Update: German Pilot Hid Illness That May Have Kept Him From Flying

March 27, Update: The Germanwings co-pilot who's believed to have deliberately crashed Flight 9525 had an illness that he hid from his employer. In a search of one of Andreas Lubitz' homes, investigators found a torn-up sick note from a doctor, calling for Lubitz to begin medical leave on the same day as the crash, according to the German prosecutors. It's not yet known what the illness was, nor whether it was physical or mental, though German media have reported he'd been diagnosed with depression. At this time, it's still not believed Lubitz was associated with any terrorist groups. This post was originally written on March 24, and has been updated as new information has come to light.

March 26: The co-pilot of Germanwings Flight 9525 crashed the plane into the French Alps deliberately, according to new reports. Soon after Tuesday's flight took off, the commanding pilot left the cockpit and then was locked out by the co-pilot, who purposely initiated the plane's descent, per the most recent timeline. 

All 150 people on board,  144 passengers and five other crew members, were killed.  The co-pilot showed willingness to "destroy the aircraft," according Brice Robin, the French prosecutor investigating the crash, who spoke at a news conference Thursday morning. Robin stopped short of calling the crash terrorism or an act of suicide, but noted that the plane's controlled descent into the mountains would have needed to have been activated intentionally.  On Wednesday night, The New York Times broke the news that recorded data from the flight's black box showed the locked-out commanding pilot banging on the cockpit door, and then trying to break it down, at the time of the plane's crash.  The co-pilot has been identified as Andreas Lubitz, 27, a German pilot who'd worked for the carrier for two years. German Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière said, "we have no indication of any kind of terroristic background for [the co-pilot]." Lubitz was "fully qualified" to fly a plane like Tuesday's downed flight on his own, according to Robin, the prosecutor, and there's no evidence of a heart attack or medical emergency.