Correction to report from 26.02.2017

It is now a year ago, almost to the day, that for the 2nd anniversary of the Germanwings crash the “Welt am Sonntag” revisited the topic again in order to “deal with it”, as they  wrote. A three-page article with the headline “Chronicle of an announced catastrophe” appeared on 26.02.17.

Before the appearance of the article, there were repeated attempts by the editors, Dirk Banse and Michael Behrendt, to contact us, attempts which did not cease even after our reply letter explaining that we had no statement to make.

Because their last of several letters, on 18.02.2017, did not provoke a reaction from us, both men appeared on our property on Sunday morning, 19.02.2017, and surprised Günter Lubitz, who coincidentally happened to be present in front of the house. Angered by this personal intrusion, the two were expelled from the property under threat of police intervention.

For reasons of space, we will not include the entire correspondence here, but it can be found under the following link for all to read:

Welt correspondence

In the article it was claimed that we had approached the Welt am Sonntag via correspondence. The reality is that we responded only after the newspaper’s first letter pressing us for information. Our written response was our refusal – namely, that for certain reasons we did not yet want to express our opinion. So, in fact, we did not “contact” the Welt am Sonntag, but rather the newspaper contacted us.

Incidentally, the Welt am Sonntag was not the only medium we responded to in a similar fashion, but in all other cases our refusals were always respected and no other news outlet misrepresented the facts in order to create a news story.

In one of the reporters’ letters to us, they claimed that they possessed a “number of documents” and that they were “investigative journalists” with the unbiased aim of reporting the whole story. However, the published article once again attempted to substantiate a negative image of Andreas. There was no “news”, nor any answers to speculations or lingering questions.

It remains doubtful if the Welt am Sonntag would have offered an objective report had we  indeed consented to share information.

We do not want to split hairs and attempt to weigh every word of every article. But it has certainly been done by others. For example, Franz Josef Wagner in his BILD column, and in the same online portals, wrote: “The Parents (Lubitzes) call it an accident …”, but, in fact, the BEA Final Report itself states: “Accident on 24 March 2015”!

A day later Mike Passmann of the BILD went even further: “Now the parents of Lubitz speak publicly for the first time and report doubts”. (Based on our letter of refusal)

In the same article lawyer Giemulla (victims’ lawyer) comments: “For the survivors of the fatalities, it is a shock to be confronted with alternative facts”. But no “alternative facts” were presented in the article.

Furthermore, at the time of publication our reply letter was almost a quarter of a year old.

Although we had offered nothing, written or spoken, we were again placed in the negative headline spotlight.

This is how Springer journalism works.

L. U.

further bogus press reports:

Maria W. – The ex-girlfriend who never existed

Recent event – the Warm-up for the 3rd Anniversary has begun

Was Andreas Lubitz deep in debt?

A new lie from the tabloid press and an open letter from relatives to Lufthansa CEO

The first media harbinger was already to be seen shortly before Christmas, when a victim’s relative complained publicly. This complaint was subsequently legally initiated at the end of January, and since 02.02.2018 the entire mainstream media has meanwhile jumped on the topic. Although we cannot know who of the affected families have so far accepted Lufthansa payments, the latest development is that Lufthansa will allegedly only provide further payments, e.g. for psychotherapeutic treatments (which are normally covered by all health insurances), if, in return, relatives forego ongoing and future lawsuits against Lufthansa.

Just before midnight on 03.02.2018, the usual time that the BILD newspaper posts its latest online news, it suddenly woke up from its month’s-long slumber with a lengthy report.

Nothing new, just old, warmed-up stories: the same as their counterparts in other media outlets, with here and there a bit rewritten and spruced up, with some remarks from relatives.

And so we come to the main point: Almost a year ago, on 21.03.2017, the father of a teacher who died complained to the FAZ (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung) that Andreas’ parents (us) were stirring everything up again with a news conference and he would be glad if it was all finally over with. But now this same man claims that probably all of Andreas’ colleagues knew about his illness and wondered why he was even allowed into the cockpit. Or were these words put into his mouth? However, this is just as much a BILD lie as was the story of Maria W.

https://andreas-lubitz.com/en/2017/09/04/maria-w-the-ex-girlfriend-who-never-existed/

Regarding this assumption about Andreas’ colleagues, here are the facts:

1. If Andreas had been continuously ill, he would not have been able to do the training nor be allowed to. Please refer to the article from December 2017.
   https://andreas-lubitz.com/en/2017/12/17/the-reality-behind-andreass-health-problems/
2. Had a colleague noticed something, he would not have flown with him and would have been obligated to immediately report it to Germanwings.
3. On the accident flight the captain would certainly not have left the cockpit if he had known about an existing illness, and this must be true about all previous colleagues who left Andreas also alone in the cockpit. Incidentally, the captain leaving the cockpit for a long period of time on both the outbound and return flights is extremely unusual on short-haul flights, yet nobody has questioned this critically.
4. Without exception, colleagues who flew with Andreas praised his professional skills and found him a very pleasant colleague. Within the company he was considered “one of the good ones”, as colleagues have commented. The questioning of colleagues and the professional evaluations in his personal file are part of the investigation file.
5. In the official BEA final report of the Germanwings crash (German version) the following statement on the health status of our son was made on page 17:

“None of the pilots and instructors who flew with him in the months prior to the accident and were interviewed during the investigation expressed concerns about his attitude or behavior during flights.”

https://www.bea.aero/uploads/tx_elyextendttnews/BEA2015-0125.de-LR_04.pdf

Here, therefore, it has again been tried to undermine the picture of Andreas with untruths, which has been going on for three years now. Perhaps only if this picture is maintained can one hope for further payments? It appears to us that this is what it’s all about, as we note that victims’ lawyer Giemulla has recently demanded higher payments from Lufthansa.

There is nothing more to say on this. We conclude by saying that we will not allow ourselves to be provoked by such untruths and will continue to confront them, now and in the future.

L. U.

other bogus press reports:

Maria W. – The ex-girlfriend who never existed

Was Andreas Lubitz deep in debt?