Airlines To Require 2 Crew Members In Cockpit At All Times After Germanwings Crash

easyJet passenger numbers. File photo dated 21/04/10 of an easyJet plane, as the number of passengers flying with low-fare airline easyJet in 2014 topped 65 million. Issue date: Wednesday January 7, 2015. The budget ... easyJet passenger numbers. File photo dated 21/04/10 of an easyJet plane, as the number of passengers flying with low-fare airline easyJet in 2014 topped 65 million. Issue date: Wednesday January 7, 2015. The budget airline carried 65.35 million passengers last year, a 6.5% rise on the total for 2013. December 2014 saw easyJet carry 4.63 million travellers, which was 3.2% more than in December 2013. See PA story AIR Passengers. Photo credit should read: Barry Batchelor/PA Wire URN:21881752 MORE LESS
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LONDON (AP) — Airlines around the world on Thursday began requiring two crew members to always be present in the cockpit, after details emerged that the co-pilot of Germanwings Flight 9525 had apparently locked himself in the cockpit and deliberately crashed the plane into the mountains below.

Leading European budget airlines Norwegian Air Shuttle and EasyJet, along with Air Canada, say they will now require a minimum of two crew members in the cockpit while a plane is in the air.

Following the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, U.S. airlines revamped their policies regarding staffing in the cockpit.

Whenever the door is open, flight attendants create a barrier between the cockpit and passengers. Typically, that is done with a beverage cart but some jets are outfitted with a mesh wire barricade. If a pilot leaves to use the bathroom, one of the flight attendants takes his or her seat in the cockpit.

Some European airlines, like Finnair, operated under similar procedures. But many did not prior to Tuesday’s Germanwings crash, which killed all 150 people aboard the plane as it slammed into a mountainside in the French Alps.

Norwegian spokeswoman Charlotte Holmbergh-Jacobsson says the new rules will be adopted “as soon as possible” on all commercial flights globally. She said that the airline’s security department had been thinking about the measure “for a while, and today decided on it.”

Air Canada says it will implement its change “without delay.” EasyJet says its new rules will take effect Friday.

Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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