Germanwings co-pilot 'wanted to do something spectacular'

BERLIN

An ex-girlfriend of the co-pilot of Germanwings flight 4U 9525 which crashed in the French Alps has claimed her former boyfriend told her he wanted to "do something spectacular" to "change the whole system."

Identified as Maria W. by the German daily Bild, the ex-girlfriend of Andreas Lubitz said he had suffered psychological problems, was unhappy with his working conditions but feared losing his job at the low-budget airline.

She was quoted as saying: "When I heard about the crash, I remembered what he told me once, 'One day I will do something, which will change the whole system, which will make my name known and remembered by all.'

“I never understood what he meant by that, but now it makes a sense."

Lubitz’s ex-girlfriend, who works as a stewardess at Germanwings, told Bild she had had a five-month relationship with Lubitz last year, but ended it because of his psychological problems.

“I have ended my relationship because while it became clear that he had problems,” Maria W. said, claiming Lubitz shouted at her several times and once locked himself in the bathroom for hours.

Lubitz had nightmares and often woke up screaming, she said.

Various hypotheses

French and German authorities suspect that the 27-year-old Lubitz intentionally crashed the airplane in southern France on Tuesday, killing all 150 people on board.

The examination of the black box voice recorder strengthened the suspicion that the co-pilot intentionally kept the pilot outside the cockpit and took the Germanwings plane into a dive.

But French investigator, police chief Jean-Pierre Michel told BFMTV on Saturday that while this has been the main hypothesis of the investigators, they were also investigating other possibilities, including a technical problem.

“The hypothesis of a technical failure cannot be ruled out for the time being,” Michel said.

German investigators were interviewing the friends, relatives, colleagues and doctors of Lubitz on Saturday to reveal more about the personality and the health condition of the co-pilot.

‘Psychosomatic illness’

German weekly Welt am Sonntag claimed on Saturday that the co-pilot had a serious psychosomatic illness, and was receiving treatment from psychiatrists and neurologists.

The weekly based its claim on the initial findings of the German police, who searched the house of Lubitz on Thursday and seized computers and various documents.

The weekly reported that the police found a number of medical records and psychiatric drugs which indicated that the co-pilot was receiving treatment for a psychosomatic illness.

No suicide note

German public prosecutor Ralf Herrenbrueck said on Friday that police had found several medical certificates showing Lubitz was undergoing medical treatment, but he had kept the fact secret from his employers.

He was not capable of working on the day of the tragedy, Herrenbrueck said, but did not give any details about his illness.

Germanwings said in a written statement the co-pilot had not forwarded a request for sick leave on the day of the crash.

No suicide note nor letter indicating a political or religious background was found during the searches in the co-pilot’s house.

'Fit to fly’

Germany’s largest airline Lufthansa, which owns Germanwings, has declined so far to comment on the claims that the co-pilot had serious psychological problems.

Lufthansa’s Chief Executive Officer Carsten Spohr had told reporters on Thursday that Lubitz had to interrupt his pilot training in the past, but declined to comment on the reasons.

He said the co-pilot joined Germanwings in 2013, after successfully completing all the tests, including a psychological test.

“He was 100 percent fit to fly without any restrictions,” Spohr said.

German daily Bild reported on Friday that the co-pilot had to interrupt his flight training with Lufthansa in 2009 due to a serious depression.

Bild claimed that the psychological problems of the co-pilot were also mentioned in the personnel files of Lufthansa.

Germany’s Federal Aviation Office confirmed on Saturday that its officials have examined Lufthansa’s personnel files on the co-pilot and informed the German public prosecutor about its findings.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel promised on Thursday a comprehensive investigation on the incident and said German authorities would do everything to reveal the truth.

Recovery efforts

French authorities so far recovered one of the two black boxes, which indicated that the co-pilot locked his captain out of the cockpit and deliberately flew flight 4U 9525 into mountains.

Recovery operations at the remote crash site in Seyne-les-Alpes in southern France continued on Saturday, with French recovery teams trying to find more evidence and retrieve human remains.

The police said around 600 pieces of human remains were retrieved from the crash site and medical teams were examining the DNA samples to identify the bodies.

- Deadly crash

The Germanwings Airbus 320 was en route from Barcelona, Spain, to Dusseldorf in Germany, when it went down on Tuesday before 11 a.m. local time (10:00 GMT) after an eight-minute descent, killing 144 passengers and six crew members on board.

The majority of the victims were German and Spanish.

The air disaster is one of the most tragic incidents in recent German aviation history, and the first deadly crash of a Germanwings plane since the low-budget airline was founded by Germany’s largest airline, Lufthansa, in 2002.

The crash was also the first on French soil since July 25, 2000, when an Air France Concorde crashed into a hotel in Gonesse in the Val-d'Oise, shortly after taking off from Roissy-CDG airport, killing 13 German passengers and crew members, along with four others on the ground.