Passenger Safety Analysis After Germanwings Incident
If you just a couple of months ago that we would be analysing safety on-board aircraft following the actions of a co-pilot without any religious connotations whatsoever, no-one would never have believed it! No-one could ever have predicted or legislated for such a tragically sick and crazy course of action!
So, with the above in mind, surely we can just wrap this article up here and now and say that’s the end to things: Andreas Lubitz was just one very disturbed individual who was in a class of his own; the chances of another equally disturbed pilot or co-pilot coming along are extremely remote to say the least. However, as 149 other innocent lives perished in this tragedy, we have to investigate exactly what happened in the Germanwings crash and make sure the same thing is never able to happen again.
Indeed, the investigation is likely to be even more accurate now as the second black box recorder has been found. This will help the Aircraft Investigation team to piece together the final moments of this ill-fated flight and ascertain exactly what transpired.
Investigations thus far have revealed a co-pilot who is said to have suffered from depression in the past, but when you consider the fact that this is such a common mental illness, there were no clear indications of anything as sinister as this being planned. No doubt other staff and management at Germanwings and Lufthansa (Lubitz’s previous employer) are thinking about every single dealing with this employee and desperately trying to remember if there was any way at all that they could have thwarted this terrible tragedy. Alas, it is likely that all such soul-searching is always likely to draw a blank.
There are already said to be numerous safeguards in place to help identify pilots and co-pilots who are displaying concerning behavioural traits. However, as some people, Lubitz included here, are diligent and expertly good liars, it is conceivable that people are going to be hoodwinked from time to time when you have a disturbed person hell bent on claiming some abhorrent infamy in some way.
What airlines need to look into is the possibility of overriding the controls of an aeroplane at either Air Traffic Control level, or from another part of the aeroplane itself, or both. But this could also open up other safety issues or risk of abuse by those so inclined. The fact that this type of incident has happened once is one time too many and everyone in the airline industry needs to work together to ensure the same thing can never happen again.
