Analyzing the Descending Flight of the Germanwings A320 4U9525 on 2015-03-24

Abstract

Something (on 2015-03-26, 10:00 still unknown) caused 4U9525 to descent. All the rest is the automatic reaction of a properly functioning Airbus A320 to these initial conditions: The aircraft is disengaging the autopilot automatically at a Mach number of 0.82 as a consequence of High Speed Protection and follows a subsequent descending flight in manual mode (with normal Fly-by-Wire flight control laws) and idle thrust. The pilots probably are neither touching the side sticks nor the thrust levers. At least, it does not need any pilot intervention to explain the cause of the last 9 minutes of the flight and the final tragic effect.