Europe’s Airbus is ordering an immediate software change to a “significant number” of its best-selling A320 family of aircraft. According to industry sources, this would disrupt half the global fleet, or thousands of aircraft.
The software switch, announced Friday and which will affect 6,000 of the widely used A320 family of aircraft, must be made before the next routine flight, threatening cancellations or delays during one of the busiest travel weekends of the year in the United States and abroad.
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Airbus said in a statement that a recent incident involving an A320 family aircraft revealed that intense solar radiation can damage data critical to the functioning of flight controls.
“Airbus has accordingly identified a significant number of A320 family aircraft currently in service that may be affected,” the company said.
“Airbus acknowledges that these recommendations will lead to operational disruptions for passengers and customers,” it added.
Industry sources said the incident that triggered the unexpected repair action involved a JetBlue flight from Cancun, Mexico, to Newark, New Jersey, on October 30, in which several passengers were injured due to a sharp loss of altitude.
Flight 1230 made an emergency landing in Tampa, Florida, after a flight control problem and a sudden uncontrolled drop in altitude, prompting an investigation by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
JetBlue and the FAA had no immediate comment.
The European Union Aviation Safety Agency will issue an emergency directive mandating the fix, Airbus said.
Airbus update on precautionary measures for the A320 fleet
➡️ https://t.co/Rf1J0atSi3— Airbus Newsroom (@AirbusPRESS) November 28, 2025
Two hour repair
For about two-thirds of affected planes, the recall will result in a relatively short grounding as airlines revert to an earlier software version, industry sources said.
Yet this comes at a time of intense pressure on airline repair shops, which are already plagued by maintenance capacity shortages and the grounding of hundreds of Airbus aircraft due to long wait times for individual engine repairs or inspections.
Hundreds of the affected planes may also need to have their hardware replaced, which will make wait times much longer, the sources said.
Shortly after Airbus’ announcement, approximately 3,000 A320 family aircraft were in the air worldwide.
American Airlines and Hungary’s Wizz Air said they had already identified which of their planes would need the software fix. United Airlines said there were no consequences.
The world’s largest A320 operator, the American, said in a statement that about 340 of its 480 A320 aircraft require software replacement, and expects the majority of these repairs to be completed “today and tomorrow,” with each aircraft taking about two hours.
Other airlines, including Germany’s Lufthansa, India’s IndiGo and Britain’s easyJet, said they would temporarily take their planes out of service for repairs.
Colombian airline Avianca said the recall affected more than 70 percent of its fleet, or about 100 aircraft, causing significant disruptions over the next 10 days and prompting the airline to close ticket sales for travel dates through December 8.
Japan’s largest airline, ANA, said on Saturday it had to cancel 65 flights because of the recall. In India, the Directorate General of Civil Aviation, the country’s aviation regulator, has ordered airlines to halt all Airbus A320 flights until required adjustments are completed.
Air India said its engineers were working “around the clock” to complete the software update and “hardware realignment” and that there had been no cancellations and no “major impact on the integrity of scheduling across our network”.
At Air India, safety is our top priority. Following the EASA and Airbus guidelines for a mandatory refactoring of software and hardware on A320 family aircraft worldwide, our engineers have been working around the clock to complete the task as quickly as possible. We have already completed…
— Air India (@airindia) November 29, 2025
An Airbus spokesman estimated that the repairs would affect a total of around 6,000 aircraft across variants, confirming an earlier report from Reuters news agency.
The temporary landings for repairs for some airlines could take much longer as more than 1,000 of the affected planes may also need to have their hardware replaced, the sources said.
The abrupt recall sent ripples around the world. In northern Europe, a Finnair flight was delayed for almost an hour as pilots determined which software version they had, a passenger said.
In Paris, Air France-KLM said it canceled 38 flights – 5 percent of the airline’s daily total. Mexico’s Volaris said it would be hit by delays or cancellations of up to 72 hours.
Largest mass recall
There are approximately 11,300 A320 family aircraft in service, including 6,440 of the core A320 model, which first flew in 1987.
The setback appears to be one of Airbus’ largest mass recalls in its 55-year history and comes weeks after the A320 overtook the Boeing 737 as the most delivered model.
The bulletin, seen by Reuters, traced the problem to a flight system called ELAC (elevator and aileron computer), which sends commands from the pilot’s side stick to the elevators at the rear. These in turn determine the pitch or nose angle of the aircraft.
The computer’s manufacturer, France’s Thales, said in response to a Reuters query that the computer meets Airbus specifications and that the functionality in question is supported by software that is not Thales’ responsibility.
Launched in 1984, the A320 was the first mainstream aircraft to introduce fly-by-wire computer control.
It competes with the Boeing 737 MAX, which suffered lengthy groundings worldwide after fatal crashes in 2018 and 2019 due to poorly designed flight control software.
Demand for the two main brands of workhorse jets has soared in recent years as Asian-led economic growth has brought tens of millions of new travelers to the skies.
Originally designed to serve hubs, the single-aisle models were later widely adopted by low-cost airlines. The connections they now provide represent a significant part of the economy.
