Germanwings crash: what we know so far about Andreas Lubitz

The co-pilot suspected of downing the plane, killing all 150 on board, is said to have told his ex-girlfriend he was planning a big gesture so “everyone will know my name”, according to German media.

Read more: Andreas Lubitz - what did Lufthansa know about his state?

The Bild newspaper published an interview with a woman who said she had a relationship in 2014 with Andreas Lubitz, the man French prosecutors believe locked himself alone in the cockpit of the Germanwings Airbus on Tuesday, and steered it into the French Alps.

So far investigators have only retrieved the cockpit voice recordings from one of the plane’s black boxes, which they say show that the co-pilot, Andreas Lubitz, locked himself alone in the cockpit and caused the airliner to crash.

‘Everyone will know my name’

“When I heard about the crash, I remembered a sentence… he said: ‘One day I’ll do something that will change the system, and then everyone will know my name and remember it’,” said the woman, a flight attendant the paper gave the pseudonym of Maria W.

“I didn’t know what he meant by that at the time, but now it’s obvious,” she said. “He did it because he realised that, due to his health problems, his big dream of working at Lufthansa, of a having job as a pilot, and as a pilot on long-distance flights, was nearly impossible.”

‘Illness’

Meanwhile, German newspaper Die Welt reported that investigators had found evidence of a serious “psychosomatic illness”, and that Lubitz had been treated by “several neurologists and psychiatrists”.

In another report, the New York Times, citing officials, reported that the 27-year-old had sought treatment for vision problems.

Depression

Questions continue to be asked about Lubitz’s mental and physical health days after he locked the captain out of the Airbus’ cockpit and brought down the airliner.

The father of one of the three Britons on the flight called for more to be done to see pilots were “looked after”, as Civil Aviation Authority documents suggested some 100 commercial airline pilots in the UK had a history of depression, with 42 still on medication.

Philip Bramley, whose son Paul, 28, was one of the three Britons on board the Dusseldorf-bound flight, said on Saturday: “I believe the airlines should be more transparent and our finest pilots looked after properly. We put our lives and our children’s lives in their hands.”

But Professor Sir Simon Wessely, president of the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCPsych), told the Observer the aviation industry should not “rush” to action in the wake of the crash.

‘Not a good idea to rush’

He cited health authorities’ response to the crimes of Dr Harold Shipman, who is thought to have killed between 215 and 260 people, as an example of ineffective policy.

Sir Simon said: “It is not a good idea to rush; it is like the response to Dr Shipman, an utterly bizarre and unpredictable event is not a good basis of policy. The procedures that they then brought in would not have prevented Shipman.

What does cause trouble is saying that if you ever have a history of depression then you should not be allowed to do whatever. Sir Simon Wessely

“I have dealt with some pilots with depression and when they recover they are still monitored. But the two I have dealt with returned to very successful careers. Why should they not?

“What does cause trouble is saying that if you ever have a history of depression then you should not be allowed to do whatever. That is wrong, as much as saying that people with a history of broken arms shouldn’t be allowed to do something.”

DNA

Forensic teams have reportedly isolated 78 distinct DNA strands from body parts at the crash site, although not one body has been found intact so far.

Patrick Touron, deputy director of the police’s criminal research unit told Agence France Presse that the difficulty of the recovery mission was “unprecedented”.

Most body parts were being winched up to helicopters before being transported to a lab in the nearby town of Seynes where a 50-strong team of forensic doctors and dentists and police identification specialists is working.

Between 400 and 600 body parts were currently being examined, Touron said.

The smallest details can prove crucial: fingerprints, jewellery, bits of ID card, teeth.

“In catastrophes, normally around 90 percent of identifications are done through dental records,” Touron added, but in the case of flight 9525, DNA was likely to play a greater role than normal.