Officials: Germanwings co-pilot accelerated ahead of crash

 

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Citing newly recovered data from Germanwings Flight 9525, officials told NPR on Thursday that the plane's co-pilot Andreas Lubitz accelerated several times as the airliner began its fatal descent. France's Bureau of Inquiry and Analysis for Civil Aviation Safety reports that Lubitz also set the plane's autopilot on a course that would result in its crash into the French Alps, dialing the airplane's setting to its lowest possible altitude — just 100 feet.
Officials reported the new information based on the recovery of a second black box flight recorder from the plane. Investigators had previously reported that the 27-year-old Lubitz, who officials believe deliberately crashed the airliner, had sought treatment for "suicidal tendencies" before last month's crash, which killed all 150 people on board. Sarah Eberspacher