The recent air tragedy in Europe has affected me very deeply. My heartfelt condolences go out to the bereaved families. I am specially perturbed by the revelations today about the errant conduct of the air crew member that has been identified.
(The French prosecutor was on Thursday quoted as saying that the co-pilot of the Germanwings A320 appears to have deliberately crashed the aircraft killing 144 passengers and six crew members on board.) I came to appreciate the importance of the specialty of aviation medicine decades ago when I had just obtained a private pilot’s licence. I decided to undergo training at the Royal Air Force Institute at Farnborough to qualify as an aviation medicine examiner. I vividly recall posing an interrogatory to Wing Commander Bagshawe, one of my instructors that the syllabus for the course had underplayed the psychiatric dimension and that as a…
