Airbus A400M Plane Crash Linked To Software Fault

Investigators have found evidence a military plane crash in Spain may have been caused by software problems. The Airbus A400M crashed near Seville, on 9 May, after a failed emergency landing during its first flight. BBC has more:

The four crew members on board were killed in the accident. A spokesman for the European planemaker told the BBC that its engineers had since discovered anomalies in the aircraft’s data logs that could be relevant to the accident.

It has sent out an alert to other air forces that have taken deliveries of thepropeller aircraft, saying that they should carry out checks of the Electronic Control Units (ECU) on board. “For practical purposes, these are computers, and there is one on each engine,” the spokesman said.

“What the ECU does is take the pilot’s inputs on the controls and then makes the engines perform in the optimum way to achieve what the pilot is asking it to do, taking a whole number of things into account. “You can conclude that as we’ve asked for checks to be made on the ECU, that that is the area of interest.”