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© Reuters / Ina Fassbender
The Germanwings co-pilot seemed to have crashed the plane deliberately, killing 150 people on board. The co-pilot wouldn't let the captain inside the cabin, with the "intension to destroy" the jet, the French prosecutor said at a press conference.

The Germanwings co-pilot was identified as Andreas Lubitz.


Prosecutor Brice Robin provided the explanation he thought the most likely, judging by the transcript of the black box recording of the last 30 minutes in the cockpit before the crash.

The captain left the cockpit to go to the toilet, asking the co-pilot to take over. Then the co-pilot accelerated the plane's descent, likely voluntarily, the prosecutor said.

Afterwards, demands for the co-pilot to open the door are heard, and the captain bangs on the door, but the co-pilot refuses to open it.

On the recording, there is the sound of the co-pilot breathing "normally" and "not uttering a single word" until the plane crashes, the prosecutor said.

The recording suggested that passengers began screaming just before the final impact. Services on the ground didn't receive any distress signals from the crashing A320.

The prosecutor said that there are no grounds to regard the crash as a terrorist act.

Someone attempted to break open the door to the cockpit from the outside, he added. The captain of the plane "desperately" banged on the cockpit door.

It is not yet known if Germanwings is legally responsible for the crash. The prosecution is set to give information on that later.

The recovery of bodies from the Alps has already begun, and will last for the next week or two.

The families of the captain and co-pilot have arrived in Marseille, but have been isolated from the other victims' families.


The co-pilot accused of deliberately crashing the plane had passed all the necessary medical tests and was "100 percent" fit to fly, Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr told a press conference. However, he added that pilots do not undergo regular psychological assessments beyond training.

"We have no words," he said. "We never thought that this could happen to our concern. We are very attentive to recruitment. We pay great attention, including to the psychological characteristics of our candidates."