Berlin: As more details emerge about the co-pilot of the ill-fated Germanwings Airbus A320 plane, the pieces of information portray the picture of a troubled 28-year-old man struggling with an 'unspecified' illness, including psychiatric and deteriorating eyesight problems that Andreas Lubitz feared might cost him his pilot's job.
Lubitz, 28, who was in 2009 (according to German newspaper Bild reports) forced to leave his pilot trainings midway because of depressions and anxiety attacks, was also seeking treatment for eyesight problems, investigators told the New York Times.
Though it has not yet become clear how serious was his eye problem, one of the investigators suspected that the eye trouble may have been related to and caused by his psychological condition, the report added.
According to a German newspaper report, the co-pilot had a detached retina, the Reuters reported.
In what might have added to his emotional trauma, it has emerged that the co-pilot was dumped by his girlfriend of seven years just a day before the crash. According to a report in the New York Post, the co-pilot's fiancee whose last name was Goldbach and with whom he had planned a 2016 wedding, had dumped him on Monday, just a day before he brought the plane down.
Earlier, another girlfriend of the co-pilot, identified as Maria W, told German newspaper Bild that Lubitz used to get nightmares of plane crash and had many times woken up in the middle of the night screaming “We’re crashing!”.
Meanwhile, the prosecutors have said that he was going through an illness and receiving proper medication for the same, suggested medical documents found at his home.
During searches at his addresses in Germany, police also found anti-depressants and “torn sick notes” - one of them declared him unfit for work on the day of the crash.
However, apparently the co-pilot managed to hide his illness and sick notes that were found shredded and on Tuesday was at the controls of the plane alone when he deliberately crashed it into the French Alps.
Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr said that he had passed all psychological tests required for training.
Andreas Lubitz, who was co-piloting the Germanwings Airbus, is said to have deliberately crashed the plane by pressing the button that caused the plane to plummet rapidly for eight minutes before it slammed into the French Alps.
According to the recordings retrieved from the CVR (Cockpit voice recorder), the co-pilot, who had locked the cockpit, was calm and breathing till the plane crashed.
Meanwhile, investigators continue to comb the French Alps as they struggle to recover the crash remains. Of 150 on board, half were Germans, 50 Spanish and others were from a dozen different nations.
