All 150 Onboard Killed In Germanwings Plane Crash In French Alps

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The co-pilot of the Germanwings jet that crashed in the French Alps deliberately forced the plane into the descent that led to the disaster, the prosecutor said. He pressed a button that accelerated the Airbus A320's descent when alone in the cockpit. "It was a voluntary action," Robin said.

The co-pilot – named by the prosecutor as Andreas Lubitz, 28, a German citizen – was alone because the pilot had gone to the toilet. When he returned, the co-pilot refused to open the door. "The intention was to destroy this plane," he said.

Lubitz was breathing normally at the point of impact, the prosecutor reveals. He said nothing during the final descent, which lasted about 10 minutes. "Absolute silence inside the cockpit. Nothing, no word during the last 10 minutes."

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Mr. Robin's conclusions are drawn from the plane's cockpit voice recorder, recovered at the crash site in the French Alps late Tuesday and analyzed by French accident investigators on Wednesday. The recording contains screams believed to be from passengers, once they recognized the plane was crashing.

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A first officer, Lubitz had been flying for Germanwings since September 2013 after being trained with the airline's parent company Lufthansa at its facility in Bremen. He had clocked up a total of 630 hours in the air.

Members of the Luftsportclub Westerwald, a flying club, of which Lubitz had been a member since he was a teenager in Montabaur, said it had been his dream to fly.

"Andreas became a member of the association and wanted his dream of flying to be realised. He began in the gliding school and made it to become a pilot," read a statement on the club's website.