Training to terrorize in AZ’s friendly skies? & Update

Andreas Lubitz, the homicidal co-pilot of the Germanwings Flight 9525 who by all accounts locked the pilot out of the cockpit before deliberately crashing into the French Alps, murdering all 149 aboard, had an Arizona connection. A spokesman for Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, acknowledged “Every Lufthansa pilot does part of their training in Phoenix, simply because the weather there is so good and conditions are good for flying.”

The flight school training program takes between a year and a half to two years to complete, and includes several months in Arizona flying small training aircraft, as well as simulator and classroom work. The Airline Training Center Arizona, an arm of Lufthansa, has trained the German airline’s pilots for 45 years,  according to its website, which proclaims “Students From Europe To Asia All Train Under The Sunny Skys (sic) Over Metropolitan Phoenix. Perfect Conditions For Learning To Fly.”

The Phoenix area is home to a large number of flight schools, which make good use of our usually clear skies.

The pilot who crashed a hijacked airliner into the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001, did his flight training in Arizona. The hijackers on American Airlines Flight 77 were led by Hani Hanjour who trained at the CRM Airline Training Center in Scottsdale, Arizona, where he received an FAA commercial pilot’s certificate. He had previously been rejected for pilot’s training in Saudi Arabia.

In all probability, they have more rigorous psychological testing.

Monday, March 30, 2015:

 It is now being revealed by Duesseldorf prosecutors that the mass murdering co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, had received treatment for suicidal tendencies for several years —- before becoming a pilot.

 “In the following period, and until recently, further doctor’s visits took place, resulting in sick notes without any suicidal tendencies or aggression against others being recorded.”

 Lubitz’ former girlfriend said he was planning a spectacular gesture so “everyone will know my name,” a German daily reported on Saturday. “I didn’t know what he meant by that at the time, but now it’s obvious,” she said. “He did it because he realized that, due to his health problems, his big dream of working at Lufthansa, of a having job as a pilot, and as a pilot on long-distance flights, was nearly impossible.”

 “He never talked much about his illness, only that he was in psychiatric treatment,” she told the paper, adding they finally broke up because she was afraid of him.

 German authorities have said they had found torn-up sick notes from his doctor showing he had been suffering from an illness that should have grounded him on the day of the tragedy. A chief French investigator raises other questions, after being quoted as saying it was too early to rule out other explanations for the crash.  “There is obviously a scenario that is well known to the media and which we are focusing on,” investigator General Jean-Pierre Michel told French media.