It’s not a good day for the power of positive thinking.
News of the Germanwings Airbus A320 crash into the French Alps raises soul-chilling questions that may never be answered. Early reports assume 27 year-old co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, left alone in the cockpit, deliberately plunged the plane and its terrorized passengers to their deaths.
I need some good cheer on a day like this when it’s hard to tell the difference between terror and tragedy, when 148 travelers who trusted the pilot and co-pilot to get them safely from here to there suddenly find themselves in the hands of…. Of whom? Of what?
In my darkest moments I am aware that we are always standing over the abyss of nothingness. Death. Extinction. But, once in awhile, something comes along to cheer me up. So far today it hasn’t.
“O God…, listen, not to our words, but to the groaning that cannot be uttered; harken, not to our petitions, but to the crying of our need.”
[W.E. Orchard, quoted in Harry Emerson Fosdick’s The Meaning of Prayer, p. 117-118, Association Press, 1915]
– Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, March 27, 2015.
Views from the Edge 
The low budget subsidiary airlines like GermanWings pay low pilot salaries. They probably cut costs further by having a minimal pilot clearance system. When an airline does this it needs to be responsible for its negligence. In the US we have the same problem as a result of airline deregulation. If you’re going to do this you better have a thorough pilot screening plan.
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Gary, as you know, the news later today indicates there may have been some yellow flags along the way. It will be interesting to hear what they learn from the second flight recorder.
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Well said. Maybe something wonderful will happen tomorrow.
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Emily, Let’s hope. The news today is what we might have expected re: Qs about medical history. What a terrible tragedy. So….How’s Dartmouth?
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