Andreas Lubitz: Germanwings Co-Pilot was Undergoing Psychiatric Counselling after Break-up with Girlfriend

It is now being reported that the Germanwings co-pilot, who crashed his plane into a mountain, killing 150 people on board, was receiving psychiatric counselling till the day of the crash to deal with his recent break-up with girlfriend.

Initial investigations into the co-pilot's background had revealed that Andreas Lubitz had a girlfriend and was planning to marry her next year, according to reports.

The shocking manner in which Lubitz locked the captain of Airbus A320 out of the cockpit and then accelerated the plane to make it crash into the French Alps has left many questioning his motive.

The mass murder-suicide had led to investigation of the co-pilot's terror links, but nothing much has come up in that angle. However, some of his friends reportedly said he suffered from a "burnout syndrome" and depression in 2009, after which he had taken six months off from training.

Now German newspaper Bild has come out with another revelation that Lubitz was in the middle of a "relationship crisis" with his girlfriend and in fact was struggling to cope up with the break-up, for which he was undergoing psychiatric counselling.

The new information on the life of the Germanwings co-pilot has come hours after investigators began collecting evidences from his flat in Düsseldorf, which he shared with his girlfriend, according to Daily Mail.

Despite the claims of depression, Germanwings has revealed that the 28-year-old had cleared all psychological assessments and was considered "fit to fly."

In the audio recordings taken from the plane's Blackbox, that was recovered on Wednesday, the captain, Patrick S, could be heard growing increasingly distressed as he kept "appealing" to Lubitz to open the door. At last in one final desperate attempt, the captain can be heard trying to break the door using an axe, according to German media.

The French investigators stated that the passengers were unaware of the crash till the last moment and that their death was instant, hitting a mountain at 700km/h.

Lubitz had lived with his parents in the town of Montabaur, but also had a flat in Düsseldorf, which is a Germanwings hub.