Image by: Dean Morley
By Jack Day

In every tragedy people try to look for a silver lining, but the truth is what is done is done. Not knowing a single person on Germanwings Flight 9525 I, like many, felt extremely horrified when I heard the news of what happened. Words fail a person in situations like this, especially considering the horrific reason behind the flight’s demise.

In the days after I could not imagine the strange collective thinking that the cycle of passengers were experiencing. It would be like getting on some of the first flights back in the air after 9/11. To ease the troubled hearts and minds of his crew and passengers, one Germanwings pilot decided to talk about the elephant that somehow boarded the plane with everyone.

The speech was a reassuring promise to get everyone to their destination safely, as well as a way to pay a little respect to those who lost their lives. In a FaceBook post on the companies page passenger Britta Englisch relayed her own thoughts on the pilots’ kind words.

Translation:

Yesterday morning at 8:40 am, I got onto a Germanwings flight from Hamburg to Cologne with mixed feelings.

But then the captain not only welcomed each passenger separately, he also made a short speech before take off. Not from the cockpit — he was standing in the cabin.

He spoke about how the accident touched him and the whole crew. About how queasy the crew feels, but that everybody from the crew is voluntarily here. And about his family and that the crew have a family and that he is going to do everything to be with his family again tonight.

It was completely silent. And then everybody applauded.

I want to thank this pilot. He understood what everybody was thinking. And that he managed to give, at least me, a good feeling for this flight.

 This is one of those tragedies that is just impossible to wrap your head around.  But this pilot did his best.  How do you feel about this incident?  Please share your comments and thoughts!