Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
Thanks. Interesting. I wish I had a dollar for every 320 flying. A great aircraft.
”The fix mainly involves reverting to earlier software and is relatively simple, but must be carried out before the planes can fly again, other than repositioning to repair centres ”
Leads me to wonder what advantage the upgraded software provided? My first guess would be better fuel economy. Did the JetBlue aircraft exceed a safe altitude and enter a stall? Just a crazy guess.
My heart goes out to all the flyers being delayed en route by this - plus adverse weather. Must be a terrible time to be flying. And, heck, I’d thought Duffy’s reducing flights by 2, 6 and 10% was rough.
The reports that I read on this indicated that the auto-pilot software could be degraded with long exposure to solar radiation. Evidently this caused a number of incidents involving sudden and unexpected in-flight control issues.
As I understand it the fix involves a software upgrade and possibly shielding (I would infer for the device containing the software).
Airbus is taking this very seriously, unlike the recent performance of their major competitor. Give them credit for that.
From the news, it's hard to understand the issue. How can a software update be more vulnerable to solar flare vs the previous version. The fix suggested seems to be to go back to the previous software version. It could be a buggy software update, but it's easy to point to solar flare as problem.
It seems that issue should be physical - may be just wrap some aluminum foil around the auto-pilot unit for shielding.
⚡ Key Facts at a Glance Aircraft Affected: 5,900–6,200 Airbus A320ceo and A320neo variants Root Cause: ELAC L104 software vulnerability to solar particle radiation Trigger Event: JetBlue Flight B6-1174 incident on 30 October 2025 Casualties: Zero fatalities; 15 passengers injured (non-critical) Estimated Cost: $1.1–$1.4 billion fleet-wide + $2.4–$3.1 billion revenue loss
Latest Update: EASA and FAA jointly confirm software rollback approved for 4,900 aircraft. Hardware shield installations begin 2 December. IndiGo Airlines reports 68% of fleet grounded as of 18:00 UTC. Updated: 29 November 2025, 18:00 UTC
A perfect storm of cosmic radiation and outdated flight-control code has triggered the largest single-model grounding event since the Boeing 737 MAX crisis. Airbus confirmed late Thursday that a software vulnerability in the Elevator Aileron Computer (ELAC) of approximately 5,900–6,200 A320ceo and A320neo aircraft can be corrupted by extreme solar particle events, potentially causing an uncommanded nose-down pitch.
What Actually Happened: The JetBlue Flight That Changed Everything
30 October 2025 | 14:22 UTC JetBlue Flight B6-1174 Incident
On 30 October 2025, JetBlue flight B6-1174 (Airbus A320-232, registration N946JB) was cruising at FL350 over the western Atlantic when a powerful geomagnetic storm — triggered by an X-class solar flare two days earlier — bombarded the aircraft with high-energy protons.
⚠️ Sequence of Events 14:22:00 UTC: Both ELAC units simultaneously receive corrupted angle-of-attack data 14:22:02 UTC: Flight control law interprets data as imminent stall 14:22:03 UTC: System commands sharp 2.1° nose-down elevator deflection 14:22:07 UTC: Aircraft descends 190 feet in under 4 seconds 14:22:08 UTC: Crew disconnects autopilot and recovers control 15:47 UTC: Emergency landing in Tampa (TPA) — 15 passengers require medical attention
Investigators later discovered the root cause: a 2019 software load (ELAC L104) lacked the radiation-mitigation filters that were silently added to later versions (L110 and above) after similar — but undisclosed — events on two Asian carriers in 2021 and 2023.
Technical Analysis The ELAC system uses 90nm silicon-on-insulator (SOI) processors, which are vulnerable to single-event upsets (SEUs) when struck by high-energy particles. At cruising altitude, cosmic-ray flux can be 300× higher than at sea level, and a direct hit by a solar proton event can flip bits in unprotected memory — exactly what happened on the JetBlue flight.
"This is a textbook case of legacy code meeting 21st-century space weather. The radiation environment at altitude has changed dramatically since 2019, but critical software wasn't updated to match."
— Dr. Sarah Chen, Aviation Safety Systems Expert
Comment: It's very interesting that "a 2019 software load (ELAC L104) lacked the radiation-mitigation filters that were "silently added to later versions."
This seems to suggest that later versions of the software were modified with "radiation-mitigation filters" to detect erroneous instructions generated by the impact of solar radiation, and to ignore those erroneous instructions.
Also interesting that Airbus knew about the potential for this situation as early as 2021 but didn't think it important enough to call in the entire fleet for the software mod and possible additional shielding of the software control system.
Big Business gonna police itself? Never, not until catastrophe strikes, or almost. This was an "almost" case. How can an update make things WORSE? (Don't tell Apple or Microsoft!) Is this a case of technicians who physically handled things, forgetting to put the shield in place? There were previously unreported incidents. Trust gummint aviation offices, anywhere anymore? Not hardly. Sit down, shut up and take yer chances.
@Crash- There's possibly a misunderstanding here of the actual sequence of events:
Up until 2019 there had evidently been no problems due to solar radiation, so the 2019 software installation had no protection against that.
There were two corruption cases in 2021 and 2023, and software installed after that had additional protection against solar corruption.
However Airbus made no effort to install the "additional protection" upgrade in aircraft with the older 2019 version. (Must have called and asked Boeing what they would do.)
The present recall is to upgrade that 2019 version.
It's amazing the role computers (and software) play in aviation today. I'd guess 1 in 3 of my flights encounters a 5-15 minute delay departing "while we update / download some computer data." On rare occassions problems of that sort have led to having to return to the gate and a cancelled flight.
Wasnt that way 50+ years ago - but there were far more worrisome operational issues to deal with with aircraft like the 727. More than one appeared to fall out of the sky while on final.
Comments
”The fix mainly involves reverting to earlier software and is relatively simple, but must be carried out before the planes can fly again, other than repositioning to repair centres ”
Leads me to wonder what advantage the upgraded software provided? My first guess would be better fuel economy. Did the JetBlue aircraft exceed a safe altitude and enter a stall? Just a crazy guess.
My heart goes out to all the flyers being delayed en route by this - plus adverse weather. Must be a terrible time to be flying. And, heck, I’d thought Duffy’s reducing flights by 2, 6 and 10% was rough.
As I understand it the fix involves a software upgrade and possibly shielding (I would infer for the device containing the software).
Airbus is taking this very seriously, unlike the recent performance of their major competitor. Give them credit for that.
It seems that issue should be physical - may be just wrap some aluminum foil around the auto-pilot unit for shielding.
Comment: It's very interesting that "a 2019 software load (ELAC L104) lacked the radiation-mitigation filters that were "silently added to later versions."
This seems to suggest that later versions of the software were modified with "radiation-mitigation filters" to detect erroneous instructions generated by the impact of solar radiation, and to ignore those erroneous instructions.
Also interesting that Airbus knew about the potential for this situation as early as 2021 but didn't think it important enough to call in the entire fleet for the software mod and possible additional shielding of the software control system.
Up until 2019 there had evidently been no problems due to solar radiation, so the 2019 software installation had no protection against that.
There were two corruption cases in 2021 and 2023, and software installed after that had additional protection against solar corruption.
However Airbus made no effort to install the "additional protection" upgrade in aircraft with the older 2019 version. (Must have called and asked Boeing what they would do.)
The present recall is to upgrade that 2019 version.
Wasnt that way 50+ years ago - but there were far more worrisome operational issues to deal with with aircraft like the 727. More than one appeared to fall out of the sky while on final.