One Pilot Locked Out of Cockpit Before Germanwings Plane Crash - Reports

One of the pilots of the Germanwings Airbus A320 jet that crashed in the French Alps left the cockpit of the plane before it went down and was not able to get back in, the New York Times reports citing a senior military official.

PARIS (Sputnik) – The A320 plane crashed in a remote mountainous region in southern France on Tuesday morning.

"The guy outside is knocking lightly on the door and there is no answer," an investigator told the Times about what has been heard on recovered cockpit voice recorders. "And then he hits the door stronger and no answer. There is never an answer."

"You can hear he is trying to smash the door down," the investigator added.

The new evidence raises some serious questions about the cause of the crash which left all 142 passengers and 6 crew members dead. The plane lost altitude suddenly, dropping from 38,000 feet over about 10 minutes. During that time the plane sent no distress signal. 

"We don't know yet the reason why one of the guys went out," the official, who requested anonymity because the investigation is continuing, said as quoted by the New York Times on Wednesday.

"But what is sure is that at the very end of the flight, the other pilot is alone and does not open the door," the official added, referring to the A320 cockpit voice recorder data.

The plane's first black box, the cockpit voice recorder, was recovered on the same day. On Wednesday, parts of the second black box, the flight data recorder, were found. Media reports said that the memory chip in the second recorder was dislodged.

French President Francois Hollande told reporters on Wednesday that the cover of the second black box had been found, but not all parts of it. Hollande stressed that everything possible was being done to understand why the Germanwings plane crashed.