Flight disruption warning as Airbus requests modifications to 6,000 planes

Theo Leggett
Business correspondent

The issue was discovered after a JetBlue aircraft en-route from Mexico to the United States in October experienced a ‘sudden drop in altitude’.

The plane made an emergency landing, with reports at the time suggesting 15 to 20 people suffered minor injuries.

It’s thought the incident was caused by intense solar radiation, which corrupted data in a computer used to help control the aircraft.

Now action is being taken to prevent further problems. About 6,000 aircraft worldwide are thought to be affected, all of them of the A320 family, which also includes the A319 and A321 models.

According to Airbus, the majority can be fixed with a relatively simple software update. However, some 900 older planes will need replacement computers, and will have to be taken out of service until they can be fixed.