Germanwings co-pilot left torn-up doctor's note for day of crash

Written By Unknown on Jumat, 27 Maret 2015 | 21.48

German prosecutors say they have found evidence that the co-pilot of the Germanwings plane that crashed in the French Alps appears to have hidden evidence of an illness from his employers.

Prosecutors in the western city of Duesseldorf say they seized medical documents from the home of Andreas Lubitz, 27, that indicate "an existing illness and appropriate medical treatment."

Lubitz house

A policeman carries bags out of the residence of the parents of Andreas Lubitz, co-pilot on Germanwings flight 4U9525, on Thursday in Montabaur, Germany. (Thomas Lohnes/Getty Images)

Prosecutor Ralf Herrenbrueck said in a statement Friday that torn-up sick notes were found, including one for the day of the crash, to "support the current preliminary assessment that the deceased hid his illness from his employer and colleagues."

He said the search of Lubitz's home revealed no suicide note or evidence of any political or religious motivation for his actions.

Lubitz, who appears to have deliberately crashed the plane, killing 150 people, received psychiatric treatment for a "serious depressive episode" six years ago, German tabloid Bild reported on Friday.

Prosecutors in France, after listening to the cockpit voice recorders, offered no motive for why Lubitz would take the controls of the Airbus A320, lock the captain out of the cockpit and deliberately set it veering down from cruising altitude at 700 km/h.

The Germanwings flight from Barcelona to Duesseldorf crashed on Tuesday. Germanwings is a division of Lufthansa.

Citing internal documents and Lufthansa sources, Bild said Lubitz spent a total of one-and-a-half years in psychiatric treatment and that the relevant documents would be passed to French investigators once they had been examined by German authorities.

FRANCE-GERMANWINGS-CRASH-CO-PILOT

Andreas Lubitz runs the Airportrace half marathon in Hamburg on Sept. 13, 2009. (Foto-Team-Mueller/Reuters)

Lufthansa chief executive Carsten Spohr told a news conference on Thursday that Lubitz had taken a break during his training six years ago, but did not explain why and said he had passed all tests to be fit to fly.

"Six years ago there was a lengthy interruption in his training. After he was cleared again, he resumed training. He passed all the subsequent tests and checks with flying colours. His flying abilities were flawless," Spohr said.

Lubitz reportedly began his commercial pilot's training in the northern German city of Bremen in 2007 and he had to take a break a year into his training.

A Lufthansa spokeswoman said on Friday the airline would not comment on the state of health of the pilot.

German police have searched the co-pilot's apartment in Duesseldorf and seized material that will now be examined. Investigators were seen carrying boxes out of the residence Thursday night.

Police also went to his parents' home in Montabaur, 130 kilometres south of Dusseldorf, and removed bags of items that included a computer.

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls on Friday called on Lufthansa to provide all information it has about Lubitz "so that we can understand why this pilot got to the point of this horrific" action.

Pilots' union angry over leaks

France's leading pilots' union is filing a lawsuit over leaks about the investigation into the crash.

Guillaume Schmid, a representative of the SNPL union, said Friday that pilots are angry that information about the dramatic final moments of the flight were reported in the media before prosecutors and others were informed.

ADDITION Germany France Plane Crash

Police searched the Dusseldorf apartment of Germanwings co-pilot Andreas Lubitz on Thursday. (Martin Meissner/Associated Press)

After the media reports, a prosecutor announced that cockpit recordings indicate the co-pilot of the jet intentionally flew the plane into a mountain.

The lawsuit is over violating a French law on keeping information about investigations secret while they are ongoing. The lawsuit doesn't name an alleged perpetrator, a common method in French law that leaves it to investigators to determine who is at fault.

Schmid said pilots are saddened by the accident and understand the public's wish for immediate information, but decried pressure on investigators and said that can lead to misleading the public instead.

James Phillips, a pilot and international affairs director of the German Pilots Association, cautioned against drawing conclusions at such an early stage in the investigation.

Support lines available for health issues

"[Lubitz] may be at fault, but we don't know," he told CBC News on Friday.

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People pay their respects at a memorial for the victims in the village of Le Vernet, near the crash site, on Friday. (Robert Pratta/Reuters)

The only way to make aviation travel safer is to "get all the information before we make the judgment," he said. "It's all happening very, very fast."

"We do have support lines for pilots that they can call on private issues," Phillips said. "Most of the airlines that we work with have them as well, to try to make sure that the pilots don't [work] if they're concerned with health issues, if they are concerned about any issues.

"I accessed it when my mother passed away. I called and said, 'I'm not fit to be in the cockpit because I am concentrating on my mother,' and my airline said, take two weeks off. Call us when you feel better."

"And I think this should actually be the real way to go forward, but I realize it's based on a trust and honesty situation, which sometimes is very difficult."


 


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