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Just been watching a bit of news about the crash. Apparently the co-pilot locked the pilot out for whatever reason. The reporter stated that the co-pilot was a German national but didn't say he was German. Early days I know but whenever something like this occurs I start thinking "terrorist"

You must be American? If a car backfires in rural Montana they think it was a terrorist act. Looks like the bloke was mentally ill.

He possibly was mentally ill but I suspect a pilot goes through a more rigorous medical than " two legs and you're in"Why state he was a German national and not just German ?

Appalling news -what is it about narcissistic whacko's wanting to top themselves & take as many innocent people with them nowadays?

those poor souls on that plane must have known they were going to die way before it happened , you can't open cockpit doors and they would have seen the plane slowly decreasing height...what a tragic end

I saw this on the news, that the guy apparently crashed on purpose. They'll no doubt now be looking at ways of stopping something like this from being able to happen again, how they'll prevent it in future I do not know. Maybe make it impossible for a pilot to lock themselves in, have one of those numbers-panels where you punch in a code from outside to get in and only the flight crew know the number - or maybe a fingerprint recognition facility so it will open for the flight crew and senior stewards. They'll have to do something. A very sad event.

At the end of the day the final person in charge must be human. As far as I see it the pilots must be in charge. I'm sure that any system that could be put in place would have an override or bypass to allow the pilots to take control. Planes have been flying for well over a hundred years and I'm sure they are a lot safer now than they were in the beginning yet you don't hear many stories of pilots deliberately crashing planes then. What has changed ?

Ever since planes started flying there would always have been scope for a nutcase pilot to crash the thing, killing himself and everyone else. Luckily this very rarely happens. I am surprised the guy could lock himself in and no one else be able to enter to cockpit. What would happen if one person was in the cockpit, he had a heart attack and died, and the other crew are all standing outside trying to get in? It seems the meausres put in place after 9/11, to stop the cockpit being entered, have gone too far. I think a number-panel where you punch in a code or a fingerprint recognition thing, as I said earlier, would be a good thing so crew members can get back in.

You may then though have a terrorist forcing a crew member to open the cockpit door at gun point, and the crew member will oblige out of fear of death - a death that would happen anyway though once the terrorist enters the cockpit and crashes the plane. Maybe have one of those means of re-entering the cockpit that I suggested, and have a sky marshall (an undercover guy sitting in the passenger area who is armed, but no one knows who he is) who can be alerted by a bleeper that all crew members would have, and he can then step forward and sort the terrorist out. With this way of doing things the crew will always be able to get back into the cockpit and there will always be someone on board to deal with things if some nutter is trying the take the plane.

I have an electronic safe and I have a key which allows me to open it if the batteries fail. I'm sure a similar system could be done on a plane but at the end of the day, somebody who is smart enough to fly a large plane and who (as it seems to be so far) intends to kill himself will know how to keep the door locked , or jammed.

Basically whatever system they introduce will not be 100% terrorist-proof. I think having sky marshalls on all planes, armed, would be a step in the right direction though. They talked about it after 9/11 but it never happened - at least not to my knowledge.