Germanwings Report Cites Self-Reporting Failure, German Law | Aviation International News

Germanwings Report Cites Self-Reporting Failure, German Law

BEA concludes pilot feared for his job despite strict confidentiality laws in Germany

By Gregory Polek • Senior Editor

March 14, 2016

The French civil aviation safety agency Bureau d'Enquêtes et d'Analyses (BEA) has assigned several failures in the system for detecting and preventing mental illness to the cause of the March 24, 2015 crash of Germanwings A320 into the French Alps in its final accident report, issued Sunday. Along with a lack of “clear guidelines” in German regulations on when a threat to public safety outweighs the requirements of medical confidentiality, it cited weaknesses in the process for self-reporting “decreased” medical fitness and first officer Andreas Lubitz’s “probable” fear of losing his ability to fly as a professional pilot if he reported his mental illness to an aviation medical examiner. It also cited the potential financial consequences of the pilot’s lack of specific insurance covering the risks of lost income if authorities did suspend his license.

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