RIP :(

..this is so, so sad, my heart breaks for their families...

Why was there no distress calls during the 8 mins that the plane dropped from 38,000 ft to 8,000 ft ?

Seems strange no communication from the plane, not even the automatic squawk button was pressed.

What type of emergency was this ?

Must be lack of air
so they were knocked out etc.

It only takes something like 12 seconds for most people to lose consciousness on a plane if the cabin decompresses so it could be delayed reaction time from the pilot and then it was too late....

Terribly sad for all families and friends of those on board.

Yes, Cabin depressurisation would seem to explain why the crew did not make any mayday calls. But what caused the depressurisation and if the plane was on auto pilot why did it then start a controlled descent ?

maybe the pilots took it off auto pilot but surely they would have put their own emergency air masks on.

engine failure might be a cause but again why no distress messages.

This is a bit of a mystery , devastating for the passengers and their families,and very worrying for the Air travel industry and Airbus.

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/03/24/wo...e-crash-clues/

By the sound of it, something went wrong with the auto cockpit navigation computer and if that's the case, the pilots wouldn't be aware that anything was going wrong until it was too late.

Auto Computer
would that have got confused
and sent it down?

but surely Auto cockpit computer or not, the pilots and crew and passengers would have felt the plane descending and wondered why ?

So the Pilots would have disengaged this computer and flown the plane manually and they would have reported the fault straight away.

But if no air
they lose consciousness

Well we don't know so its pure conjecture, but all it would need is for some catastrophic event in the cockpit that took out the 2 pilots, the time it took to decend is just in relation to the cockpit controls at the time of the event.

I'm actually hoping that the whole plane was knocked out and that the passengers knew nothing about it as an 8 minute decent with everyone aware is just terrible.

3 British on that flight sadly

Apparently not according to experts. All this took around 8 minutes and it would only be the last few minutes when passengers noticed they were flying low. Because an air bus relies on a satellite navigation system, its doubtful they would of been looking out of the cockpit and may only of known about their decent when cabin crew came in to tell them; by then it may of been too late to take the plane back up manually.

This would also explain why there was no MD to ground control. MD only happens after everything has done to get a plane out of danger.

8 or 18mins
they are guessing

We have an auto computer system on our boat and these things are very reliable. We do know someone who crashed their yacht into a harbour wall at night because his computer system had been incorrectly set. The thing about these auto navigation systems is, they have to be set by humans and so open to human error.

If it was 18 minutes it was a much slower decent.

I heard a report yesterday from some hikers who were up in the Mountains near to where the plane came down. they reported hearing a strong rumbling sound a bit like thunder and then about 8-10 mins later another louder rumble which could have been the plane crashing.

so what was the first sound they heard ? could it be an explosion of some kind or catastrophic engine failure which would explain why the plane descended.

I hope they can accurately piece together these events and understand what actually happened to cause this tragedy.

This is normal. Pilots are trained to, in emergencies, to first stablise the plane and gain control, second to regain control of direction and then to mayday. It would seem they did not get beyond 1

Im pretty sure they are looking into it.

This has really unnerved me, probably because I flew Germanwings constantly when I lived in Germany (Edinburgh-Cologne route) and I'm flying next Friday... eurgh. Horrible tragedy!

But this So Rare.
You will be fine

It may take longer to find out
as the boxes are damaged

The latest
is one Pilot was outside
the door after going to the toilet
he was banging hard on the door
trying to be let in by the other pilot?

So passengers near the Front would have heard the panic

yes on the BB you can hear him lightly tapping and speaking and then loud thudding as he panics and tries to get in but cannot....

The door has a code but the pilots can lock and override

of the 10 crashes from this type of airplane:

8 have been pilot error
1 was hit by geese
1 had a landing gear issue caused by a mechanics error


so it looks likely its pilot error?

Yes so the Other Pilot
locked him out
while they started to go down.


They must find out what the pilots
background is.