San Francisco Frontiers - Airbus confirms 'quality issue' on A320 panels

"Airbus confirms it has identified a supplier quality issue affecting a limited number of A320 metal panels," a spokeswoman for the company told AFP, confirming earlier media reports.

"Airbus is taking a conservative approach and is inspecting all aircraft potentially impacted -- knowing that only a portion of them will need further action to be taken," she added.

"The source of the issue has been identified, contained and all newly produced panels conform to all requirements."

Shares in Airbus earlier fell more than 10 percent on Monday in Paris following media reports that quality problems with fuselage panels had delayed delivery of some of its top-selling A320 aircraft.

Shares in the company were down 10.24 percent at around 1200 GMT, while the Paris market was showing a small drop. It subsequently recovered some of the losses.

The reports of the new problem came after a separate incident in which Airbus last week said some 6,000 of its A320 planes should not fly again until a software upgrade was made following an incident in the United States.

The announcement initially raised concerns that hundreds of planes would need to be grounded for long periods, but Airbus said Monday that fewer than 100 planes remained immobilised.

On October 30, a JetBlue-operated A320 aircraft encountered an in-flight control issue due to a computer malfunction apparently caused by solar radiation affecting the equipment.

The plane suddenly nosedived as it travelled between Cancun in Mexico and Newark in the United States, and pilots had to land in Tampa, Florida.

Analysts at Deutsche Bank said the fact that Airbus had not updated its guidance for aircraft delivery this year suggested the impact of the software update was still being evaluated or had been contained.

Produced since 1988, the A320 is the world's best-selling aeroplane. Airbus sold 12,257 of the aircraft by the end of September compared with the sale of 12,254 Boeing 737s.

H.Reyes--SFF