Software Fault Most Likely Cause of Plane Crash

In their initial findings released on Wednesday into the crash of an A400M military plane in Seville last month, Airbus has confirmed that the immediate area of concern was the engine control software.

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The report states that the crew of the aircraft tried in vain to regain control of 3 engines that were frozen due to a suspected software problem.

The report has not explained the full details of the problem but has been able to rule out structural failure and instead is focussing on the assembly process.

A spokesperson said that investigators were mainly evaluating “the different processes around assembly of the aircraft, engines and preparations for the first flight”.

Airbus said that data from the black box and cockpit recordings indicate that three of the four turboprop engines registered high power shortly after takeoff, but the three affected engines “did not respond to attempts by the crew to control the power under normal procedures”.