WASHINGTON, D.C. March 26 (DPI) – Amid the revelations today that a 28-year-old co-pilot deliberately crashed the Germanwings airliner, readers across the internet were drawn to a 2001 magazine article about the two-year probe of the 1999 EgyptAir crash, a gripping narrative which in the wake of this week’s disaster resonates with real-time wisdom and insight.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2001/11/the-crash-of-egyptair-990/302332/

The 4,000 word article, written in 2001 and published in The Atlantic Monthly in November of that year, only weeks after 9/11,  gives a powerful account of National Transportation Safety Board’s investigation of the EgyptAir crash in which more than 200 were killed, in a fashion not dissimilar to the crash Monday of Germanwings flight 9525. It was revealed by French officials last night that investigators believe co-pilot Andreas Lubitz locked his pilot colleague out of the cockpit and took the jet into a fatal dive. All 150 aboard were killed.

The Atlantic article – brilliantly written, describing the ongoing tension between US investigators and Egyptian officials, who tried to deflect blame from a pilot – was reported and written by William Langewiesche, a journalist with an aviation and piloting background. He now works as an international correspondent for Vanity Fair. His father, also a pilot, wrote one of the primers on pilot training, which is still published.

The magazine’s site, theatlantic.com, revealed that its most popular article today is not from any current issue but from an issue printed more than 13 years ago – “The Crash of Egyptair 990.”