Australia is among many countries reviewing aviation safety procedures after revelations the co-pilot of a Germanwings flight deliberately caused it to crash in the French Alps, killing all 150 people on board.

The federal government has sought a briefing from domestic airlines about their cockpit procedures.

“Whenever there is a major aviation incident, everyone reviews their safety procedures,” Prime Minister Tony Abbott said today, adding that aviation was the safest form of transport and “we want to keep it that way”.

A number of international airlines and aviation regulators are changing their practices to ensure there are always two people in the cockpit at any one time, after investigators said co-pilot Andreas Lubitz appeared to have deliberately slammed his Airbus A320 into the French Alps.

Lubitz initiated the plane’s descent while alone at the controls, refusing to open the locked cockpit door for the pilot, who was believed to have gone to the toilet. There was no immediate clue as to the motive.

Canada has ordered its airlines to post two people at all times in cockpits of passenger planes, effective immediately. Canada’s flagship carrier Air Canada, Westjet and charter airline Air Transat have confirmed the policy change to AFP.

Germany’s aviation association BDL has announced it plans to introduce a two-person cockpit rule, while British airline easyJet, Norwegian Air Shuttle and Icelandair have all announced they will now require two people to remain in their planes’ cockpit.

EasyJet in a statement on Thursday said it “can confirm that, with effect from tomorrow … it will change its procedure”.

Its Ireland-based budget rival Ryanair already has the two-person cockpit policy.

Norwegian Air Shuttle’s flight operations director Thomas Hesthammer said when one person left the cockpit, “two people will now have to be there”, effective from Friday.

And Air Transat has “decided to always have two people in the cockpit”, also starting on Friday, its spokeswoman Debbie Cabana said.

The head of Germanwings’ parent company Lufthansa, Carsten Spohr, said the two-person cockpit rule would be discussed at an industry meeting on Friday to be attended by the Federal Aviation Office (LBA).

In a chilling account of the last minutes of Germanwings Flight 4U 9525, lead prosecutor Brice Robin on Thursday said 28-year-old Andreas Lubitz initiated the plane’s descent while alone at the controls.

The young German appeared to “show a desire to want to destroy” the plane, Robin told reporters, basing his findings on sound recordings from the Airbus A320’s cockpit flight recorder in the minutes before the crash.

Among the dead were Australian nurse Carol Friday and her son Greig, both from Melbourne.

Robin said those on board died “instantly” and probably were not aware until the “very last moment” of the impending disaster.

“The screams are heard only in the last moments before the impact,” said the prosecutor.

“The co-pilot was alone at the controls,” he said. “He … refused to open the door of the cockpit to the pilot.”

The pilot, believed to have gone to the toilet, made increasingly furious attempts to re-enter the cockpit, banging on the door, the recordings show.

There was no immediate clue as to the motive of the co-pilot, but investigators appeared to rule out terrorism.

“At this moment, there is no indication that this is an act of terrorism,” Robin said, adding that Lubitz had no known terrorist connection.

Germany’s interior minister echoed this, saying there was so far no indication of “a terrorist background.”

Robin also said he was unwilling to use the word “suicide” and could not guess at Lubitz’s motive.

“Usually when you commit suicide, you do it alone. When you’re responsible for 150 people, I don’t call that a suicide,” he said.

The co-pilot, who deliberately set the controls “to accelerate the plane’s descent” into the side of a mountain, “was conscious until the moment of impact,” Robin said.

“This action can only be deliberate. It would be impossible to turn the button by mistake. If you passed out and leaned over on it, it would only go a quarter-turn and do nothing,” he stressed.

“He didn’t reply to a thing. He didn’t say a word. In the cockpit, it was utter silence.”

Lufthansa chief executive Carsten Spohr said he was “stunned” by the revelations and had “no indication” on the motives of Lubitz.

He added that no security “system in the world” could have prevented the co-pilot’s actions.

Spohr said Lubitz had passed all psychological tests required for training and underwent regular physical examinations.

The shocking new information was released as families and friends of victims travelled to the remote mountainous crash site area.

Two planes arrived in southern France on Thursday from Barcelona and Duesseldorf with families and friends.

Tents were set up for them to give DNA samples to start the process of identifying the bodies of loved ones, at least 51 of whom were Spaniards and at least 72 Germans.

Meanwhile, the remains of victims, found scattered across the scree-covered slopes, were being taken by helicopter to nearby Seyne-les-Alpes, a source close to the investigation told AFP.

Germanwings co-pilot a friendly pro

Andreas Lubitz was a life-long flying enthusiast who had flown for Lufthansa’s low-cost subsidiary for nearly two years and had belonged to a flight club since childhood.

German authorities and Lubitz’s employers and neighbours said they had no idea what might have led him to bring down a plane with 149 other people on board in the French Alps on Tuesday.

The head of Lufthansa, parent company of Germanwings, told a news conference that there wasn’t “the slightest indication what might have led” to his actions.

“In our worst nightmares we could not have imagined that this kind of tragedy could happen to us here at the company,” Carsten Spohr said.

The head of LSC Westerwald flying club, which Lubitz joined as a youth, described the aviator as a guy-next-door type.

“He was just a normal young person, actively engaged in life and not really unusual in any way,” Klaus Radke told AFP, calling him “a very skilled professional”.

Before the horrific findings of the French investigation emerged, the club had posted a tribute to Lubitz on its website on Wednesday, saying he had died doing what he loved.

Lubitz was from the western town of Montabaur and lived with his parents there while keeping a flat in Duesseldorf, a Germanwings hub and the city for which the doomed flight from Barcelona was bound, Montabaur mayor Gabriele Wieland told DPA news agency.

Neighbours in the small town of 12,500 people said Lubitz had a girlfriend and the couple liked to jog together. He also had a young brother who did not live with him.

On his quiet, neatly-swept residential street, acquaintances of Lubitz said they were stunned by the news.

“I cannot believe it and don’t want to believe it. I am absolutely shocked,” Johannes Rossbach, 23, told AFP.

A man in his 50s who gave his name only as Hans-Dieter fought back tears as he said he travelled from a nearby town to see Lubitz’s home.

“I wanted to know where the murderer lived,” he said.

“He’s like the guy in Norway who started shooting people,” referring to Anders Behring Breivik, the right-wing extremist who murdered 77 people in 2011.

Lubitz had worked for Germanwings, a Lufthansa subsidiary, since September 2013 and had 630 hours of flight experience.

Germany’s interior minister Thomas de Maiziere said Thursday there was no indication of Lubitz having “a terrorist background”, echoing comments by French officials.