Australia orders two on flight decks after French Alps plane crash

"The government has been in discussion with the airlines over the last couple of days and there has been an agreement that airlines in Australia will move immediately to adjust their flight operation procedures to ensure that there are always two people on the flight deck," Mr Truss told reporters on Monday.

Last week the European Aviation Safety Agency recommended that at least two people be present in the cockpit of planes at all times following the loss of Flight 4U 9525, which French officials say appears to have been a case of suicide and mass killing.

Many European airlines have since moved to implement the so-called "rule of two" which is already standard in the United States, while Canada has also ordered its airlines to impose the regulation.

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"There are now quite a number of cases, perhaps more than a dozen over the last 30 or 40 years, which are thought to be aircraft crashes resulting from pilot suicide," Mr Truss said.

"It's very, very difficult to intervene in all of these circumstances because they are different in every case but we certainly need to be sure that we're taking every possible step to make sure there isn't an incident of this nature in Australia and that global aviation is as safe as possible."

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Australia orders two on flight decks after French Alps plane crash