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Germanwings Flight 4U9525 crashes in the French Alps, all 150 passengers and crew lost

THE two Australians killed in the Germanwings crash have been identified. They were a mother and son holidaying together.

Matt YoungMatt Young
@MattYoung
7 min read
March 24, 2015 - 9:30PM
News Corp Australia
French President on the Airbus crash

THE two Australians killed in the Germanwings Airbus crash have been identified as Carol Friday and her 29-year-old son Greig.

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop confirmed the pair were killed when the flight came crashing down on Tuesday into a remote mountain range in the French alps killing 150 people.

The family of the Melbourne mother and son have released a statement expressing their “deep disbelief” and requesting privacy.

“Carol was a loving Mother of two, a devoted wife to her husband Dave and a sister to three brothers. She celebrated her 68th birthday on March 23rd.

“Greig was to turn 30 on 23rd April. He was a loving son to Carol and Dave and an exceptional brother to his sister Alex. He was adored by all of his family and friends.”

Greig Friday
Greig Friday
Carol Friday
Carol Friday

Carol, a registered nurse and midwife “loved to travel and see many of the world’s greatest sights”, the family said.

Greig, a mechanical engineer and student also loved travel and had just competed a course for teaching English as a foreign language, which he was hoping to do in France the coming year.

The pair had been enjoying a few weeks holiday together as Grieg began his European stay.

“They were both extraordinary and exceptional people who were loved by many, who they loved in return,” the family statement reads.

“They will forever be with us in our hearts, memories and dreams.”

IN the eight minutes it took for the Germanwings Airbus A320 to plunge to earth killing 150 people, no Mayday signal was sent out and no message of distress was sent from the plane to air traffic control.

Authorities are now investigating what happened during those eight minutes of radio silence when the plane plummeted 31,200 feet into a remote mountain range in the French alps, taking two Australians down with it.

The commercial aircraft’s black box has been recovered and will offer vital clues to what happened in what is currently being treated as an accident, but initial reports indicate the pilots may not have been “in control of the environment” when the plane made its sudden descent resulting in the worst air disaster on French soil in decades.

Aviation experts say the descent was slower than the three to four minutes it should have taken, and the fact that no distress call was made was the most crucial aspect in the incident.

“The aircraft was 46 minutes into the flight, it was at the top of its cruise altitude at 48,000ft and then in eight minutes dropped 32,000 feet,” aviation expert Neil Hansford said.

“If it was a total and catastrophic explosion, the debris would be over a much bigger field ... if it was a loss of power it would have glided further.

“It’s simply too early to rule anything out as a cause.”

Debris of the Germanwings Airbus A320 at the crash site in the French Alps. Pic: Denis Bois
Debris of the Germanwings Airbus A320 at the crash site in the French Alps. Pic: Denis Bois

Germanwings Flight 4U9525 was travelling from Barcelona, Spain, to Dusseldorf, Germany, when at approximately 10.30am local time on Tuesday, the plane lost radio contact.

The plane was carrying 144 passengers, including two babies and a group of schoolchildren as well as two pilots and four cabin crew.

A mother and her adult son, from Victoria, are among those who perished, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop confirmed in a press conference this morning, adding the government was seeking to confirm whether any other Australians or dual citizens were on board.

No further details have been disclosed regarding the Australian passengers’ identities.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of the victims,” Ms Bishop said.

The Foreign Minister said the crash was being treated as an accident and the flight company’s CEO said initial information about the cause of the crash should be available “relatively quickly”.

Debris of the Germanwings passenger jet is scattered on the mountain side near Seyne less Alpes, French Alps. Pic: Claude Paris
Debris of the Germanwings passenger jet is scattered on the mountain side near Seyne less Alpes, French Alps. Pic: Claude Paris
A helicopter flies to the crash site Pic: Denis Bois
A helicopter flies to the crash site Pic: Denis Bois

The fatal flight was the first of the day, just 46 minutes in when trouble struck, plummeting 31,200 feet in eight minutes. The cause of the crash is still unclear, but the black box from the flight, which has already been recovered, will provide the first clues.

Shocking images of the crash site show steep terrain as a challenging high altitude search and rescue operation gets underway.

Germany’s Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said the site was “a picture of horror”.

“The grief of the families and friends is immeasurable,” he said.

“We must now stand together. We are united in our great grief.”

A police officer at the horrifying scene told AP: “There is no need for any rescue operations, everyone is dead.”

Rescuers leave from a field where the rescue effort is headquartered Pic: Anne-Christine Poujoulat
Rescuers leave from a field where the rescue effort is headquartered Pic: Anne-Christine Poujoulat

Prime Minister Tony Abbott spoke briefly about the incident this morning offering his condolences.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of all those killed, particularly with the loved ones of the two Australians that have lost their lives,” he said.

“Consular officials are doing all they can.”

Australian consular staff will set up an office in a nearby town and liaise with French authorities regarding the retrieval and recovery operation.

Britain’s Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond said it was “sadly likely” there were Britih nationals on board the flight.

Of the 150 on board, 67 passengers are believed to be German citizens and 45 Spanish. Columbian, Belgian, Danish and Turkish citizens are also thought to be among the dead.

French Prime Minister Manuel Valls confirmed a challenging search and rescue operation was underway with crews arriving at the crash site, near a popular ski resort known as Pre Loup in the Alps.

France’s Interior Ministry has suspended the investigation of the site with recovery of debris and remains expected to continue Wednesday morning. Ten police officers will spend the night guarding the site.

No bodies have been found.

Tearful relatives of passengers gathered grieving at Barcelona and Dusseldorf airports as officials announced none of the 150 people on board survived. Pic: Quique Garcia
Tearful relatives of passengers gathered grieving at Barcelona and Dusseldorf airports as officials announced none of the 150 people on board survived. Pic: Quique Garcia
Relatives of passengers arrive at the Barcelona El Prat airport on March 24, 2015 in Barcelona, Spain. Pic: David Ramos
Relatives of passengers arrive at the Barcelona El Prat airport on March 24, 2015 in Barcelona, Spain. Pic: David Ramos
Gendarmerie and French mountain rescue teams arrive near the site of the Germanwings plane crash near the French Alps. Picture: Patrick Aventurier
Gendarmerie and French mountain rescue teams arrive near the site of the Germanwings plane crash near the French Alps. Picture: Patrick Aventurier
Staff members of Germanwings and Lufthansa hold a candlelight vigil at Dusseldorf Airport. Pic: Marius Becker
Staff members of Germanwings and Lufthansa hold a candlelight vigil at Dusseldorf Airport. Pic: Marius Becker

According to French Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet, debris from the crash has been spotted near the town of Barcelonnette, on the southern edge of the French Alps near a village in the Digne region, about eight hours drive southwest of Paris near the French-Italian border.

Mr Brandet told BFM television he expected “an extremely long and extremely difficult” search and rescue operation due to the remote area of the crash site.

According to Sky News it could be “several hours before rescue teams can even reach the crash site”. There is no access to the crash site by road and weather reports forecast a deteriorating environment, with a downpour of snow likely.

Pierre Polizzi, the owner of camping site Camping Rioclar in the Alpes-de-Hautes-Provence, told Al Jazeera he heard the flight go down.

“There was a loud noise and then suddenly nothing. At first I thought it came from fighter jets that often hold drills in the area. The plane crashed just 2km from here, high on a mountain.”

According to aviation journalist John Walton, the last words from the cockpit were, “Emergency, emergency”.

The transport minister said the flight was flying “at 5,000 feet and in an abnormal situation”.

The crash happened “shortly afterwards”.

It is believed the flight did not send out a distress call during it’s rapid plunge to earth.

“The aircraft did not itself make a distress call but it was the combination of the loss of radio contact and the aircraft’s descent which led the controller to implement the distress phase,” a spokesman for the DGAC authority told Reuters.

In a press conference, Germanwings CEO Thomas Winkelmann confirmed two babies were on board the flight. He said he believed 67 Germans were also on board.

The mayor of the small Spanish town of Jaca in the Pyrenees mountains says that a woman originally from the town died in the crash along with her baby boy.

Jaca Mayor Victor Barrio said Marina Bandres had been attending a funeral in Jaca for a relative and was taken to the Barcelona airport by her father.

The second baby on the flight that crashed on its way from Barcelona to Dusseldorf was the child of German opera singer Maria Radner and her husband, also on the flight.

German opera singer Maria Radner along with her husband and baby, were among the 150 victims of the Germanwings plane crash. Pic: Kerstin Joensson
German opera singer Maria Radner along with her husband and baby, were among the 150 victims of the Germanwings plane crash. Pic: Kerstin Joensson

A group of 16 school students almost missed the flight with one of the year 10 girls scrambling to locate her passport, but the entire group managed to board at the last minute.

The mayor of Haltern, in Germany, Bodo Klimpe, briefed the media about the status of the children, revealing the exchange group studying Spanish were due to return from their school trip today.

Parents are “expecting the worst” because no contact could be made with their children on the telephone, Mr Klimpe said.

“We are getting support from all sorts of authorities and we have a number of people well trained in counselling.”

Candles have started to appear outside the Josef-Konig School where the students were from.

Students gather at a memorial of flowers and candles in front of the Joseph-Koenig-Gymnasium school where 16 victims of the crash attended secondary school. Pic: Sascha Schuermann
Students gather at a memorial of flowers and candles in front of the Joseph-Koenig-Gymnasium school where 16 victims of the crash attended secondary school. Pic: Sascha Schuermann

A Swedish third division soccer team says it booked on the doomed Germanwings flight that crashed in the French Alps escaped death by changing flights at the last minute.

The Dalkurd FF team from Borlaenge, in central Sweden, was booked to fly home to Sweden on the budget carrier on Tuesday after a trip to Catalonia.

Germanwings CEO Thomas Winkelmann.
Germanwings CEO Thomas Winkelmann.

Pierre-Henry Brandet, spokesman for the interior ministry, told BFM TV “the aircraft debris has been localised, and we can only fear a heavy death toll.

“The first information from rescuers suggests that the number of survivors, if there are any, will be low, but until we have reached the site by land, we cannot say with any certainty. The rescuers are being taken in by helicopter.”

Earlier, Germanwings confirmed the crash in a series of tweets.

“We must confirm to our deepest regret that Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 from Barcelona to Dusseldorf has suffered an accident over the French Alps,” the statement read.

“Everyone at Germanwings and Lufthansa is deeply shocked and saddened by these events.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and friends of the passengers and crew members”.

People waiting for flight 4U 9525 are led away by airport staff at the airport in Dusseldorf, Germany. Picture: Frank Augstein
People waiting for flight 4U 9525 are led away by airport staff at the airport in Dusseldorf, Germany. Picture: Frank Augstein
Picture: Frank Augstein
Picture: Frank Augstein
A man who appears to have waited for the missing flight 4U 9525 covers his face at the airport in Dusseldorf, Germany. Picture: Frank Augstein
A man who appears to have waited for the missing flight 4U 9525 covers his face at the airport in Dusseldorf, Germany. Picture: Frank Augstein

An image of the crash site is being circulated online but there is no official word or confirmation.

France’s president, Francois Hollande, said there were unlikely to be any survivors and called the crash a “tragedy”.

“It’s a tragedy on our soil,” he said.

“I want to express to the families of victims of this air crash my solidarity,” he said on Twitter shortly before 10.20pm.

Helicopters have reportedly arrived at the scene. French media outlet Le Monde report 80 firefighters are en route to the scene with more than 200 police.

Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has appeared alongside the French President, confirming 45 Spaniards were on board the flight.

“All I can tell you is that obviously I’m very sad, as many are, about this very dramatic accident,” he said.

“We’re going to do everything in our power to help, to help the families, to give them our support.”

Germanwings is an affiliate of German airline Lufthansa. The plane was travelling between Barcelona and Dusseldorf.

The cause of the crash is not known.

The single-aisle A320 typically seats 150 to 180 people.

If you are concerned for any relatives, call DFAT’s 24-hour emergency numbers on 1300 555 135 (within Australia) or outside Australia: +61 2 6261 3305 or SMS +61 421 269 080.

Originally published as Germanwings Flight 4U9525 crashes in the French Alps, all 150 passengers and crew lost

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Original URL: https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/germanwings-flight-4u9525-crashes-in-the-french-alps-all-150-passengers-and-crew-lost/news-story/d0b2fd0f3e52fe7b590f154c1555843e