A German aviation publication is calling for the reopening of the investigation of the Germanwings A320 crash in France in 2015, saying there were some fundamental errors made by investigators. The crash, which killed all 150 people onboard, was blamed on the suicide of Flight 9525's First Officer Andreas Lubitz, who the investigation found deliberately plowed the airliner into a mountain. Simon Hradecky, who runs the popular aviation incident Web site Aviation Herald, said in a lengthy post on his site on Friday, there is evidence Lubitz wasn't on the flight deck at the time of the crash and that Capt. Patrick Sondenheimer was monitoring the flight deck when the plane went down. "Hence the investigation into the Germanwings Flight 9525 accident needs to be re-opened and conducted by an independent accident investigation authority who has not been involved in the investigation so far," Hradecky wrote.
So the doctors who told the investigators they saw the co-pilot for five months before the crash and told investigators that he was showing signs of regression into mental illness were all lying.
As were the technicians who analysed the remains of the CVR and said they heard the captain leave his seat… etc.
Find it very hard to believe.
Why do we feel so compelled to insist that there must be a conspiracy in events like this?
If the captain was supposedly incapacitated then why did the FDR indicate that he made multiple adjustments to the decent rate and airspeed.
And there’s the fact that investigators had found that Lubitz had searched “ways to commit suicide” and “Cockpit doors and their security provisions” the week before the crash.
And then there’s the fact that BAE had determined that Lubitz had done a test run of setting the autopilot to descend on a previous flight while the captain left the cockpit.
And yet a new investigation is started because we are suppose to explore the possibility that the FO, who had a history of depression which was documented by doctors shortly before the crash, left the cockpit, then the cockpit door lock malfunctioned, then the captain became incapacitated, and then the A320 made an uncommanded decent?
A respiratory rate of 26 breaths per minute, although faster than “normal” for an adult at rest, in no way proves any form of incapacity or impairment.
A copilot with a diagnosed a psychosomatic disorder, and psychotic depression, and an anxiety disorder, who was recommended to undergo psychiatric hospital treatment and was supposed to be on anti-depressant medication and having possibly career ending vision problems or…
A 34 year old captain with 6,700 hour spotless flying career.
I’m guessing that the magazine is doing this for clickbait.
Commentary here so far is negative towards Hradecky’s findings and his urging that the investigation be reopened. And of course inevitably his intentions are called into question. Having been a reader of The Aviation Herald for years I can tell you Hradecky does not need to intentionally create clickbait. There is plenty of that to be found in the simple and factual reporting of incidents and accidents, many from which there is much to learn. As for the book, he’s simply as he stated recouping his own investigation expenses.
No one who is not afraid of the truth, be it a confirmation of the original probable cause or the finding of a new contradictory one should be bed wetting over Hradecky’s request to reopen the investigation.
I think we need to have open minds, but not embrace conspiracy theories. What I find interesting are some of the conflicting automation modes that are described by Simon Hradrecky. Either an investigation is improved or a conspiracy theory gets debunked. I’d just hope the families involved, especially those of the pilots, get a say in whether this will be re-opened or not.
It does not seem like other Airbus planes are somehow resetting themselves to fly into the ground. Nor has anybody taken credit for some nefarious act. Nor would there be much incentive for somebody powerful to kill a bunch of people on a budget flight.
Also for Simon’s scenario to play out the cockpit door keypad has to fail. There has to be incapacitation of the flying pilot. There has to be simultaneous failure of automation to get the airplane to descend into terrain. Or somebody who’s struggling flips and decides to kill a bunch of people.
I agree with Jzarinnia & John Kliewer. Hradecky’s brand is based on the opposite of the clickbait conspiracy theorist type - sober to the max. I think the first thing we need is the DNA report of the person who went through the windshield.
I don’t accept everything that I read or hear without any substantiation, but if the information is coming from Hradecky, then I certainly have time to pay attention to it.