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Alps crash: descent may have been 'suicidal choice' by pilot, claim experts

With one pilot locked out of cockpit, events point to the suicide or sudden illness of remaining pilot, with latter theory unlikely say experts.

La rédaction de Mediapart

This article is freely available.

The descent to destruction of the Germanwings Airbus may have been a deliberate, suicidal choice by the pilot who remained in the cockpit, French aviation experts believe, reports The Independent.

They said  that a conscious decision must have been made by the remaining pilot to put the Barcelona-Dusseldorf flight onto a downward 11-minute descent until it collided with a mountain in the French Alps.

Following the revelation that one of the two pilots was locked out of the cockpit , the experts told the French news agency AFP that events pointed to either the suicide or sudden illness of the remaining pilot.

Illness was very unlikely, they said, because a conscious decision must have been made to place the aircraft on a gentle downward trajectory.

"A downward trajectory of this kind can only be the result of a voluntary action by the crew," an expert told AFP.

Read more of this report from The Independent.