Pilot ‘saw seven docs in a month’

France to expand Germanwings crash probe

FRENCH investigators say they are expanding their Germanwings crash probe to see if anyone can be held liable for manslaughter, as it emerged the pilot saw seven doctors in the month before the disaster.

Andreas Lubitz, the Germanwings co-pilot who ploughed his plane into the French Alps, saw 41 doctors over the course of five years, French prosecutor Brice Robin said in Paris after meeting 200 of the victims’ relatives.

“The French penal code forbids me from opening a judicial enquiry for murder because the perpetrator is dead,” said Robin, who appointed three investigative judges to lead the manslaughter probe.

Grieving relatives were shown three different reconstructions of what had happened in the cockpit on their trip to Paris to seek answers about the doomed flight, according to the head of a disaster support group who attended the meeting.

Investigators said 27-yearold Lubitz intentionally downed the plane en route from Barcelona to Duesseldorf on March 24, killing all 150 on board.

Robin said Lubitz, who suffered from “psychosis”, was terrified of losing his sight and consulted 41 different doctors in the past five years, including GPs, psychiatrists and ear, throat and nose specialists.

Several of these doctors who were questioned by German investigators said Lubitz complained he had only 30 per cent vision, saw flashes of light and suffered such crippling anxiety he could barely sleep.

Lubitz reportedly said “life has no sense with this loss of vision”.

However, the doctors he consulted, including one who booked him off work two days before the ill-fated flight, did not reveal his mental struggles due to doctor-patient privilege.

“How to handle medical privilege and flight security when you have a fragile pilot” will be one of the key questions in the judicial inquiry, Robin said.

Stephane Gicquel, the head of the support group, said the “stakes” in the expanded probe were to find out if there had been errors in tracking the mental state of the co-pilot.

Investigators only last month finished identifying the remains of all 150 people on the flight.