at all.



Bad guys need to be kept out of the cockpit, no matter what.
Good guys need to be able to get (back) into the cockpit, no matter what.

Both good and valid principles. But they can't both be true at the same time.

[Wader2]

Ian I thoroughly agree that seeds of public mistrust have been planted, which is why I mentioned the 'mercurial potential of public

I warrant that a huge proportion of the travelling public have no awareness of the other suicide events, have probably forgotten MH370 or the shoot down. In a few weeks pragmatism will set in and this too will sink on to oblivion.

[Denti]

We know that there's only a 5% success rate for candidates at initial application stage.
Do we have metrics for cuts once traing has started and does LFT management have such metrics anchored in the agreed targets for their performance-based bonuses, possibly triggering our old friend, the Law of Unintended Consequences?

Lufthansa states that only around 2% of those that pass the whole selection process fail during flight training and have to be let go. Those figures seem to be consistent for the last 30 or 40 years.

I have no idea about any bonuses, it might be tied into the management of lufthansa flight training, but i guess, as the flight school is a rather small part of the whole LFT company, that economical performance figures are rather more important there.

I warrant that a huge proportion of the travelling public have no awareness of the other suicide events, have probably forgotten MH370 or the shoot down. In a few weeks pragmatism will set in and this too will sink on to oblivion.

At least true in germany, or rather those parts of the media i peruse (no, i don't "read" Bild). It is seen as singular event, even if, on the side, one or two of the other events are mentioned.

[Lonewolf_50]

And it will change the industry. And that is what Lubitz has told to his girlfriend.
Does that mean "the terrorist has won" or that the industry was in some way going so wrong that it needed something extreme to induce change? (Please don't shoot me for the question. Some of what I've read on PPRuNe and discussed in person with friends on the pilot side of the industry indicate some cultural issues that are of concern).

[G0ULI]

To all the deniers out there who express doubts as to what may or may not have been picked up by the CVR, it is possible to build a small kit capable of detecting a human heart beat at 25 metres using just easily available consumer grade parts and a couple of cheap electret microphones the size of a pea.

If a cheap consumer microphone element costing less than a pound and mounted on an open circuit board can perform this well, how much better will a commercial grade microphone insert work?

Using multiple speakers placed where the original recording microphones were located, a soundscape can be recreated allowing precise estimates to be made of the placement of all sounds recorded.

The only limitation is the dynamic range available in the recording, which limits the amount of digital filtering and processing that can be reasonably applied.

It is perfectly possible to identify and place a soft key click to a given area in the soundscape, especially if background noise has been heavily filtered. Breathing sounds are a cinch. Given sufficient gain, the brush of fingertips against a control surface can be identified and located to a given point in space.

Any audiophile with a high end system can easily demonstrate how individual instruments playing in an orchestral piece can be identified and placed in space within playback of a good quality stereo or quadraphonic recording.

Microphones tend to exhibit a linear response over a wide range of frequencies and recordings have to be adjusted to match the logarithmic response of the human ear to sound realistic. Digital filtering and boosting specific frequencies in a recording enable sounds that are normally indiscernable to a human ear to be easily identified.

[skyhighfallguy]

GOULI , to add to your substantial knowledge, I believe the copilot's boom mic would be tied into the CVR. How close do you need to get to get breathing?

[no-hoper]

What the microphones are recording...


Post #2985 was nearly correct,but refering to the CAA rules.


Page 16 and 17 showing clearly the difference FAA/CAA;


ACARS ARCHITECTURE - Description and Operation - System Description_°Ù¶ÈÎÄ¿â (http://wenku.baidu.com/view/746bb55b77232f60ddcca109.html)

[G0ULI]

skyhighfallguy

It would be possible to identify how many people were in the cockpit just from the sounds of breathing picked up by the area mic.

Breathing sounds can be picked up 50 metres away with the simple kit I described that can pick up heart beats at 25 metres.

This kit is used for tracking wildlife, just in case anyone thinks I am doing really weird stuff in the wild!

[Vinnie Boombatz]

@IBMJunkman, 2 Apr 2015 at 09:17:

A good deal of what used to be human operations has been automated, but the two man and two officer rules did work for a number of years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-man_rule

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permissive_Action_Link

Like electronic countermeasures and electronic counter-countermeasures and their extensions, or cryptography and code-breaking, you never design an infallible system. You just keep working at it.

And as so many commenters have noted, knee-jerk reactions aren't the most productive method.

[peekay4]

no-hoper:
What the microphones are recording...

Post #2985 was nearly correct,but refering to the CAA rules.

Page 16 and 17 showing clearly the difference FAA/CAA;

ACARS ARCHITECTURE - Description and Operation - System Description_°Ù¶ÈÎÄ¿â

That looks to be an old document. Current FAA regs also require hot mics for the flight crew microphones.

[TheInquisitor]

The Inquisator/EPPO

I think fully automated aircraft are technically within our reach. I think they would face two major obstacles. One, development and implementation cost, and two public acceptance.

I must respectfully disagree with you on one point - and agree with you on another.

We are not even remotely close to technically replicating what a human pilot can bring to the game. There are those within my industry that would agree with you - but they, by and large, are the ones who work behind desks & computers and rely on numbers, theory, postulation and the 'art of the possible' - and almost to a man, have no actual operational experience of "Zero POB". Those of us who do know how it works in the real world, know the practical limitations of such things, as we have dealt with them in real life day-to-day.

Where we are in agreement is on cost. To design, build, test, certify and put into service just a remotely piloted airliner (not 'autonomous', which is technically well beyond our reach, and not even being discussed in regulatory circles) will be EXPONENTIALLY more costly than a traditional, manned, 2-pilot Flight Deck.

And that's before you even take into account the running costs of such things, which will require everything a manned airliner currently has, and IN ADDITON - reliable, assured, certified, broadband datalinks, and fully qualified and competent HUMAN pilots sitting in a GCS on the ground somewhere. The costs of the datalinks alone are eye-watering.

When a certain loudmouthed airline CEO gets around to doing his homework and sums (as the rest will eventually do) they will realise that the unmanned option for passenger transport simply isn't:

A) Technically possible at present, nor will it ever likely be; AND,

B) Exponentially more expensive, and therefore not commercially viable.

[nsmith]

Lufthansa states that only around 2% of those that pass the whole selection process fail during flight training and have to be let go. Those figures seem to be consistent for the last 30 or 40 years.

There is something about that statistic I really do not like. It might tell us how good the selection filter is, but it might also be telling us how doggedly they hold to their initial, possibly incorrect, assessments. That nothing has changed over the last 30-40 years I also find quite troubling.

[WingNut60]

Gouli, I think the disbelief probably originates from people thinking that because they can not hear the breathing through the headphones that the mic is not picking it up.

Two very different concepts.

A little bit of filtering and amplification would surely give you the breathing.

[klintE]

The cause of this crash was the inability of the Captain to enter the flight deck and to recover a situation caused by a very mentally sick FO its as simple as that!! Disagree. Remember crash of EgytpAir flight 990? Cockpit door was unlocked, suicidal co-pilot started tragic dive and when captain get back to the flight deck wasn't able to stop his actions. Door is not the key. It was just a factor. The real cause was (most probably) deliberate action from FO. Planned and cold blood (should say steady breath) executed.

And mental condition is a separate case. I really doubt he could be as sick as some delusional, psychotic person who see things and hear things. These types of diseases are very easy recognizable, visible to environment.
More likely he was an APD (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisocial_personality_disorder). And depression fueled by personal and professional problems was a trigger.

[CodyBlade]

A little bit of filtering and amplification would surely give you the breathing.

Correct and when analyzing sound a spectrum analyzer give a 'visual picture' of frequencies of interest.

Example:

Cockpit background noise will have it's own frequency plot.
Aural alarms will have it's own frequency plot.
Electrical seat movement will have it's own frequency plot.
Someone banging cockpit will have own plot.
Breathing thru Full face mask will have it's own frequency plot.

A spectrum analyzer can differentiate all these.

[ExSp33db1rd]

That nothing has changed over the last 30-40 years I also find quite troubling. Why, I can't recall us having the problem 40 years ago, If It Weren't Broke Then, Don't Fix It Now, leave what was working well alone ? One Swallow Does Not Make A Summer.

When was the first recorded incident of a pilot trying to commit suicide with a shed load of innocent passengers on board ? I have a vague recollection of a JAL DC-8 landing short, (or nearly landing short ?) at the old Haneda Airport?
( I know, I could Giggle it but Life's too short and I'm sure someone will do it !)

Maybe the first pilot who would have been accused of attempting suicide with an aeroplane as an accessory was Lindbergh ? I doubt that he would pass any of today's Risk Assessment modules now being forced upon the flying community.

I was once asked if the fact that I had responsibility for 300-400 lives weighed heavily on me ? I replied not, what weighed most heavily on my mind was my own survival, I flew the bit of the aeroplane that I could see in front of me, the rest just followed ! I flew the freighter aircraft with as much professionalism and responsibility as the passenger models. I guess that's where the term SLF comes from ?

[Denti]

IF you are hired by Germanwings, can you move to regular Lufthansa or not?

Yes. You can move to lufthansa mainline or lufthansa cargo if there are openings and the initial fleet freeze is over.

IF you just quit, is there still a requirement to repay the mortgage on the flight training?

Probably, but i have to say i don't know really, it is not a case that is usually considered.

There is something about that statistic I really do not like. It might tell us how good the selection filter is, but it might also be telling us how doggedly they hold to their initial, possibly incorrect, assessments

During my time there they had a formalized procedure how to deal with cadets that didn't show the required performance. Pretty similar to what most airlines do with normal pilots that flunk their simulator or line checks. Even for us non-Lufthansa cadets that paid for their own training it wasn't different and they had no problems at all to to let anyone go if his performance wasn't good enough, even if it meant a loss of revenue for them.

[Sawbones62]

flynerd:

Dont let the scorched appearance fool you - the FDR is tough, I got to see them being built at the L3 factory in Sarasota, the steel "pot" the memory chips live in is well insulated and built to be cooked - rated as "50,000 BTU/sq. ft./hr. for 60 min. at 1100° C; 10 hrs. at 260° C"...so I expect it will be okay.

[toffeez]

The Marseille prosecutor said yesterday that the condition of the FDR leaves open a "possibility" that the data is usable. It is now in the hands of the BEA for analysis.

[Wader2]

Flynerd the FDR, number of phones recovered, bodies of all individuals on identified, all discussed here hours ago.

[nsmith]

@ExSp33db1rd

Quote:
That nothing has changed over the last 30-40 years I also find quite troubling.
Why, I can't recall us having the problem 40 years ago, If It Weren't Broke Then, Don't Fix It Now, leave what was working well alone ? One Swallow Does Not Make A Summer.

When was the first recorded incident of a pilot trying to commit suicide with a shed load of innocent passengers on board ? I have a vague recollection of a JAL DC-8 landing short, (or nearly landing short ?) at the old Haneda Airport?
( I know, I could Giggle it but Life's too short and I'm sure someone will do it !)

Maybe the first pilot who would have been accused of attempting suicide with an aeroplane as an accessory was Lindbergh ? I doubt that he would pass any of today's Risk Assessment modules now being forced upon the flying community.

I was once asked if the fact that I had responsibility for 300-400 lives weighed heavily on me ? I replied not, what weighed most heavily on my mind was my own survival, I flew the bit of the aeroplane that I could see in front of me, the rest just followed ! I flew the freighter aircraft with as much professionalism and responsibility as the passenger models. I guess that's where the term SLF comes from ?

I feel that I must have missed something here, but nothing about my comment had anything to do with suicide. The only point I wanted to make was that when someone claims that they have an entry filter for flight training that is so good that it only results in a subsequent 2% drop out, the reason for this may not be as benign as it sounds. And when I hear that over 30-40 years this never varied, it only amplifies my suspicion that this statistic may be misleading.

[GXER]

@kcockayne

The decision to impose a "2 in the cockpit at all times" policy is, though understandable, a thoroughly "knee jerk" reaction by authorities etc. who "have to be seen doing something" - no matter that it only complicates the situation & does not, necessarily , do anything to increase cockpit security.
It is, for the reason that it does not guarantee anything effective to avoid or overcome the problem, & for the fact that it was hastily (& unthinkingly) set up," Kneejerk".
It is unthinking because 1) it introduces another person to the cockpit (who might, in fact, be the perpetrator of this kind of action), 2)that person may be physically unable to overcome the remaining pilot, 3) that person is totally unqualified to recognise a problem caused by the remaining pilot's actions 4) &, unable to take corrective action, 5) make matters worse, 6) far from your simple explanation of being able to open the door for the returning pilot- be totally incapable of doing even that.
Indeed, I should imagine that such a person's presence & influence would be limited to a very slight deterrent to a pilot with such intent.
What do you really expect a lady stewardess, or a weakly built steward, or a lady pilot to physically be able to do to stop a more powerful (& technically capable) pilot from doing what he is suicidally bent on doing !?
The only way a third person in the cockpit would be reliably capable of stopping such actions would be if HE was a type rated, physically superior, pilot ( & then preferably if there were 2 of them - one to overcome the "suicidal pilot" & the other to correct his actions & fly the a/c).
Otherwise, forget it !
These sort of problems need calm, careful, reflective & exhaustive examination & problem solving to overcome. The whole history of the reaction to this terrible disaster & the piecemeal release of information by the investigators have complicated the very investigation that is taking place. It may even have jeopardised an eventual objective outcome ! (By releasing facts & info. ehich should not be in the public domain.
Certainly, I prefer the DLH Chief Executive's more measured approach & reaction - even if he may have appeared a little insensitive at times !
I appreciate the time you have taken to respond but I disagree with nearly all your objections. The central fact is that implementation of the "two persons" principle makes it far more difficult, by orders of magnitude, for a Lubitz inclined pilot to repeat that specific method of self-destruction. Dealing with your specific objections:

1. CC are given access to the FD anyway to deliver refreshments so the risk of one with evil intent is not much changed whether there to act as door opener or to deliver a cup of coffee.

2. Physically limited possibly but that also applies to captain v FO or vice versa, so no change there.

3. In any event, as I understand the sole pilot is supposed to be always at the controls and strapped in when the other has left FD. The CC only needs to be standing at the door ready to allow access and can call for assistance immediately if the remaining pilot makes any move to leave the controls.

4. I would agree that CC will often not be qualified to judge the remaining pilot's actions but that's not part of the requirement. The job is simply to guard the door and re-open it to the absent pilot.

5. How can CC standing at the door make matters worse?

6. As I understand, turning the handle from the inside over-rides any other lock so the CC at the door will ALWAYS be able to open the door.

Not one of your objection stands up to scrutiny. Moreover, if it is not an improvement, why was the "two persons" rule implemented by some regulators and some carriers even before last week. The answer is simple - it provides another layer of protection; one that quite probably would have prevented Lubitz from doing what he did, or at least not as easily.

[Pace]

1. CC are given access to the FD anyway to deliver refreshments so the risk of one with evil intent is not much changed whether there to act as door opener or to deliver a cup of coffee.

And 1000s of FOs have access to the cockpit too every day and that risk had not changed till it happened

The risk of a rogue CC because of the ease of becoming CC compared to going through all the training to gain an ATPL surely has to be greater?

Like with the FO because it hasn't happened does not mean it won't happen
You are replacing one risk factor with another greater risk to remove a tiny risk factor of another FO doing the same awful deed. That stinks of knee jerk reaction public perception reaction with no statistical in crease in safety

Infact by placing CC in the flight deck with only one pilot there alone you have probably increase the chance of a terrorist crash slightly higher than the chance of another FO doing the same

it provides another layer of protection; one that quite probably would have prevented Lubitz from doing what he did, or at least not as easily.

What would have prevented Lubitz doing what he did would have been the Captain being able to access the cockpit and the rogue FO not having the ability to lock him out! A terrorist within using a system designed to stop a terrorist without. The police discovered that he had been refreshing his knowledge of the locking over ride systems on his computer at home in what was a planned suicide mass murder

[captainsmiffy]

Lets face it, if I wanted to take the aircraft and 'do a lubitz' then all I have to do is to put the aircraft in an unusual position, roll it inverted etc. nobody but nobody will get through that door under the loads imposed on the aircraft.....whether the door is guarded or not. We have to face facts, the aircraft can always be taken by one of its pilots. This two in the cockpit thing is a complete waste of time. Have always wondered why pilots are parted from their sharp items through security, dont need them to cause a catastrophe.

[Tokyo Geoff]

I appreciate the time you have taken to respond but I disagree with nearly all your objections. The central fact is that implementation of the "two persons" principle makes it far more difficult, by orders of magnitude, for a Lubitz inclined pilot to repeat that specific method of self-destruction.

The recent disclosures that Lubitz had been researching suicide and the door lock mechanism means he planned this in advance. If you make this *specific* method of murder-suicide harder the next Lubitz will simply choose another method. As plenty of pilots have said, there are many options to bring down an airliner as PF.

So changing the rule to "two in cockpit" doesn't prevent the next Lubitz but does open up the possibility of a rogue CC having only one pilot to take out, instead of two. It doesn't seem to be a well considered change.

[NigelOnDraft]

1. CC are given access to the FD anyway to deliver refreshments so the risk of one with evil intent is not much changed whether there to act as door opener or to deliver a cup of coffeeTypically with 2 pilots on the Flt Deck, not one.

3. In any event, as I understand the sole pilot is supposed to be always at the controls and strapped in when the other has left FD. The CC only needs to be standing at the door ready to allow access and can call for assistance immediately if the remaining pilot makes any move to leave the controls.Exactly - the CC now knows they will get access to the Flt Deck, they know there will only be one pilot with them, strapped in, and they know they can override the Capt's command and controls to allow anyone access to the Flt Deck.

4. I would agree that CC will often not be qualified to judge the remaining pilot's actions but that's not part of the requirement. The job is simply to guard the door and re-open it to the anyoneAnd with a guarantee they can override anybody else in order to do so.

Moreover, if it is not an improvement, why was the "two persons" rule implemented by some regulators and some carriers even before last week. The answer is simple -Yes it is - a PR stunt, and if you actually read the EASA/CAA recommendation, you will see the "2 in the Flt Deck" recommendation was only after a review of the risk assessment, and as part of that risk assessment. Some airlines managed, and announced that review conveniently for TV deadlines rather than safety IMO.

[PAXfips]

Ticker on german newschannel N24 just reads:
"FDR data verifies copilot acted deliberatly"
no details given yet.

Isnt that a bit quick for data read out and analysis?:suspect:

[toffeez]

The BEA has said the FDR is readable and confirms the (up to now supposed) actions of the FO

[mcloaked]

Sky news carrying the same story:

Black Box Data Confirms Crash Was Deliberate (http://news.sky.com/story/1458121/black-box-data-confirms-crash-was-deliberate)

Also indications of speed changes in the report at: http://www.thelocal.fr/20150403/second-black-box-confirms-alps-crash-co-pilot-acted-deliberately

With a few more pictures of the FDR at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/germanwings-plane-crash/11513967/Second-black-box-confirms-French-Alps-crash-co-pilot-Andreas-Lubitz-acted-deliberately.html

[NorthernKestrel]

Good read on the RAeS Insight blog on this incident. Particularly the part about the 'cultural prism' and previous murder-suicides.


Royal Aeronautical Society | Insight Blog | Germanwings - the final frontier of aviation safety (http://aerosociety.com/News/Insight-Blog/3013/Germanwings-the-final-frontier-of-aviation-safety)

[sky9]

The solution is to move the cockpit door to the other side of the toilet to provide a FD exclusive washroom and bring back 3 crew on the FD, the current FTL'S require it.

[INeedTheFull90]

Gotta love the way we do things in Europe. In SE Asia we have lost an A320 and very little has been released. In Canada an A320 is ruined and many won't even admit to it being an accident. Open, honest and quick is always the best!

[timmermc]

It is poor translation into English, its 'the pilot changed the autopilot setting to increase the speed of the plane descending'

[toffeez]

You can be sure the BEA's official translation will be out soon, on their site. By the way I find their English versions to be very professionally done. They take the time to get it right (hint to everyone of the Twitter generation who thinks that instant hot air blabbing is more important than accuracy)

[somethingclever]

Over 3000 posts and just a precious few scratching the surface for a real world solution. Instead we get same nonsense responses all over again. First, the revenge squad who take pride in their old testament-style craving for easy answers in their black and white world. The "this guy was a mass murdering psychopath, case closed"-brigade. It's a completely meaningless attitude to bring to the table and effectively what it means is that you are happy for the next incident which will be coming down the line. It will be a simple matter of time. All you are doing is scrubbing out the number on the "X days since last murdercide" sign and going off to lunch.

Then the technobabbling nerds who think the door mechanism has anything to do with it. It doesn't. At all. For one simple reason. You can not invent away lack of trust. You either trust your pilots or you do not.

After that come the home grown lawyers with more paragraphs in the works for us. Some more pages to read, documents to sign to somehow magically prevent or reveal mental problems. How is this ever going to work? Forcing people to feel good? Forcing people to admit being unfit to fly? You don't think a person with mental issues will be able to con his way over such hurdles? In a heartbeat buddy. Tougher checks during training, that will do the trick, right? Tougher checks during medicals, while at work, while at home. Force pilots to sign a paper every turn-around declaring their mental fitness. All these things simply ADD MORE PRESSURE. Once again, you either trust your pilots, or you do not. And so what if you have all these fine checks to keep the people with problems out. You can have problems at any point during your career, and in fact you probably will. Especially now that the industry has abandoned every pretence of safety over profit and is clamping down on everything from sick leave to fuel burn. It's an intentionally sick industry choosing money over stability and it works until it doesn't work anymore. Captain America with grey temples and 30000 hrs can snap. You may not like to think so, but he can. You can. Because, gasp, you are HUMAN. The industry specifically and society in general would do well to accept that reality. We are reverse engineering our lives. We decide what's best for the bottom line and work backwards to see how the people need to act and feel for that to come true. It's a bad idea in general and a down right lethal recipe in aviation.

The only way, period, is to have crew you can trust. To get that, you need crew that trust you, the company and the only way to get that is to have a non-punitive and inviting reporting system that is backed by an absolutely rock solid support system. A system that is designed with the expressed goal of getting you diagnosed, treated and returned to service. That is trust on a human level. You can always come to us and express your concerns and feelings. We will listen and we will help. Our team is standing by for your benefit whatever the problem may be. We will not turn our backs and we will not kick you out.

But today we don't have that. Today we have bean counters and lawyers on one side, and faceless employee numbers on the other. If you report mental problems they will say "ah, looks like 342323 is broken, let's go ahead and remove that one from the production line. Bring in 342324 please." Mental illness needs to be treated like any other problem, instead of this fearful stigmatisation that never seems to let up. Not a single LOL-insurance that I'm aware of is valid for mental problems. If you lose your medical due to depression, you get nothing. How can anyone in their right mind claim that aviation is safety-focused? Safety, money permitting maybe. Safety, time permitting maybe. Until the industry backs off again and implements a human-centric approach to operations, problems will keep getting worse. Until the industry encourages employees to come in and get effective treatment, we are simply waiting for the next incident.

[anengineer]

Sky9 said: The solution is to move the cockpit door to the other side of the toilet to provide a FD exclusive washroom and bring back 3 crew on the FD, the current FTL'S require it.

Absolutely. Maybe not as far as 3 crew, but moving the door will finally separate pax from the flightdeck and stop the pilots being separated from each other.

[NigelOnDraft]

Hi TriskelWould it be more reasonable to lock in the autopilot whenever one of the pilots leaves his seat? My lawn tractor has a pressure switch in the seat which turns off the engine when vacated - a similar switch in pilots' seats could lock into A/P (maintaining current settings) whenever either seat is vacated - of course pilots would have to choose when to leave i.e. no likely imminent change of course/altitude, but I guess most do anyway? I'm afraid that solution is about as sensible as mandating that when one pilot leaves the cockpit, the other must do so also :ooh:

Frequently when I leave the Flt Deck, my colleague is required to speak to ATC, alter heading, navigation and FL - and primarily of course, be ready and able to react to any abnormal situation appropriately. And this is a flaw in the "2 in cockpit rule" - prior GW their role could be seen as in case of incapacitation and/or door operative. Post GW, unless and until it is clearly stated, people (including Cabin Crew) will see the role to "monitor" the remaining pilot, and be consulted over such actions.

Hence whilst I am not necessarily against a "2 in cockpit" rule, with it's implementation the role of said person needs to be very clearly laid out. You only have to read the last X million posts on this thread to see that role has been given many different purposes.

Prior to a pilot under training being assessed as competent to handle the above tasks by themselves, a 3rd (Safety) pilot is carried. What some posters above seem to be advocating with the "2 in cockpit" rule is removing that ability from all pilots - if that is the case, then the rule needs to be "2 pilots in the cockpit at all time", which effectively equates to 3 Flt Crew aircraft. Fine by me :ok:

[GlueBall]

Still don't understand the drip feed of data approach....

What's your solution to internet news portals in a world where news is everywhere instantly? Sit on the data for a week, for a month, before talking about it? Is the CVR audio in doubt? Is CVR audio less factual today than it would be a month from now? Is the FDR data in doubt? Is the FDR data inconclusive about altitude & speed changes initiated by someone in the cockpit? :ooh:

[Good Business Sense]

Think everyone forgets the aircraft hijacked on 9/11 operated with locked cockpit doors. :ugh:

[GlueBall]

xollob ...BEA (Bureau d'Enquêtes et d'Analyses pour la sécurité de l'aviation civile) has a secondary role to assist the prosecutor in technical matters, as it was established to be a criminal act. Thus, primary jurisdiction is with the French prosecutor's office, which is not subject to ICAO protocols.

[G-CPTN]

Andreas Lubitz modified the automatic pilot system several times to increase the speed of descent.
"the pilot in the cockpit used the automatic pilot to put the airplane on a descent towards an altitude of 100ft (30m)"
"Then several times the pilot modified the automatic pilot settings to increase the speed of the airplane as it descended," it added.Germanwings also said it was unaware that Lubitz, 27, had experienced depression while he was training to be a pilot.
Lufthansa confirmed on Tuesday that it knew six years ago that the co-pilot had suffered from an episode of "severe depression'' before he finished his flight training.
"We didn't know this,'' said Vanessa Torres, a spokeswoman for Lufthansa subsidiary Germanwings, which hired Lubitz in September 2013.
From (and more at):- Germanwings crash: Co-pilot Lubitz 'accelerated descent' - BBC News (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-32173632)

[Pace]

RexBanner

But neither was a completely insane FO under the personal invitation of the captain? a sane one yes and that is obviously what this poor captain thought he had. That is the worrying thing if he didn't doubt him how would anyone else?

[RexBanner]

The hijackers on 9/11 took advantage of a window of opportunity that was only available up until 09:37 on Tuesday September 11th 2001 (the moment the Pentagon was hit). From then on it was apparent to the passengers on United Flight 93 and the rest of the entire world that the classic hijack scenario had ended and the tactics had now radically changed.

No aircraft that has been hijacked since will have its passengers meekly sit subserviently as they fly to their doom. Likewise air forces on the ground will prevent any aircraft getting near built up areas.

It is also highly probable that had the US Government actually been paying attention to the threat posed (they had numerous warnings from Mossad and German intelligence amongst others) and the CIA and FBI had been sharing their information, they would have apprehended Atta and the others before they got anywhere near commercial aircraft that morning.

[G-CPTN]

No aircraft that has been hijacked since will have its passengers meekly sit subserviently as they fly to their doom.But they are now unable to gain access to the Flight Deck - so they can do no more than the passengers on the Germanwings flight were able to do . . .

Likewise air forces on the ground will prevent any aircraft getting near built up areas.
Though eight minutes doesn't seem enough time to react and respond - was there any evidence that the Germanwings flight was being intercepted?

I agree that there was no built-up area near by, but if the FO had maintained altitude there would have been no trigger for ATC to decide on action.
Could the Captain have contacted 'base' from outside the FD?

[RexBanner]

G-CPTN Read between the lines. That is my EXACT point. The flaw is in the cockpit door to start with and our entire approach to security and counter terrorism.

[GXER]

@NoD, Pace and others who object to the "two in the cockpit" principle.

None of the stated objections have real substance or come close to outweighing the immediate and real benefit of ensuring that a single pilot cannot easily exclude the second pilot from the cockpit without overpowering that pilot or at least one other crew member. Dealing with those stated below -

Typically with 2 pilots on the Flt Deck, not one.Are you saying there is a RULE that CC cannot enter the cockpit unless both FD crew are present?

Even if that was the case, which I doubt, the risk of a rogue CC overpowering the single pilot is hardly more significant than the risk that a CC will conspire to allow a hijacker or terrorist to enter the flight deck when delivering refreshments to the FD crew.

Exactly - the CC now knows they will get access to the Flt Deck, they know there will only be one pilot with them, strapped in, and they know they can override the Capt's command and controls to allow anyone access to the Flt Deck.As above. If there is a rogue CC, the risk exists anyway and is hardly increased by the need for an occasional extra visit to the FD to guard the door.

And with a guarantee they can override anybody else in order to do so.There is always a risk that CC will refuse to obey the captain's instructions. This risk is not increased.

Yes it is - a PR stunt, and if you actually read the EASA/CAA recommendation, you will see the "2 in the Flt Deck" recommendation was only after a review of the risk assessment, and as part of that risk assessment. Some airlines managed, and announced that review conveniently for TV deadlines rather than safety IMO.Honestly I am dismayed by what I have been reading. Your profession is facing a crisis of confidence and all you seem to have to say is "the risk of rogue pilots is tiny, no need to worry or take additional precautions". Well hello. Lubitz (and some others before) proved that the risk is real and exists NOW. True it has done for years but that is NO reason not to take NOW, immediate, simple, and virtually zero cost steps to reduce the risk.

More may be needed, which may take more thought and time, but this CAN be done, SHOULD be done and I am pleased that some carriers and regulatory authorities have faced up to that and taken steps to make sure it is done.

Waiting for a better long-term solution, if there is one (which is far from certain), is foolish and reckless.

[Pace]

In my world of corporate jet flying we fly with the same pool of pilots who normally become friends. We even meet up for a night out
We spend longer periods away together than the quick turnaround low cost carriers and will tend to know each others problems and usually discuss those problems with each other and yes pilots have problems like anyone else.

You can keep things hidden for a short time to someone you don't know but you cannot do that with someone you know very well.

Maybe rostering crews not to always fly together but to fly more together might part help. The fact that you get crews who have never clapped eyes on each other before the flight might not be a positive thing.

Crews used to be a unit years ago, there were benefits to that as well as negatives

But if Lubitz was devoid of any external emotions so that no one would notice then he was a very dangerous and thankfully rare character

[NigelOnDraft]

I should think that CC are sufficiently qualified to open the door to let the other pilot back inPlease confirm that you would "empower" the CC in this scenario to override the specific verbal instructions of the Captain?

If that had been done on this flight, then the outcome may have been differentIt almost certainly would have, but then it would not have been planned in this way. You cannot look at one accident in isolation - you need to design a "system" to provide the minimum overall risk.

"Mentally ill pilot crashes aircraft and kills all on board". How best to address? Prevent the situation in the 1st place, or accept it as fact, and devise solutions that not only allow the mentally ill pilot to still achieve their aims, but opens up a whole range of new hazards.

PS I assume you do know the rules (or lack of) re CC operating with depression / mental illness / associated drugs, their medical checks (nil) etc.?