The final moments of Germanwings Flight 4U 9525 were shrouded in mystery today after air traffic controllers said they received no SOS despite the jet nosediving 32,000ft in just eight minutes.
All 144 passengers and six crew were today presumed dead after the Airbus A320 crashed in a remote region of the French Alps en route from Spain to Germany.
Debris from the jet, operated by Lufthansa's Germanwings budget airline, has been found scattered over a wide area near Barcelonnette in an inhospitable region of the Alps.
Witnesses have described hearing an explosion 'like the sound of dynamite' then seeing fighter jets fly past, suggesting the passenger plane had been under military escort.
Two babies were among 45 Spaniards feared dead, while 16 German schoolchildren are also believed to have been killed.
Grieving families have been gathering at Dusseldorf airport in Germany, where the jet was due to land, to await news of the rescue and recovery operation.
French president Francois Hollande said he did not expect there to be any survivors.
All 150 passengers and crew on board an Airbus plane operated by the Germanwings are presumed dead after the aircraft crashed in the French Alps region.
Germanwings said the Flight 4U9525 plane, started descending one minute after reaching its cruising height and continued losing altitude for eight minutes on Tuesday.
"The aircraft's contact with French radar, French air traffic controllers ended at 10.53am at an altitude of about 6,000 feet (approximately 1,825 metres). The plane then crashed," Lufthansa unit Germanwings' Managing Director Thomas Winkelmann told reporters.
He said that routine maintenance of the aircraft had been performed by Lufthansa Technik on Monday.
In a live briefing, French President Francois Hollande said it was unlikely that there were survivors, adding that the area of the crash was remote.
"There were German and Turkish victims. There should be no French victims but I am not completely certain ... We are in mourning," he said. "It's a tragedy on our soil."
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