Discussion for article #236049
“Authorities are still puzzling over why co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, who had suffered from suicidal tendencies and depression in the past, sent the Barcelona-to-Duesseldorf flight straight into the French Alp”
I find that sentence to be someone self-contradictory…or perhaps it answers its own question. I’m wondering why heads aren’t rolling with respect to whoever allowed this man to control a plane full of innocent passengers in the first place with that kind of mental health history. Certain things should disqualify you from doing certain things and I question whether there was any negligence on the part of the airlines et al in the first place.
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Yeah, this has all the earmarks of an industry that’s “regulated” by its own insiders. “Can’t take away a man’s livelihood,” even if it endangers everyone around him. Shades of the medical profession.
One doesn’t “get over” severe, suicidal depression. With treatment, people can sometimes get it under control and live reasonably decent lives. But you don’t put someone like that at the controls of a suicide machine.
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Same here. If the guy was suicidal, that’s the answer to “why.”
As for the airline, I suppose as far as they knew, he had been treated successfully for his depression. They evidently didn’t know that he was still being treated, and German law wouldn’t have allowed them to find that out. There needs to be some re-thinking of where to draw the line between individual privacy and the public’s right to safety. And that’s not such an easy line to draw, but Germany and all the rest of the world need to wrestle with it.