By Tim Hepher and Victoria Bryan
LONDON/BERLIN (Reuters) - A task force set up after the Germanwings disaster has recommended improved psychological screening for new pilots, a European database with details of medical visits and better support networks to reduce the risks of a similar tragedy.
The panel of experts led by Europe's aviation safety regulator also called for the introduction of random drugs and alcohol testing of pilots and better oversight of the doctors responsible for their regular medical checks. It delivered its findings to the European Commission on Friday.
European Union Transport Commissioner Violeta Bulc ordered the review after a young pilot barricaded himself inside the cockpit and crashed a Germanwings jetliner into the Alps in March, killing all 150 people on board.
Prosecutors have found evidence that the co-pilot, who had suffered severe depression and may have feared losing his job, had researched suicide methods and concealed an illness from his employer, sparking a debate on supervision and medical secrecy.
"We don't know everything that happened in this tragedy but we know a certain number of causes and we thought we may not want to wait until the final report of the accident investigation to launch actions," Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), told Reuters.
The idea is to "minimise the risk of a similar tragedy in the future", he said in an interview.
The psychological testing recommendation applied only to new pilots because it would be difficult to implement it for all those currently flying, an EU official said.
Co-pilot Andreas Lubitz broke off his training due to a period of severe depression, but Germanwings parent company Lufthansa
Alongside the extra testing, the panel is proposing better support schemes to allow pilots or their colleagues to come forward with concerns about health issues, careers or other problems and discuss them confidentially.
Unions say the proposals would represent welcome progress for the airline industry.
"If the aviation industry, through the work of this task force, can help de-stigmatise mental health issues and the way to deal with them and propose solutions beyond the reaches of the industry, it will have achieved more than the initial goal," said Paul Reuter, technical director of the European Cockpit Association and a member of the task force.
COCKPIT DOORS
The EASA task force -- drawn from airlines, flight crews, doctors and aviation authorities -- did not recommend changes to cockpit doors that were specially strengthened after the Sept 11, 2001, attacks in the United States.
But it endorsed a recent EASA recommendation that there should always be two people in the cockpit.
France's BEA air crash investigation agency has found that Lubitz took advantage of toilet breaks by the captain, both to rehearse the manoeuvre on the previous flight and then to carry out his plan to destroy the jet after locking the captain out on the return flight 9525.
The BEA is investigating separately whether cockpit door-locking systems should be changed and how to balance safety with medical confidentiality, a particularly sensitive issue in nations such as France and Germany.
The medical database proposed by EASA would initially only record the dates and places of specialist 'aero-medical' check-ups and whether a pilot had been deemed fit to fly.
That would not have helped in the case of Lubitz, who is suspected of concealing notes written by a general practitioner, but would prevent what Ky called "medical tourism" or going abroad to get a favourable certificate for the pilot licence.
EASA called for a deeper examination of medical secrecy in all 28 EU nations. Some such as Britain already advise doctors to report any concerns where public safety is at stake.
(Additional reporting by Julia Fioretti in Brussels; Editing by Pravin Char and Keith Weir)
