All over the news right now there
are stories about the crash of the Germanwings plane. It is now known that it was intentionally
crashed into the Alps by the co-pilot. Although
many facts are starting to come to light, we still are unsure of some elements
of this tragic event, such as why he intentionally crashed the plane and also
the identities of all the passengers on the plane. It is presumed everyone on the flight died in
the crash, but authorities have not yet released a full list of the casualties
stating that they must go through and use DNA testing until everyone has been identified. The biggest question that still remains is
why did the co-pilot deliberately make the plane descend and eventually crash
into the Alps, taking 150 lives.
The most
disturbing part about all this is that we have not found out the motive of the
co-pilot. It is easy for us to put blame
on a terrorist group and immediately come out with a plan to help prevent
similar events in the future. The
authorities have found many destroyed doctor’s notes in the man’s apartment,
and it is implied so far that he was suffering from some type of mental
illness. In my opinion his employer
should have been more vigilant about the over-all state of their employees. It would be very surprising that this
co-pilot did not shown some signs of distress, or mental illness in the events
leading up to the crash. Also, how did
his family and friends not now about how bad his condition was? It seems to me
that the only explanation is that the co-pilot led a very solitary lifestyle,
and that the ones who could have helped him didn’t know the severity of his
distress. I don’t know that even when
all of the facts do come to light if we can ever truly understand how someone
could not only take his own life but the lives of 150 innocent people. Perhaps one positive result of this tragic
event will be the spotlight on the seriousness of mental illness and getting
proper treatment.
Truly this situation is a bizarre one, and has only gotten more bizarre as additional details come to light. Interestingly enough, it's been revealed that the co-pilot did have suicidal tendencies in the past. When it's all said and done, this whole thing really does call into question the protocol that goes into training and screening airline pilots.
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