Father of Germanwings crash victim blames airline for letting co-pilot fly

The father of a British man who was killed in the Germanwings disaster has blamed the airline for allowing the co-pilot to fly the plane, which crashed killing 150 people last year.

Investigators found evidence that the co-pilot Andreas Lubitz deliberately flew the plane into a mountainside after locking the pilot out of the cockpit.

Philip Bramley has told the Sunday Mirror newspaper that if one of the dozens of doctors Lubitz had seen had reported their concerns, his son Paul would still be alive.

Families of victims of the crash were told Lubitz - who was previously treated for depression - had seen 41 doctors in recent years but under German law none was able to alert his employers to his state of mind.

Investigators are due to publish their report into the crash later today, and the specialist aviation law team at Irwin Mitchell, which is representing British families, said it wanted to see "important lessons learned".

Two other Britons also died in the crash; Martyn Matthews, 50, from Wolverhampton, and seven-month-old Julian Pracz-Bandres, from Manchester, who died alongside his Spanish-born mother Marina Bandres Lopez-Belio.

Jim Morris, an expert aviation lawyer at Irwin Mitchell and former RAF pilot, who is one of the team representing the families involved, said: "The information about this tragedy has already been devastating for the families to hear."

He said they want to know why more was not done to prevent the co-pilot from flying "when it seems clear from the evidence already available that he was a potential risk to himself and passengers".

Mr Morris added: "It's crucial that any reasonable recommendations made in the accident report to improve aviation safety are implemented as soon as possible.