‘Co-pilot crashed plane deliberately’
French Prosecutor Brice Robin claims that Lubitz, the co-pilot, crashed the plane deliberately.
While the co-pilot was alone he locked the door and engaged a system which started the descent of the plane. This can only be done voluntarily….The co-pilot didn’t say a single word while he was alone and could be heard breathing normally. It wasn’t the breath of someone who was struggling. He didn’t say a single word, it was total silence.
Informed flight school of depression
Lufthansa says Lubitz had informed the flight school about his previous mental health issues in 2009. Lufthansa:
In his correspondence, he informed the Flight Training Pilot School in 2009… about a previous episode of severe depression.
Rehearsed crash on outbound flight
Investigators say Lubitz practiced entering the fatal descent settings on the previous, outbound flight. The changes in autopilot settings, mimicking those which, two hours later, crashed the jet on its way back to Duesseldorf from Barcelona, would barely have been noticeable because the jet was already descending. Investigator:
I can’t speculate on what was happening inside his head; all I can say is that he changed this button to the minimum setting of 100 feet and he did it several times.