In the wake of this kind of problem, people will be wondering why airlines can’t arrange to have ground crews take remote command of aircraft whose crews are in trouble or “misbehaving.”
It’s implementation issues. A remote control would make hijacking possible too in principle. Pilots would not like it any more than they liked the idea of “black boxes” that they could not erase on successful landing (i.e. the chance for being second guessed).
Such a think would require an amazing overhaul of technology.
Probably a more comprehensive examination of a potential pilot’s emotional, mental, physical, and “religious” state would be a lot cheaper.
But that would be, of course, “PROFILING”! (Perish the thought!)
That only moves a weak link further down the chain. Enable a loose nut on the ground or a hacker with the capability to take control of an aircraft in flight from a competent flight crew? Seriously??
Procedurally always requiring two people in the cockpit is much easier to implement.
The root cause is getting to look like the Germanair/Lufthansa screening process failed to find a loose nut behind the wheel.