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Torn-up sick notes show crash pilot grounded

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Andreas Lubitz competes at the Airportrun in Hamburg, northern Germany. (Michael Mueller, AP
Andreas Lubitz competes at the Airportrun in Hamburg, northern Germany. (Michael Mueller, AP

Düsseldorf - German authorities found torn-up sick notes showing that the pilot who crashed a plane into the French Alps was suffering from an illness that should have grounded him on the day of the tragedy, which he apparently hid from the airline.

French prosecutors believe Andreas Lubitz, 27, locked himself alone in the cockpit of the Germanwings Airbus A320 on Tuesday and deliberately steered it into a mountain, killing all 150 people on board.

"Documents with medical contents were confiscated that point towards an existing illness and corresponding treatment by doctors," said the prosecutors' office in Duesseldorf, where the co-pilot lived and where the doomed flight from Barcelona was heading.

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