Kathmandu, 30 Nov: Airbus has issued a safety advisory to operators worldwide after identifying a potential technical risk in some A320 series aircraft, causing flight disruptions in several countries. However, Nepal Airlines and Himalaya Airlines, which collectively operate six Airbus A320 family aircraft, reported no impact on their operations. Representatives from both airlines confirmed on Sunday morning that all their aircraft were flying normally without any interruptions.
According to an airworthiness inspector from the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN), Nepal also received the global alert sent by Airbus. The notice mentioned the possibility that solar radiation could affect critical data within the flight control system. After coordinating with both Nepali carriers, CAAN confirmed that none of their aircraft required grounding.
What Issue Was Detected in the Airbus A320 Series?
On Friday, Airbus released a statement warning that intense solar radiation at high cruising altitudes could destabilize vital flight-control-related data. The company asked regulators worldwide to immediately implement safety measures. Airbus manufactures around 6,000 A320 family aircraft currently in service globally, and the risk was identified in only a small portion of them. The emergency alert, known as an Alert Operators Transmission (AOT), was issued from the Airbus headquarters in Toulouse, France.
The alert instructed all operators to roll back the Elevator and Aileron Computer (ELAC) software version L104 to a previous, stable version before their next flight. According to a Nepal Airlines engineer familiar with the update, Airbus had released a service bulletin for the L104 software a few months ago, but the update was not mandatory, so Nepal Airlines never installed it. For this reason, their aircraft were not affected despite the global issue.
Himalaya Airlines, however, had already installed the L104 update on all four of its aircraft. Following the Airbus alert, the airline immediately removed the L104 software and reverted to an earlier safe version on Friday and Saturday in both Nepal and China, according to CAAN sources.
The New York Times reported that the global alert was triggered after an incident a month earlier involving a JetBlue A320. The aircraft, flying from Cancun to New Jersey, experienced a pitch-down issue at cruise altitude and made an emergency landing in Florida. Twenty passengers were hospitalized, and the aircraft was removed from service for detailed inspection. The incident drew international attention to the A320 flight control system.
The ELAC computer controls an aircraft’s pitch and roll. Because the L104 software update installed in the ELAC was linked to the problem, Airbus and the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) jointly launched an investigation. On 29 November 2025, EASA issued an emergency directive instructing all A320 operators to immediately remove L104 and replace it with L103 Plus or another safe version.
Over the Thanksgiving holiday period, software-related issues forced airlines including American, Delta, and JetBlue to cancel numerous flights, causing delays for hundreds of passengers, media agencies reported.
