Airbus recalls 6,000 A320 aircraft due to control issue

The European aerospace giant Airbus has announced an urgent recall of around 6,000 A320-family aircraft — more than half of the global fleet of this model. The reason is a newly identified flight-control system issue that, in rare cases, may malfunction due to solar activity.

According to Airbus, airlines must immediately perform a software rollback of the ELAC system (the computer responsible for controlling the elevator and ailerons) to a previous version. Until the update is carried out, the aircraft cannot be used for commercial flights (only repositioning flights to maintenance bases are allowed). For most aircraft the procedure will take about two hours. However, more than 1,000 planes may also require hardware replacement, which could lead to much longer downtime.

The investigation was triggered by an incident involving a JetBlue flight from Cancún to Newark on 30 October: an A320 unexpectedly lost altitude due to a control issue and made an emergency landing in Tampa, with several passengers injured. The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is investigating the case.

The situation is worsened by the fact that aircraft maintenance facilities are already overloaded — some Airbus jets are grounded due to long waits for engine servicing, and the industry is facing a personnel shortage. Experts warn that coordinating such a massive recall during the peak season will pose a serious challenge for the aviation market.