Germanwings pilot was 'locked out of cockpit minutes before crash'

Mystery surrounds the Germanwings crash after it was revealed one of the pilots was locked out of the cockpit.

Early analysis of the cockpit voice recorder suggests the man was trying to smash the door down to get back in.

However, there is not yet any indication why he left or what happened to the pilot left in charge of the plane.

A senior military official involved in the investigation described a "very smooth, very cool" conversation between the pilots during the early part of the flight from Barcelona to Düsseldorf.

Then the audio indicated that one of the men left the cockpit and could not re-enter.

Germanwings A320 plane crash: One of the pilots was locked out of the cockpit when the aircraft crashed

Early analysis of one of Flight 4U 9525's cockpit voice recorders suggests the man was trying to smash the door down to get back in

Mystery surrounds the Germanwings crash after it was revealed one of the pilots was locked out of the cockpit.

Early analysis of the cockpit voice recorder suggests the man was trying to smash the door down to get back in.

However, there is not yet any indication why he left or what happened to the pilot left in charge of the plane.

A senior military official involved in the investigation described a "very smooth, very cool" conversation between the pilots during the early part of the flight from Barcelona to Düsseldorf.

Then the audio indicated that one of the men left the cockpit and could not re-enter.

"The guy outside is knocking lightly on the door and there is no answer," the investigator said.

"And then he hits the door stronger and no answer.

"There is never an answer."

He said: "You can hear he is trying to smash the door down."

While the audio seemed to give some insight into the circumstances leading up to the Germanwings crash, it also left many questions unanswered.

"We don't know yet the reason why one of the guys went out," said the official, who requested anonymity because the investigation is continuing.

"But what is sure is that at the very end of the flight, the other pilot is alone and does not open the door."

The mangled voice recorder, one of the Flight 4U 9525 's two black boxes, was found hours after the jet crashed in the French Alps on Tuesday, killing all 150 people aboard.

It holds the last two hours of cockpit noise and chatter.

The first files were extracted from it today - though a full analysis may take months.

The smashed-up recorder arrived at the HQ of France's accident investigations bureau BEA in Paris today.

Director Remi Jouty said some audio has been recovered, including sounds and voices from the Barcelona to Dusseldorf flight.

He ruled out a mid-air explosion or depressurisation.

His investigation team will now listen to engine noise and analyse every alarm, vibration and thump.

Their aim is to explain why Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 plunged into a mountain from its 32,000ft cruising altitude during a terrifying eight-minute descent .

They hope to work out why there was no mayday from the Airbus A320. Theories include the crew becoming incapacitated – possibly after a cracked windscreen blow-out.

Mr Jouty said: "We have been able to extract a usable audio data file .

"Detailed work will be carried out to understand and interpret the voices and sounds."

He hoped to give more details in "a matter of days" but said it was too early to draw conclusions about causes of the crash.

Mr Jouty revealed that the airliner was flying “until the end”.

He said the final communication from it was a routine air traffic control message about permission to continue on its route.

An anonymous post on a website for pilots claimed to have inside knowledge of the investigation.

Its author wrote: “CVR [cockpit voice recorder] data has been read.

“ It seems structural failure (windshield? not determined yet) . It was quick ... sound of cracks but crew initiated emergency descent by autopilot then they weren’t heard any more.”

But Carsten Spohr, chief executive of the budget airline’s parent company Lufthansa, said the jet was fit to fly.

He went on: "It is inexplicable this could happen to a plane free of technical problems and with an experienced, Lufthansa-trained pilot."

Lufthansa said the 24-year-old jet had repairs to a landing gear hatch on Monday – but insisted that this was not a safety issue and that repairs had been done to reduce noise.

Search teams today continued the hunt for the second black box amid grim conditions at the crash scene – where bodies and debris lay strewn across the mountainside.

After being winched down from helicopters, as the site is inaccessible by foot, they scoured the landscape.

The teams were looking for the flight data recorder which holds key technical information such as pressure altitude, airspeed, heading, acceleration and the time radio transmissions were made by the crew.

A total of 38 police, doctors and rescue workers were at the scene of the crash, working in pairs and methodically crisscrossing the site.

The casing of the flight data recorder has been found but not the device itself, French President Francois Hollande said as he arrived in the remote Alpine region with Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel to pay tribute to the victims.

"At this moment people are on the scene still searching," he said in Seynes-les-Alpes.

"This is a true tragedy, and the visit here has shown us that," Ms Merkel said.

Mr Hollande promised that French investigators would do everything to determine the crash's cause.

The ‘black box’ canisters, which are actually bright orange, are designed to withstand 3,400 times the force of gravity on impact as well as extreme temperatures and pressures.

Experts in the BEA’s warren of laboratories spent hours rebuilding the machine before trying to save as much data as they could.

The commander for the high mountain police in Alpes-Grenoble, Laurent Jaunatre, said identification of the bodies would be a difficult task.

He said: "Victim identification will be difficult.

"Identification will essentially be done by DNA."

Brice Robin, the Marseille prosecutor in charge of the investigation, said the process could take weeks.

He said: "The identification of bodies will take several weeks.

"Unfortunately, this is unavoidable.

"We will explain this to the families."

Pilot Xavier Roy, coordinating air operations, said: "When we go to a crash site we expect to find part of the fuselage.

"But here we see nothing at all."

It would take at least a week to recover all the remains of the victims, he added.

The Spanish government today raised the number of its citizens lost to at least 51.

Germanwings chief executive Thomas Winkelmann said those killed came from at least 13 different countries.

The British victims so far have named as 50-year-old Martyn Matthews , a senior quality manager from Wolverhampton; Paul Bramley, 28, originally from Hull but living in Switzerland; and seven-month-old baby Julian Pracz-Bandres, from Manchester, who died alongside his mother Marina Bandres Lopez Belio , 37, originally from Spain.

They were joined by 72 Germans, including 16 children and two teachers on a school exchange trip , two Australians, three Americans, two Iranians and one Japanese.

The flight took off at 10.01am Spanish time on a regular Germanwings route.

Contact with it was lost 45 minutes later as it plummeted 32,000ft in eight terrifying minutes.

The small scatter of debris has lead investigators to conclude it slammed in the mountainside 6,000ft up at around 400mph.

Mr Winkelmann added: "We are a very small company and a family of colleagues and therefore we as a company are very understanding."

At a press conference tonight, Mr Spohr and Mr Winkelmann announced a special flight to Marseilles on Thursday morning from Barcelona for family members.

With the assistance of French authorities they will then bring those who wish to the crash site.

Mr Spohr said: “What they have gone through is incomprehensible.”

He said he believed there was a “high probability” of finding the second black box.