No survivors of Germanwings horror crash in French Alps with 150 onboard

A Germanwings plane waits at the airport in Dusseldorf, Germany, Tuesday, March 24, 2015. A Germanwings plane from Barcelona crashed on its way to Duesseldorf over the French. Image by (AP Photo/Martin Meissner)

A passenger jet carrying 150 people has crashed in a remote area of the French Alps as it flew from Barcelona to Dusseldorf.

As search-and-rescue teams struggled to get to the snow-covered region, France’s president warned that no survivors were expected.

The crash site was at Meolans-Revels, near the popular ski resort of Pra Loup, officials said.

The site is 430 miles (700 kilometres) south-southeast of Paris. But with mountains all around and few clear trails into the area, access to the crash site was expected to take time.

The Germanwings Airbus A320 plane left Barcelona at 9.55am local time, sent out a distress signal at 10.45am, then crashed in a mountainous zone in France at an altitude of about 6,550ft (2,000 metres), said Pierre-Henry Brandet, the French Interior Ministry spokesman.

Mr Brandet told BFM television he expected “an extremely long and extremely difficult” search-and-rescue operation because of the area’s remoteness.

Germanwings official Oliver Wagner told German television that Germanwings flight 9525 carried 144 passengers and six crew members. He did not give a breakdown of nationalities on board.

Germanwings is a lower-cost unit of Lufthansa, Germany’s biggest airline.

It has been operating since 2002, part of traditional national carriers’ response from rising European budget carriers. It serves mainly European destinations.

The Germanwings logo, normally maroon and yellow, was blacked out on its Twitter feed.

People waiting for flight 4U 9525 are lead away by airport staff at the airport in Duesseldorf, Germany, Tuesday, March 24, 2015, after a Germanwings passenger jet carrying more than 140 people crashed in the French Alps region as it traveled from Barcelona to Duesseldorf. Image by (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Family members arriving at Dusseldorf airport were taken from the main terminal to a nearby building, which airport employees partially covered with sheets for privacy. At Barcelona airport, police escorted several crying women to a part of the airport away from the media. One woman held a jacket over the head of another woman, who was sobbing.

The owner of a campground near the crash site, Pierre Polizzi, said he heard the plane making curious noises shortly before it crashed.

“At 11.30, I heard a series of loud noises in the air. There are often fighter jets flying over, so I thought it sounded just like that. I looked outside, but I couldn’t see any fighter planes,” he said. “The noise I heard was long – like eight seconds – as if the plane was going more slowly than a military plane. There was another long noise after about 30 seconds.”

Mr Polizzi said the plane crashed about three to 11 miles (five to eight kilometres) from his place, which is closed for the season.

“It’s going to be very difficult to get there. The mountain is snowy and very hostile,” he said.

The municipal sports hall of Seyne-les-Alpes, six miles (10 kilometres) from the Val d’Allos ski resort, was being set up to take bodies or survivors from the crash, according to Sandrine Julien of the town hall.

There was no obvious weather reason why the plane went down. Captain Benoit Zeisser of the nearby Digne-le-Bains police said there were some clouds but the cloud ceiling was not low.

The snow capped French Alps. Image by Doggettx / CC BY 2.0

In addition, the safest part of a flight is when the plane is at cruising elevation. Just 10% of fatal accidents occur at that point, according to a safety analysis by Boeing. In contrast, take-off and the initial climb accounts for 14% of crashes and final approach and landing accounts for 47%.

In a live briefing, Mr Hollande said it was likely that a number of the victims were German. “It’s a tragedy on our soil,” he said.

The last time a passenger jet crashed in France was the 2000 Concorde accident, which left 113 dead – 109 in the plane and four on the ground.

German chancellor Angela Merkel spoke to both Mr Hollande and Spanish prime minister Mariano Rajoy about the crash, immediately cancelling all other appointments.

At a briefing in Berlin, Ms Merkel told reporters she would travel to the crash site region tomorrow, and that Germany’s foreign and transport ministers were already en route.

She said her thoughts were “with those people who so suddenly lost their lives, among them many compatriots”.

“The crash of the German plane with more than 140 people on board is a shock that plunges us in Germany, the French and the Spanish into deep sorrow,” Ms Merkel said.

She reminded everyone that the cause was not known.

“We still don’t know much beyond the bare information on the flight, and there should be no speculation on the cause of the crash,” she said. “All that will be investigated thoroughly.”

The A320 plane is a workhorse of modern aviation. Similar to the Boeing 737, the single-aisle, twin-engine jet is used to connect cities between one and five hours apart. Worldwide, 3,606 A320s are in operation, according to Airbus.

The A320 is certified to fly up to 39,000 feet but it can begin to experience problems as low as 37,000 feet, depending on temperature and weight, including fuel, cargo and passengers.

The A320 family also has a good safety record, with just 0.14 fatal accidents per million take-offs, according to a Boeing safety analysis.

The German Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation was sending three people to France to join the investigation.

(Press Association)