French find 2nd Germanwings black box
Print Edition
The second black box from the Germanwings plane that crashed in the French Alps last week has been found after a nine-day search, prosecutors said yesterday.
Authorities are hoping to unearth more clues about the disaster from the black box after the first voice recorder suggested that co-pilot Andreas Lubitz deliberately flew the plane into a mountain.
The second black box records technical flight data that could provide vital insights into the final moments of Flight 4U9525 before it crashed last Tuesday, killing all 150 people on board.
The first black box, found the same day as the crash, recorded conversations between Lubitz and the pilot and showed that the 27-year-old German was alone at the time of the crash.
He apparently took advantage of the captain’s absence to lock him out and set the plane on a deadly descent into the Alps.
German prosecutors have said Lubitz was diagnosed as suicidal “several years ago,” before he became a pilot and yesterday revealed he had searched online for information about suicide and cockpit doors.
The plane smashed into the mountains at a speed of 700 kilometers an hour, instantly killing everyone on board.
According to prosecutors, the voice recorder suggested that the passengers were unaware of what was going to happen to them until the very last seconds, when screams were heard.
Rescue workers have since been sifting through the plane wreckage for days trying to identify body parts and victims via their DNA.
The search for evidence has been hampered by the extremely difficult mountain terrain as well as the force of the crash.
The parent company of Germanwings, German flag carrier Lufthansa, has come under huge pressure after it emerged that Lubitz had informed his bosses that he had suffered from severe depression.
Lufthansa said the co-pilot had told the airline in 2009 about his illness after interrupting his flight training.
Doctors had recently found no sign that he intended to hurt himself or others, but he was receiving treatment from neurologists and psychiatrists who had signed him off sick from work a number of times, including on the day of the crash.
Police found torn-up sick notes during a search of his apartment after the crash.
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