Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 News Updates -- March 25, 2015

Daily Mail: Did Germanwings plane's windscreen CRACK? Pilots of flight 4U 9525 may have been incapacitated after oxygen level plunged - as first pictures of damaged black box flight recorder emerge

* Airbus A320 was carrying 144 passengers - including two babies and 16 German children - plus six crew members
* At least three British nationals and two Americans are believed to have been on board the flight, say officials
* Reports on professional pilot forum suggest black box voice recorder reveals 'structural failure' caused disaster
* Top official says crucial minute between 10.30am and 10.31am when contact was lost was vital to the investigation
* Reports suggest the aircraft had been grounded just 24 hours before it crashed into remote region of French Alps
* One Germanwings flight from Dusseldorf to Barcelona cancelled because pilots 'don't feel they're in a position to fly'
* Several Germanwings crews - including pilots - refused to work at British airports following the accident yesterday
* Helicopter search operations resumed at first light this morning in near-freezing conditions across remote terrain

The doomed Germanwings plane may have crashed because the windscreen cracked, causing a sudden drop in oxygen levels that rendered the pilots unconscious, it was claimed today.

Reports circulating on professional pilot forums suggested the black box on the Airbus A320 had been analysed and revealed that a 'structural failure' was responsible for the disaster.

Flight 4U 9525 dropped out of the sky and ploughed into a mountainside in the French Alps at more than 400mph yesterday, killing all 150 people board.

In the latest theory to emerge, it is thought the windscreen gave way, incapacitating the pilots and leaving them unable to send out a distress call.

Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 news Updates -- March 25, 2015

Alps Plane Crash: Updates -- BBC
Germanwings Flight 4U 9525: Updates -- AP
Germanwings Airbus 320 crash: Hollande, Merkel and Rajoy visit site – live updates -- The Guardian
Germanwings plane crash live: New evidence suggests descent took 18 minutes - latest -- The Independent
Live: Hollande, Merkel and Rajoy visit Germanwings crash site -- France 24
Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 News Updates -- Euronews
Airbus A320 plane crash in Southern France LIVE UPDATES -- RT

Hollande, Merkel, Rajoy arrive in Alps for crash tribute -- Reuters
Search Resumes at Germanwings Crash Site -- VOA
Search operations restart at French Alps crash site -- Al Jazeera
Germanwings plane crash: Leaders visit Alps site -- BBC
France opens black box, hoping to unlock jet crash mystery -- AP
Germanwings plane crash investigators begin examining black box -- The Guardian
Germanwings plane crash: Search underway for second 'black box' -- CNN
Germanwings Crash Investigation Hits Snag in Retrieving Data -- NYT
Crash Experts Face Mystery of Eight-Minute Drop Without a Mayday -- Bloomberg
Pilots of A320 Made Contact With Dispatchers Moments Before Descent -- Sputnik
Helpless Air-Traffic Controllers Watched Germanwings’ Fatal Dive -- Bloomberg
Swedish football team avoids fatal flight 4U9525 after last-minute change of plan -- The Guardian
Two Americans aboard doomed German jetliner; photo of 'black box' released -- FOX News
The classmates who never came home: First picture of tragic German exchange students who died on doomed Flight 4U 9525 -- Daily Mail
A look at the nationalities of victims in France jet crash -- AP
What happened to Germanwings flight 4U 9525? -- The Guardian