He was a master of hiding his darkest thoughts and frightened his former lover so much she decided to leave him

He told former girlfriend he was planning an act so horrifying his name would be remembered forever

Lubitz had sought help for vision problems in the weeks leading up to the crash despite being deemed 'fit to fly'

Torn-up sick notes have been found in 27-year-old's flat which showed he had hidden extent of illnesses from Germanwings

Andreas Lubitz should have been off sick on day he deliberately crashed plane into mountainside

The pilot concealed medical conditions that would have stopped him flying, including psychological disorders

Killer co-pilot Andreas Lubitz sought treatment for problems with his vision in the weeks before he deliberately crashed his Germanwings A320 Airbus into the French Alps.

The problems may have meant the end of his flying career, officials disclosed.

He was also treated by several neurologists and psychiatrists for 'severe overload syndrome', which can be debilitating. Whether his vision complaints were linked to his psychological difficulties is unknown.

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Erratic: Lubitz (pictured) was a master of hiding his darkest thoughts and would wake up from nightmares screaming ‘we’re going down’. He also told his former lover that he was planning a heinous act

Relationship: Lubitz and his ex-girlfriend lived in a smart flat on the outskirts of Dusseldorf, understood to be in the block pictured above

Recovery: Rescue helicopters continued to search the province in the French Alps today for further signs of wreckage and bodies

Grief: Relatives of the victims laid flowers at a memorial in Le Vernet, south-eastern France today (left) as the family of Germanwings captain Patrick Sonderheimer - the plane's pilot who was locked out of the cockpit by Lubitz - consoled each other in the Alps (right)

Upset: The family of pilot Patrick Sonderheimer, who desperately tried to gain re-entry to the cockpit in his final moments, at the memorial

Tributes: Relatives place flowers in the village of Le Vernet in the French Alps, close to the crash site of the Airbus A320, for the victims

The revelations came as police revealed that evidence found at Lubitz' home suggested he was suffering from a 'serious psychosomatic illness'.

Officers reportedly found a variety of drugs used to treat mental illness at his flat in Dusseldorf, appearing to substantiate claims he was severely depressed.

And a former partner described him as a tormented, erratic man who was a master of hiding his darkest thoughts and would wake up from nightmares screaming ‘we’re going down’.

The 26-year-old Germanwings stewardess, known only as Maria W, revealed to a German newspaper how Lubitz ominously told her last year:

‘One day I will do something that will change the whole system, and then all will know my name and remember it.’

It is not clear how severe Lubitz' eye problems were, but officials confirmed that evidence found at his home suggested he was being treated for psychological issues. It is understood that he hid his health problems from Germanwings.

Two officials with knowledge of the investigation said the authorities had not ruled out the possibility that the problems with his vision could have been psychosomatic, the New York Times reported.

The revelation came after German investigators revealed that the 27-year-old should have been off sick on the day he deliberately flew his 149 passengers and colleagues to their deaths in the Alps.

Investigators said medical sign-off notes were found at his home - including at least one that covered the day of the crash - and Dusseldorf University Hospital confirmed he had been a patient there over the past two months.

While the hospital would not initially disclose his condition, bosses confirmed that he had been evaluated at the clinic in February and on March 10.

The hospital, which has its own eye clinic, later denied speculation that he sought treatment for depression at the centre but would not confirm he had attended for vision problems, citing privacy laws.

It came as German newspaper Welt am Sonntag said police found evidence at his flat which suggested he was suffering from 'severe burnout syndrome' - a serious psychosomatic illness.

A source in the police investigation team told the newspaper that Lubitz was treated by several neurologists and psychiatrists, before adding: 'This is clear from personal notes stored and collected by the pilot.'

'Severe burnout syndrome' is a state of emotional, mental and physical ‎exhaustion and is often linked to those in jobs with high stress levels.

It's symptoms include alienation and negativity towards their work environment and colleagues and it is also known to cause suicidal tendencies and anger issues.

German state prosecutors and police declined to comment on the media reports, adding there would be no official statements on the case before Monday.

Earlier, Lubitz's former lover Maria, who claimed to have dated the pilot and keen runner for five months after the pair met while flying across Europe together, said he 'never really' spoke of illness but she was aware he was receiving psychiatric treatment.

She said they spent 'several nights' in hotels together and described him as a 'nice and open-minded' man.

However, she claimed there was a difference between his professional and his private ego, with him being 'soft' and needing love when the couple were alone but becoming 'someone else' when they talked about work.

She told Bild: 'We spoke a lot about work and then he became another person. He became agitated about the circumstances in which he had to work, too little money, anxiety about his contract and too much pressure.'

His personal problems and erratic behaviour became so severe that the flight attendant decided to call the relationship off after fearing his increasingly volatile temper.

'During conversations he'd suddenly throw a tantrum and scream at me,' she said. 'I was afraid. He even once locked me in the bathroom for a long time.'

Despite parting from Lubitz, Maria said previous conversations with him suddenly 'made sense' when she heard about the crash on Tuesday.

She said: ‘When I heard about the crash, there was just a tape playing in my head of what he said: “One day I will do something that will change the system and everyone will then know my name and remember me”.

‘I did not know what he meant by that at the time, but now it’s clear.’

She added: 'The torn up sick notes make sense now to me and were a clear sign that he did not want to admit that his big dream of flying as a captain was over.'

Dozens of mourners attended a special mass in honour of the victims of the doomed flight at a cathedral in the French Alps this morning

The congregation said prayers during the special ceremony which was held to honour the 150 people who died in the deliberate crash

The ceremony was held in Notre-Dame-du-Bourg Cathedral in Dignes in the French Alps today as rescuers continue to scour the crash site

Adults and children from across the region attended the ceremony as families of the victims still come to terms with the horrific tragedy

The victims were honoured in a special ceremony in the French Alps today as it emerged Lubitz had sought help over vision problems

One woman expresses her grief during the mass today (left), while another member of the congregation lights a candle for the victims

Police will want to interview the air stewardess in detail about the pilot’s state of mind, as well as his most recent girlfriend who he is said to have lived with in a smart flat on the outskirts of Dusseldorf. One report claimed they had been together on and off for seven years and were engaged and planned to marry next year.

Lubitz had reportedly ordered two new Audis for them just before the tragedy in an apparent desperate last attempt to win her back. But she appeared to have rejected his offer, as only one car was ever delivered.

It is not known why they split but it has been claimed their relationship broke down because he was secretly gay and was suffering torment over hiding his homosexuality.

BRITISH AIRLINES TO REVIEW HEALTH CHECKS FOR PILOTS The UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has instructed British flight operators to review their policies on pilot assessments following the revelation that Germanwings pilot Andreas Lubitz had shown signs mental health problems. A CAA spokesman said all pilots flying for UK airlines undergo 'extensive and regular medical assessments to determine their fitness to hold a licence'. He added: 'As part of this, aeromedical examiners are required to assess a commercial pilot’s mental health at each medical examination which, for an airline pilot flying with at least one other pilot, is undertaken annually. 'These detailed medical assessments are in line with international aviation standards. 'We will continue to monitor the situation as the investigation develops and our thoughts remain with the friends and relatives of all those affected by this tragic incident.' Advertisement

One report claimed he was taunted by fellow pilots for previously being a 'trolley dolly' airline steward and dubbed 'Tomato Andy' - a derogatory gay slur - by colleagues.

A Lufthansa spokesman declined to comment on the stewardess's comments but the company and its low-cost subsidiary Germanwings took out full-page advertisements in major German and French newspapers today, expressing 'deepest mourning'.

The firms offered condolences to the friends and families of the passengers and crew and thanked the thousands of people in France, Spain and Germany it said had helped since the crash.

German officials also announced that there would be a ceremony on April 17 in Cologne Cathedral attended by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and senior officials from other countries including France and Spain.

As investigators continue to scour his complicated background, it also emerged that the fitness fanatic was receiving treatment for his mental health issues and apparently feared his flying licence would be taken away if his airline learned the extent of his psychological breakdown.

At least one of the medical certificates found by investigators covered Tuesday, the day Lubitz locked his captain out of the cockpit and calmly crashed the aircraft. Reports in Germany last night claimed that two doctors had signed him off sick on the day of the disaster.

More sick notes are said to have covered other days when he flew despite being told not to. But police said they found no suicide note in a five-hour search.

Lubitz had notched up more than 600 flying hours and had been deemed ‘100 per cent’ fit to fly after passing regular medical tests.

Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr said all pilots undergo annual medical checks, but not special psychiatric assessments beyond training.

He added: 'He passed all medical exams, all checks. He was 100 per cent fit to fly without any restrictions.’

Mr Spohr said Lufthansa pilots go through an extensive battery of physical and psychological testing including regular vision and cognitive tests.

He added that Lufthansa routinely checks on pilots’ ability to fly, but that psychological exams are not implemented once training ends.

A spokesman for Germanwings told MailOnline that under German employment law it was the responsibility of an employee to inform an employer if they were deemed unfit to work.

He said: 'We do not have the right to ask for this medical information from any employee. It is their responsibility to tell their superior, to tell their employer if they are sick.' He said doctors could not step in as the data would be protected.

The company also stressed that it was unaware of any medical notes from Lubitz.

Memorial: Relatives of the victims on the crashed Germanwings flight gathered in the French Alps today to pay tribute to their loved ones

Floral shrine: French police officers continued to guard tributes which have been left at a special memorial in the village of Le Vernet

Rescue: A French Gendarmerie helicopter takes off from Seyne-les-Alpes today as the operation to recover the wreckage continues

Analysis: Police officers carry DNA samples of victims of the disaster to be tested at a mobile laboratory set up near the crash site

Samples: Investigators at the Germanwings crash site revealed they have retrieved more than 400 body parts belonging to the disaster's 150 victims - but have not found an intact body. Above, DNA testing is carried out in the makeshift forensics laboratory near the crash site

Described as a man whose life-long obsession had been to become a pilot, it has been suggested he may have feared his flying licence might not be renewed on medical grounds. One friend said he 'would have died' if he had not passed his flying exams.

It also emerged that Lubitz was familiar with the area of the French Alps where he brought down the Airbus A320, having previously completed a gliding course there.

He frequented a gliding club just 30 miles from the crash site with his parents as a child before later flying over the province himself as a teenager.

Members of his former flying club said he was ‘passionate and obsessed’ with the Alps and would have been well-acquainted with the area of the crash.

The disclosures will raise more questions for Lufthansa, the parent company of Germanwings, as to how he was allowed to fly a passenger jet when he was known to suffer from depression – and to have suffered burnout and mental illness.

Unusually, Lubitz’s file with the German Civil Aviation Authority had been ‘flagged’ with the warning that he needed regular psychological assessment before being allowed to continue to fly.

Lawyers believe the families of victims could win up to £100million in a joint action against Lufthansa and Germanwings, which had claimed Lubitz was ‘100 per cent fit to fly’ but then admitted he slipped through their safety net.

Belgian Christian Driessens, whose brother Claude died in the crash, said: ‘I don’t understand how a serious company can let a depressed man pilot a plane.’ Police have ruled out any religious or political motive for the crash.

Scene: A helicopter flies over the snow-covered French Alps as operations continue at the crash site of the doomed Germanwings flight

Wreckage: Search teams continue to scour the site, in which debris and human remains were scattered over an area of two square miles

Recovery: Rescue said yesterday they have recovered the bodies of 14 of the 150 victims and returned them to the base of the mountain

Crash: Recovery workers are still scouring the area where the plane crashed down and have recovered the bodies of some of those killed

CAPTAIN'S CROWBAR FURY The captain of the Germanwings plane desperately tried to break down the cockpit door with a crowbar after Andreas Lubitz locked him out, it emerged yesterday. The flight recorder showed that Patrick Sonderheimer repeatedly knocked on the door of the cockpit as the plane began to descend. But he resorted to using a crowbar to try and get through the armoured panel as the plane plunged fatally towards the Alps. German newspaper Bild yesterday reported that he had attempted to use an axe, and a Germanwings spokesman confirmed that such a tool was on board the aircraft. But it emerged last night that the only axe on the plane would have been in the cockpit, meaning it was out of reach of the captain. Advertisement

Ralf Herrenbrueck, of the German prosecutors office, said that torn-up sick notes ‘support the current preliminary assessment that the deceased hid his illness from his employer and colleagues’.

He said seized documents indicated ‘an existing illness and appropriate medical treatment’.

Police are investigating whether Lubitz had stopped taking any medication he was on.

As well as having been signed off from training with depression in 2008 and suffering a ‘depressive episode’ in 2009, it was reported that Lubitz had continued to receive mental health support right up until this week’s crash.

He had been described as ‘unflyable’ while at flying school and had been downgraded on several occasions due to depression. He had received psychiatric treatment for an 18-month period, according to reports.

Lubitz seemed overwhelmed by stress after he started his pilot training course with Lufthansa, said the boss of fast food restaurant where he had previously worked.

Airline bosses stressed last night that Lubitz had not presented the company with a sick note for last Tuesday – and it had not known he had been signed off.

It came as relatives of the victims on the doomed flight, including those of captain Patrick Sonderheimer, gathered in the village of Le Vernet, near the crash site, to lay floral tributes.

Others attended a special mass ceremony in Notre-Dame-du-Bourg Cathedral in Dignes in the French Alps.

Residents join airline staff in a memorial service for the victims of the Germanwings crash at St-Lambertus-Kirche in Dusseldorf, Germany

Mourners comfort each other after a service in Haltern am See, home to the 16 schoolchildren and two teachers who died in the crash

A passenger on the outbound flight from Dusseldorf to Barcelona, which is believed to have had Lubitz on board, also questioned today why he didn't down that flight instead.

Michael, 45, said he saw the pilot leave the cockpit during the 6.45am flight for a toilet break.

He told Bild: 'I sat in the fifth row. I could see the front of the plane. The toilet behind the cockpit was apparently out of order, I could see the red light flashing throughout the flight.

'A man over 40, probably the pilot, in a grey V neck sweater came through the curtain. He went through the plane probably to the rear toilet.

'After an estimated three to five minutes he came back and again opened the cockpit door.'

He said he didn't see the co-pilot during the flight but described the journey as 'unobtrusive and 'normal'.

Lubitz, a keen half-marathon runner, grew up in the small town of Montabaur where his businessman father and piano teacher mother owned an imposing detached property, worth some £330,000.

A friend said: ‘For him there was ever only one goal – to fly. It was a dream he had had since primary school. His room was plastered with pictures of planes and the Lufthansa logo could be seen everywhere. Pictures of old planes, new planes, of the largest planes – everywhere you could see aviation stuff.’

The Germanwings tragedy has already led to a number of developments in the airline industry.

The Civil Aviation Authority called on UK airline operators to review safety procedures, and easyJet and British Airways were among several airlines to introduce rules so that two crew members are in the cockpit at all times.

AIRLINE THAT ALLOWED KILLER PILOT TO FLY NOW FACES TENS OF MILLIONS IN LEGAL PAYOUTS The airline that allowed Andreas Lubitz to fly could face compensation claims of tens of millions of pounds, it emerged last night. Lufthansa – which owns the budget carrier Germanwings – is offering immediate aid of up to 50,000 euros (£36,500) per passenger to relatives, it was revealed yesterday. But families of the 149 victims may launch a ‘class action’ for compensation which could see the airline involved in lawsuits for years. Airlines are automatically liable to pay up to £105,000 for each death under the 1999 Montreal Convention – an international agreement on compensation for aviation disasters. But victims’ relatives can make much bigger claims if they can prove they have suffered losses as a result of the crash. In order to reject the demands, the airline must prove that it was not negligent or a third party was responsible – which could be difficult for Germanwings as there is evidence that Lubitz crashed on purpose. Airline spokesman Thomas Jachnow confirmed a report on Lufthansa’s offer by German daily Tagesspiegel. The airline had not previously detailed the level of the payments to relatives, which are separate from eventual compensation claims. Lufthansa CEO Carsten Spohr had said earlier that the airline would ‘honour international arrangements regulating liability’, and noted that the company already has offered immediate financial aid to anyone requiring help. Advertisement

BA made to follow its rivals and ban lone pilots in the cockpit

British Airways is being forced to follow the lead of other UK airlines and ban pilots sitting alone in their cockpits.

It had resisted calls by the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority for it to fall into line with other British airlines such as Virgin Atlantic, easyJet and Monarch in enforcing the policy to stop a repeat of Tuesday’s Alps plane tragedy.

'I LEFT HIM ALONE IN THE COCKPIT' A pilot who once flew with Lubitz last night told how he left him alone in a cockpit to use the toilet. ‘I remember him well,’ said Frank Woiton, 48, ‘and I left my seat from time to time in the air to use the toilet. ‘When I flew with him he told me of his training and how happy he was. ‘He said that he wanted to fly long-haul routes and become a captain. ‘He had mastered the plane very well, he had everything under control. That’s why I left him alone in the cockpit, to go to the toilet.’ He also told how he volunteered to fly the day after the crash after several Germanwings crews refused to board their aircraft. The father-of-two added: ‘I am proud to be a pilot. Right now. The passengers and the crew trust me with their lives. By the unfathomable act of this man endless confidence is destroyed that now must be laboriously rebuilt.’ Advertisement

But European safety regulators last night issued a ‘temporary recommendation’ for airlines ‘to ensure that at least two crew, including at least one qualified pilot, are in the flight crew compartment at all times of the flight’. Such recommendations are effectively mandatory.

Last night the CAA issued an official statement saying: ‘The CAA has been closely co-ordinating with colleagues at the European Aviation Safety Agency since the Germanwings incident and we believe this recommendation is a proportionate step to enhance aviation safety for the travelling public.

We remain in close contact with all UK airlines, and it is the individual airline’s responsibility to determine how to comply with this recommendation, following a review of their cockpit security procedures.’

BA has declined to explain its reasoning insisting: ‘We don’t discuss security issues.’ It repeated that line again last night.

However the CAA said cockpit rules were an ‘operational issue’ and not a security issue.

The details were published in a major new aviation safety information bulletin issued last night and relating to ‘authorised persons in the flight crew compartment.’

But fears have been expressed by some that ‘knee-jerk’ reactions could perversely leave planes more vulnerable to terrorist attack.

The aim of the new rule is to help prevent a repeat of Tuesday’s tragedy when co-pilot Andreas Lubitz, 28, locked his captain out of the cockpit of the Germanwings Airbus and flew the packed plane into a mountainside.

British Airways carries 40million passengers a year to 175 destinations in 79 countries, at the rate of around 750 to 800 flights a day, including 43 to the USA. It has 281 aircraft of which 134 are long-haul and 147 short-haul. It employs 3,600 pilots and 15,600 cabin crew.

BA was the only one of the eight major UK airlines to refuse to implement new cockpit rules when they were first announced on Thursday.