It is feared that there are no survivors after a German airliner went down in a remote area of the French Alps on Tuesday.
150 passengers were on board Germanwings Flight 9525 from Barcelona, Spain to Dusseldorf, Germany, and French president Francois Hollande told reporters he fears that, because of the conditions of the crash, all on board are dead.
While nationalities of many passengers on board were not immediately available, an executive for Germanwings said 67 of those on board were Germans. The plane reportedly climbed to cruising altitude at 38,000 feet after it took off at 10 a.m., but then started a descent for eight minutes before losing contact with French radar around 10:53 a.m. It is still unclear what caused the crash, but French officials say the plane’s black box has been located at the crash site. Germanwings is a budget subsidiary of Germany’s national carrier, Lufthansa.
Guests:
Jacky Rowland, senior Paris correspondent for Al Jazeera. She is reporting on the crash from the ground in France.
Michael Barr, senior instructor in the Aviation Safety Program at the Viterbi School of Engineering at USC. He’s an expert in aviation safety as well as airline crash investigation and prevention.