Updated
One of the two pilots of the crashed Germanwings flight was locked out of the cockpit before the plane slammed into the French Alps killing 150 people, a source close to the investigation says.
Cockpit recordings recovered from the crash site indicated one of the seats was pushed back and the door opened and closed, followed by the sound of knocking, the source said, adding "there was no more conversation from that point until the crash".
The source said an alarm indicating the proximity of the ground could be heard before the impact.
The recording included the pilots speaking normally and in German at the start of flight 4U9525.
The source could not say if it was the captain or the first officer who had left the cockpit.
Earlier, the New York Times reported an unnamed investigator who had heard the recording as saying officials did not know why one of the pilots left the cockpit.
"But what is sure is that at the very end of the flight, the other pilot is alone and does not open the door," the investigator said.
The Airbus A320 began a sudden and fatal eight-minute descent shortly after reaching cruising altitude.
No distress signal was sent and the crew failed to respond to desperate attempts at contact from ground control.
All 150 people on board the airliner were killed, including Melbourne nurse Carol Friday, 68, and her 29-year-old son Greig.
'Not the slightest explanation' for crash
The reports come after the head of French air crash investigation agency BEA said "usable data" was recovered from one of the plane's black boxes.
The first black box, the cockpit voice recorder, was found late on Tuesday afternoon (local time) several hours after the crash of the budget flight from Barcelona to Duesseldorf, and the data was analysed on Wednesday afternoon.
Photos of the mangled black box, which was retrieved at the site, showed its metal casing torn and twisted by the violence of the impact.
The casing of a second black box, the flight data recorder, has been found but not the device itself.
BEA chief Remi Jouty said data had been recovered, but experts still had "not the slightest explanation" for the crash.
While stressing it was too early to form a clear picture, he ruled out a mid-air explosion having taken place and said the crash scenario did not appear to be linked to depressurisation.
Among the new details, he said the airliner had flown in a straight line directly into the mountain — but would not say whether that suggested at the hand of a pilot or auto-pilot.
In Frankfurt, the chief of Lufthansa, which runs the low-cost Germanwings airline, Carsten Spohr said the crash was "inexplicable".
"The plane was in perfect condition and the two pilots were experienced," he said.
Weather did not appear to be a factor in the crash, with conditions calm at the time. Germanwings had an unblemished safety record.
Crash site 'shocking', mountain guide says
Investigators said the force of the impact left only small pieces of debris scattered over a wide area.
A mountain guide who got near the crash site said he was unable to make out recognisable body parts.
"It's incredible. An Airbus is enormous. When you arrive and there's nothing there ... it's very shocking," said the guide, who did not wish to be identified.
The crash site, which is situated at an altitude of about 1,500 metres, is accessible only by helicopter or an arduous hike on foot.
Helicopters have begun winching the remains of victims, found scattered across the slopes, to Seyne-les-Alpes, a source close to the investigation said.
Lyon-based international police agency Interpol said it had dispatched a team of victim identification experts to the site.
16 German students won trip in school lottery
Mr Spohr said the organisation was in shock after "the darkest hours" in the company's 60-year history.
"After 20 years in this industry and being a Lufthansa pilot myself, we still cannot understand what happened," he said.
"Lufthansa has never in its history lost an aircraft in cruise flight."
Arrangements were being made for the families of the victims, at least 51 of whom were Spaniards and at least 72 Germans, to gather near the crash site.
Among the 150 people on board were 16 German teenagers returning home from a school trip.
Bereaved pupils from the teenagers' high school in the small German town of Haltern wept and hugged near a makeshift memorial of candles.
"Yesterday we were many, today we are alone," read a hand-painted sign at the school, decorated with 16 crosses — one for each of the victims, most of whom were around 15 years old.
Compounding the tragedy, it emerged the students won the trip in a lottery of their classmates, local publication the Halterner Zeitung reported.
German, French, Spanish leaders visit site
Meanwhile, during a visit to the area, French president Francois Hollande promised German chancellor Angela Merkel and Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy they would "find out everything" about the crash.
"France stands by you," Mr Hollande said.
Ms Merkel replied: "It feels good that in a difficult hour like this, that we're standing so closely together in friendship."
"Dear Francois, I'd like to say to you a heartfelt 'thank you' in the name of millions of Germans who are deeply appreciative of this German-Franco friendship."
Mr Hollade told reporters: "We have to understand what happened. We owe it to the families and the countries concerned by the drama".
No comments:
Post a Comment