Germanwings plane crash tinfoil hat society meeting

tuna55 wrote:

GameboyRMH wrote: If you're crazy enough to kill yourself with a planeload of people, you're way more than crazy enough to kill yourself with a slow descent...and sadly he wouldn't be the first.

So an experienced pilot that nobody thought was odd at all just snapped one day? Plausible certainly, but that's pretty rare.

There are plenty of people who seem just fine, but are actually covering up severe mental illness.

As for why take people with you? "Some men just want to watch the world burn"?

From what I've read, in "locked" mode the keypad is completely disabled until the mode is changed from inside the cockpit!

GameboyRMH wrote: From what I've read, in "locked" mode the keypad is completely disabled until the mode is changed from inside the cockpit!

Not 100% true. There are 2 door codes- the first being a standard access code, which in 'normal' toggle mode will open after 30sec of idle activity without any pilot/cockpit inputs. There is an additional 'emergency code that will still open the door in 'locked' toggle mode, but there is a 5:00 delay period in the door opening. It is possible that either the pilot either did not remember this SOP, or it was too late by the time he realized it... the decent lasted 8min. It's unclear at what time in the decent, if at all, that the emergency door code was entered, but it is very clear that the door switch was definitely put into 'locked' mode by the copilot while the pilot was outside of the cockpit.

What's the reason behind that? Were they worried someone would hack the keypad? Or that one of the pilots would go nuts and needs to be locked out?

Seems to me, you should never allow the cockpit to be completely locked out, because what if a terrorist got to the controls and locked out both pilots?

Why not make bulkheads or doors that can be opened or closed remotely, with the ability of the crew to speak with the ground from outside the cockpit, or even that the plane can be controlled remotely. The pilot or crew enters a code that allows the plane to controlled by the ground from outside the cockpit. "Hey, my co-pilot has gone nuts and locked me out, please switch controls to autopilot and unlock the cockpit door. Commander code 1875G2."

Maybe there is some very high-up code that can only be employed when the plane has not responded in a certain amount of time, like in a loss of cabin pressure.

In reply to PHeller:

In the US, there is a mandatory '2 in the cockpit' rule, which sort of negates the 'rogue pilot' scenario to a certain extent. It requires either of the pilots to get an attendant inside the cockpit when one of them needs to leave. Having this would have perhaps at the very least caused a commotion in the cockpit and may have thwarted this probably pilot suicide scenario. Maybe not as well... but at least it's better than nothing.

The keypad and 'sterile cockpit' orders were enacted to prevent unauthorized access to the cockpit, period. I'm sure it will be reevaluated now, but pilot suicide/terrorism is/was a severely low occurrence in terms of air disaster. I think in general it is/was a good concept and idea, just with slightly flawed execution. Again, my opinion and mine only.

In reply to Wally:

Yeah, because "Timothy McVeigh" is such a non-western sounding name...

In reply to pres589:

I thought he was Hindu......

Joe Gearin wrote: "The bubbleheaded bleach-blond comes on at 5

she can tell you about the plane crash, with a gleam in her eye

it's interesting when people die.....give us dirty laundry..."

Thank you! I haven't listened to that song in years! One of my favorites. I'll have to bring it up when I get home tonight.

The law of unintended consequences will bite you every time. Motivated people will find a way to accomplish their goals.

Yes they will. It's just really hard to think of someone being that cold... not only taking 149 people you don't even know with you, but also the ~600 hours of cockpit time, along with studying the lock operation, then not saying a word for the whole 8 minutes of descent... makes the 9/11 guys look like amateurs.

Thing I don't get it why now? Why this flight? You'd think he would have had numerous opportunities to do this in the past, why wait so long?

If he was suicidal there may be no rhyme or reason to it. This was just they day he had enough.

Who knows? Why did Robin Williams wait so long to hang himself?

The switch finally flipped.

They are saying the copilot simply turned the altitude setting on the flight controller (auto pilot) to a lower (mountain intercept) level.

I find that a bit interesting. It means he did not really take control of the plane, he wanted to let it crash itself. If he really wanted to crash it, and make sure no one could get into the cockpit, a nice rollover and pull would make that very difficult.

It seems to point to wanted to do it, but not wanting to actually "do it".

Suicide is sometime referred to as a form of cowardice. This may fit that bill.

This may be the first time this image has ever been used -not- in a joking fashion.

So the going theory is that the guy went all 'General Jack Ripper" on us.

That's incredible.

Precious bodily fluids?

In reply to aircooled:

Stop trying to bring fluoride into this....

Seriously. I wasn't trying to be silly. That sounds like what happened. A dude with power who was supposedly vetted against these very things studied the systems at his control and did exactly what he needed to do to kill as many people as possible.

Holy crap I never knew the plot behind Dr. Strangelove. Gonna have to watch that now.

In reply to tuna55:

Oh no, I agree with that......but its still silly since its Dr. Strangelove.

And PHeller, why the hell would you not just watch it considering we told you to.....

When did you tell me to?

Tuna55 wrote to PHeller: Go watch Dr. Strangelove. Stop what you're doing, go home and watch it right this very minute.

In reply to tuna55:

I don't see that comment anywhere in this thread. Am I missing something?

I mean, I plan to watch it now, but only because you mentioned it, not because someone told me to.

PHeller wrote: In reply to tuna55: I don't see that comment anywhere in this thread. Am I missing something? I mean, I plan to watch it now, but only because you mentioned it, not because someone told me to.

Just messing around, I just wrote that in quotes for fun.

You really will enjoy the movie. Instead of a jumbo jet going down, it's nuclear war. It really is a similar concept though.

tuna55 wrote: I don't get it. If you're going to kill yourself, why take a bunch of strangers with you? Assuming you have that angle figured out, why a shallow decent? Just dive the thing straight into the ground. Assuming there is a legit reason for that, why no note, no point to be made, nothing? Smells weird.

Curmudgeon wrote: Man. That's terrible. I wonder what will come out as a possible motive?

The standard TV trope (24, Blacklist, etc.) is that 'bad guys' threaten your loved ones with something horrible unless you do whatever terrible thing it is they want you do. Do you pick instant death for yourself and a group of strangers, or slow terrible things done to you and your family?

There's no way to know what on earth the co-pilot's motive was in this case, but in the spirit of this thread, put on your tinfoil hat and ask: who would want this plane crashed?