Two years after horror crash relatives open up about torment of missing loved ones as they sue Germanwings over suicidal pilot
As second anniversary nears, family of Brit Martyn Matthews say they're still awaiting his return after Andreas Lubitz deliberately brought down plane in Alps
BRITISH passenger Martyn Matthews watched in terror as the plane captain tore at the locked cockpit door with a crowbar while the packed aircraft plunged from 38,000ft.
“For the love of God, open this door!”, the captain yelled.
But at the controls was suicidal co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, who deliberately crashed the Airbus A320 into the Alps in 2015 killing himself, five colleagues and all 144 passengers.
Now, two years on, families of the four victims who lived in Britain are to sue flight operator Germanwings in the UK.
Lawyers for the relatives of businessman Martyn, student Paul Bramley along with Marina Bandres and her baby son Julian will this week file a damages claim in the Royal Courts of Justice in London.
These families are claiming through the UK courts while relatives of some of the depressed pilot’s other victims have been awarded “derisory” damages under the German legal system.
Martyn’s grieving widow Sharon, told The Sun last night: “No family must ever go through what we have been through.”
Martyn, 50, a senior quality manager, had been on a business trip and was keeping a promise made to his wife that he would return to their Wolverhampton home early.
So he caught the fated flight from Barcelona to Dusseldorf.
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Germanwings’ owners, Lufthansa, quickly made advance payments of £43,500 to relatives of all 144 passengers killed in the March 24 horror for funeral and travelling expenses to the crash site near the village of Le Vernet.
But since then, passengers who have tried to claim against the airline in Germany have been offered “meagre” payouts.
Lufthansa offered some families of the 72 German passengers just £21,750 for the victims’ pain and suffering.
A pittance compared to the reported £2.4million salary and bonus package of Lufthansa’s Chief Executive Carsten Spohr.
Relatives of victims who lived in the UK have still not received a written apology from the airline.
Their lawyers are now suing Germanwings for damages in the UK courts where compensation payouts are higher than in Germany.
And the British victims are also part of civil action in the USA, which could cost Lufthansa millions of dollars.
That action is being brought at Arizona’s District Court as Lubitz spent three months at Lufthansa’s air training centre in Phoenix in 2010.
Lawyers for the victims are arguing Lubitz’s training should have ended when Lufthansa realised he had previous mental illness. Luftahansa are fighting the US case.
Aviation law specialist Clive Garner of Irwin Mitchell Solicitors, who represents the UK victims, says: “Lubitz had a history of depression and suicidal tendencies.
"Should that have been sufficient for Germanwings to have cancelled his training? Because if they had, 149 people would still be alive today.”
Martyn Matthews worked for German car parts firm Huf, which has offices in the West Midlands.
He regularly flew to Barcelona for business meetings and usually got home at midnight.
But on the morning of Tuesday, March 24 he was on Flight 4U9525.
Catering student Paul Bramley, 28, had switched flights at the last moment on his trip home to see his family in Hull.
Marina Bandres Lopez-Belio, 37, was returning home to Manchester from her native Spain with her seven-month-old son, Julian.
In an interview to mark the second anniversary of the crash Sharon Matthews, 50, revealed how she and husband Martyn were looking forward to time together having raised their children Jade, now 22 and Nathan, 25.
She said: “We’d just celebrated 25 years of marriage. We’d brought our two beautiful children up to be really good young adults.
“We’d given all our efforts to our children and he said ‘this is our time’. People think two years on, it’s all done and dusted. It isn’t. I still haven’t come to terms with it. I just want my husband back. Anybody can see what it’s done to us.”
Sharon, who teaches gym and dance at a local school, adds: “I hate Sundays and I hate Tuesdays. Actually, I hate most of it. Sunday is the day he said ‘bye’ and Tuesday is the day he said, ‘Don’t forget, I’m coming home early’. He didn’t. I’m still waiting for him to come home.
“I need to get over that and the fact they went in such a pre-planned, horrific way.”
“The other families are in the same position. Two years on they have no closure.”
Sharon is determined that such a horror can never happen again.
So, with the help of her local MP Emma Reynolds and her lawyers, she is campaigning for airlines and civil aviation authorities to learn from the tragedy and support pilots who, like Lubitz, suffer from mental problems and suicidal feelings.
She says: “So many lives are in the hands of pilots and I want to make sure there are good systems in place to support them when they are feeling like that.”
Sharon has seen officials at the Department of Transport and hopes to meet the UK Civil Aviation Authority.
On Friday, the second anniversary of the crash, Sharon, Nathan and Jade, will join the families of all 149 victims at the crash site 6,000 feet up in the French Alps for the unveiling of a new memorial.
Martyn is buried there and they will also visit his grave.
Sharon says: “It’s a beautiful, place. Even though a horrific, unbelievable incident happened there you feel so calm, so close. It’s like mother nature is protecting them.”
