6,000 Airbus A320 Jets Receive Critical Update After “Intense Solar Radiation” Exposure

Airbus announced early Monday that nearly all A320-family commercial jets have received a critical software update after “intense solar radiation” last month triggered a glitch that could affect flight controls.

“Out of a total number of around 6,000 aircraft potentially impacted, the vast majority have now received the necessary modifications,” Airbus wrote in a press release, adding, “We are working with our airline customers to support the modification of less than 100 remaining aircraft to ensure they can be returned to service.” 

Last Friday, Airbus released an Alert Operators Transmission to all airlines operating the narrow-body jet about an urgent software update, warning the fix could cause “operational disruptions to passengers and customers.” 

The planemaker said the corrupted flight-control data was caused by “intense solar radiation.”

At cruising altitude, jets are exposed to 100 to 300 times more solar radiation than at ground level, and a solar storm can amplify that exposure enough to disrupt avionics processors, including corrupting memory or causing logic errors.  

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Airbus’ warning is an unusual confirmation of space weather risk to the modern economy…

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… something we’ve warned about for years.