Software updates completed for over half of affected A320 family planes in India: DGCA data

As many as 338 A320 family aircraft operated by Indian airlines require the software upgrade to address a potential issue related to flight controls and modifications have been carried out in more than half of the affected fleet, according to DGCA data.

Sources said there are no flight cancellations but there are delays in the range of 60-90 minutes for some flights as the software updates are being carried out for the affected planes.

On Friday, Airbus said intense solar radiation might corrupt data critical to flight controls in a significant number of A320 family aircraft and that the software changes required to fix the issue would lead to operational disruptions.

The software upgrades have been completed for 189 A320 family planes out of the total 338 aircraft, as per the data available with the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) till 10 am on November 29.

The software upgrades on all the affected planes are to be completed by 5:29 am on November 30.

The DGCA on Saturday issued an Airworthiness Directive to airlines asking Indian operators to immediately carry out the requisite software upgrades.

This followed Airbus issuing an alert to operators globally and European Aviation Safety Authority (EASA) coming out with an Emergency Airworthiness Directive regarding the potential issue.

IndiGo, Air India and Air India Express operate A320 family planes, which include A320 ceos and neos, A321 ceos and neos.