Planecrash in France, developing story

[Fragony]

looks like it was not an accident, the French autorities think it was done on purpose. No terrorist-attack at least, but suicide with taking 150 people with you. This is really a tragedy there will probably be nothing to bury, that plane looks like it was evaporated you can only see a wheel, the rest is gone.

RIP victims.

ffz if you have to commit suicide put a bag on your had and take a bath, so many lives lost

[Rhyfelwyr]

One of the main theories with that Malaysian flight that went missing was suicide as well IIRC.

I normally have sympathy for people who commit suicide but its hard when they do it in such a way. RIP to all who lost their lives.

[Viking]

This would be murder/homicide, not simply suicide - to state the obvious.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Heard the announcement this morning. Nauseating.

Said prayers for them and the families. Simply horrifying.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

This morning I watched the press session with the Lufthansa CEO. He was, to my ability to read body language (not a German speaker, so I don't know all the cultural norms there) sincere and earnest in his responses. Moreover, he had a look on his face that I have come to associate with a person experiencing heartburn but whose antacids aren't kicking in.

Then this afternoon I heard a snippet from Merkel's address on the issue. I don't believe I have ever heard her sounding so emotionally affected by something -- though admittedly we only get limited exposure here to German political events.

I am getting a sense that many in Europe are quite horrified by this event.

[Fragony]

Of course we are horrified, it's horrible. The -alledged- guy who -alledgedly- did this is supposed to have had a mental breakdown, but that was years ago and he passed all psychological tests. Nobody seems to understand it, employers nor relatives, he seemed to be perfectly sane is what they all say. From the video's I saw the system is pretty foolproof, but systems can fail. That he was steadily breathing untill the impact doesn't really say anything either, it could really be an accident. I hope it was. Also bears mentioning that the fabricant of airbus-planes warned against a defect in certain models, this was one of them, that if a plane reaches a certain angle the software takes over and the pilot isn't in control anymore. There is a door at the front, what if it opened for some reason, pulling the plane in that angle. I am not going to draw any conclusions just yet.

update: major fuckup. He didn't just have a mental breakdown, he was in a closed institution. People can fully recover of course but becomming a pilot? A tad risky I would say. Since when is the background of employers not checked anymore.

People can fully recover so I'm waiting for me, can still be an accident but it at least looks bad. Not comfirmed: he might be a convert to islam.

[Husar]

There is one problem with the accident theory: The pilot didn't get into the cockpit.

The cockpit door should have opened after 30 seconds if the copilot had passed out, unless the copilot actually denied the opening of the door. The following video explains it with some scenes that remind me of Harry Enfield sketches:

[Fragony]

You can probably scretch both things from my update, he apparently was never in a nuthouse, and if he was a convert also probably isn't true, he had a relation with a muslim girl but that's about it it seems.

[Fragony]

There is one problem with the accident theory: The pilot didn't get into the cockpit.

The cockpit door should have opened after 30 seconds if the copilot had passed out, unless the copilot actually denied the opening of the door. The following video explains it with some scenes that remind me of Harry Enfield sketches:

Seen the video, but electrical systems can fail, ask any windows user. If the airplane has a certain angle manual control is shut off, I am still not sure if this was actually intentional, very likely it was but still not sure. The police found some stuff in his appartment but no word on what it is for now.

[Rhyfelwyr]

Latest I heard is that police found torn-up sick notes in his house that said he was unfit to work. Didn't mention what illness the sick notes spoke of.

[Husar]

Seen the video, but electrical systems can fail, ask any windows user.

It's a really bad idea to compare the systems on a multi-million-Euro airplane to a multimedia computer.

And what Rhyfelwyr says, it seems like the copilot wasn't fit for work and went there anyway.

[Kadagar_AV]

Swedish media report that it was a suicide... And he just took the others with him...

He locked the other captain out, and crashed the plane.

Also, he seems to have some type of illness... He was already "free of work" for healthcare reasons, but didn't inform his bosses and flew anyway... We all know what happened afterwards.

Absolutely HORRIBLE...

I have a mountaineer friend who used to work at the same ski school as me... He was/is part of the "rescue"... Handling dead people isn't exactly what normally comes with the job, but he said every qualified mountain guy in the vicinity went there at once, and called in their friends from around...

So well, a thought for those unsung heroes... They don't even expect pay, they are volunteers...

[Kagemusha]

RIP for the victims of this horrible deed. I cant understand why cant people novadays just kill themselves, but have to take innocent lives with them in the process.

[Montmorency]

I would do the same given this guy's resources.

I find it so strange that liberal democratic societies prefer to extract every last bit of productivity out of citizens rather than facilitating their deaths in appropriate circumstances.

[Husar]

I would do the same given this guy's resources.

I find it so strange that liberal democratic societies prefer to extract every last bit of productivity out of citizens rather than facilitating their deaths in appropriate circumstances.

That might be because our societies are geared completely towards productivity, there are people who get depression from being unemployed because they feel worthless and not appreciated etc. And other people call them lazy leeches on society, which probably does not help. Now this pilot wasn't unemployed so he probably had other issues. Given that he was excused from work and went there anyway, him having been overworked sounds unlikely.

But what was so bad about his resources? He could have rented a small plane and crashed that or jumped in front of a truck from a highway bridge or whatever, lots of means to suicide without killing more than a hundred other people. Yes, the truck driver may get emotional damage but he'd rather get that than die in a plane crash I assume.

That said, the investigation is not entirely concluded yet, it just seems very, very likely that it was a kind of amok-suicide, apparently experts say people do that if they don't just want to die but also hate or blame the world somehow. Maybe something happened to him that has not been revealed yet.

[Montmorency]

Do keep in mind that I like to be provocative at times. Anyway -

By "resources", I mean this:

"Active" forms of suicide are extremely difficult to carry out and are usually impulse-actions. For the long-term suicidal, there is almost no hope for such an outcome. I count suicide by firearm in this category, though it is perhaps the least "active" form of them all.

"Passive" forms of suicide - such as dying in an explosion - are excellent for such individuals in that they require a minimum of effort in the moment. They are, unfortunately, very difficult to actually set up. Most individuals, for example, do not have access to bombs or, as it were, planes.

If the state were to provide a simple medium-term vetting process to exclude the impulsively suicidal, then the long-term suicidal could be terminated in controlled circumstances. Hopefully better-thought-through than the United States lethal injection process, at any rate.

TLDR

[Rhyfelwyr]

I would do the same given this guy's resources.

I find it so strange that liberal democratic societies prefer to extract every last bit of productivity out of citizens rather than facilitating their deaths in appropriate circumstances.

Never has there been so much wrong in such a simple post.

The guy just killed 150 people, and you are seriously saying you would do the same thing to all those individuals purely because society didn't make it easy enough for you to kill yourself? Then there is your bizarre idea that Western societies' opposition to euthanasia is nothing to do with traditional ideas of the sanctity of life, but in fact is all about maximising productivity from citizens?

In fact, before I go on, I must remind myself that I rarely understand your point, and I should probably just stop now.

[Montmorency]

Then there is your bizarre idea that Western societies' opposition to euthanasia is nothing to do with traditional ideas of the sanctity of life, but in fact is all about maximising productivity from citizens?

If you want my serious view, then it's not about "sanctity of life" either but a holdout from Christian morality concerning God's "ownership" of human souls.

Clearly, Western liberalism minus this particular influence would demand that the 'agency' and 'true will' of the passively-suicidal individual must be upheld. From tolerance, it's a short leap to pragmatism: much better for society to administer death in a systematic manner than to have to deal with "public fallout", so to speak.

[HopAlongBunny]

A tragedy.
Having dealt with depression coupled with work in transportation, the emerging explanation makes sense.
Caught in the U-Turn environment of thoughts of self destruction, being left alone in the cockpit; Motive, Opportunity, Desire!
Depending on how long the co-pilots condition lasted, you do eventually hit a wall; "while I can rationalize reasons to no do it just now, at least it would stop the *ing thoughts/dialogue/debate" silence, sweet peace.

The other aspect involves his position.
If he informed his employers, what reaction could he expect?
If your expectation is to simply lose your job; you shut-up and try to muddle through.
Not many countries, companies, employers have supports in place to aid people in his condition; where supports exist you can look forward to reduced earnings; a "file" on your condition that will follow you the rest of your life and the stigma that comes with being "not quite right"

Still a tragedy that it should come to this.

[Fragony]

I kinda wonder why his shrink didn't warn his employers, must be confidality, in hindsight easy to say but he knew there were risks. What if had been a technician at a nuclair plant.

[CrossLOPER]

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32098578

"one day everyone will know my name"...would at times wake up screaming "we're going down".... "it is because he understood that because of his health problems, his big dream of a job at Lufthansa, as captain and as a long-haul pilot was practically impossible,"..."One day I'm going to do something that will change the whole system, and everyone will know my name and remember,"

Kind of sounds like an asshole.

[Montmorency]

Oh, that's just the typical mass-murderer profile. You know, workplace violence, school shootings, etc. - same idea.

[CrossLOPER]

Oh, that's just the typical mass-murderer profile. You know, workplace violence, school shootings, etc. - same idea.

What would be their equivalence of waking up screaming "we're going down"? This isn't just depression or extreme narcissism. This is a multi-tiered complex.

[Montmorency]

Yeah, that's implicit. Almost all these guys have both "personality" disorders and "affective" disorders.

[Husar]

I do find it somewhat weird how the press is now tearing apart his life and how they act around the victims.
There are apparently reporters in a village where half a school class died on the plane and they offer money to children for them to make some kind of prepared statements in front of a camera. Maybe the pilot was disgusting but many here say the conduct and self-respect of a lot of the press crashed together with that plane.

[Greyblades]

Hrm, I'm certainly getting the "news companies are glorifying the perpritrators of crimes and thus encouraging copycats" vibe from this.

[Fragony]

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32098578


Kind of sounds like an asshole.

A psychoses ain't just a cold, waiting for the official reports but he should have never been there in the first place imho, missed the radar so to say and that is probably all circumstances that were never considered by anyone. Probably nobody nobody to really blame for this happening if you are being reasonable.

[CrossLOPER]

A psychoses ain't just a cold, waiting for the official reports but he should have never been there in the first place imho, missed the radar so to say and that is probably all circumstances that were never considered by anyone. Probably nobody nobody to really blame for this happening if you are being reasonable.

No arguing that. Well we don't have a definitive diagnosis, and will probably never will.

[Fragony]

Looks like it was exactly what it looked like, second black box rules out any doubt that it could have been an accident. It was pretty likely from the go of course, but it can always be unfortunate circumstances.

What a mess.

[Fragony]

Gets even worse, Lufthansa knew that he had serious psychological problems, and should have shared that information by law.