MADRID, June 11 (UPI) -- Spanish investigators and Airbus Group said an engine control malfunction caused the crash of a military cargo plane in May that killed four.
The BBC reported Wednesday that an erroneous data swipe might have caused the malfunction. The A400M was on its first flight.
After the crash, Airbus found indications of a software problem in the plane's data logs. Investigators believe some files could have been deleted by mistake, causing propellers to spin too slowly.
Airbus Group released a statement Saturday that confirms the pilots' inability to obtain adequate power from three of the plane's four engines, with only a "flight idle" command remaining functional.
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Earlier, Defense News cited a conversation with Airbus Group's Chief of Strategy Marwan Lahoud, who said that the black boxes recovered from the wreckage point to a serious quality control issue in the production of the planes.
The downed A400M had departed from Sevilla Airport on the afternoon of May 9 for a test flight before crash landing in a field. Four of the six people aboard died. The two others were seriously injured.
The crash prompted Airbus to send out an Alert Operation Transmission on May 19, which called for checks on Airbus' additional A400M aircraft. No abnormalities have been found in other planes.
Airbus remained confident in the A400M project and urged operators to continue flying them. It announced its plans to fly one of its planes at the Paris Air Show next week.
However, the U.K., Germany, Turkey and Malaysia all grounded their A400M aircraft with only France continuing to fly them.
Airbus may also suffer financially as Spain has prohibited the company from carrying out test flights using newly built planes, which are necessary for completing additional orders.
The A400M military transport plane project is years behind schedule and over budget.
Germany has only received one plane this year despite plans to obtain five more before the year's end and 11 in 2016. France, which is one of the largest operators of Airbus' plane, is considering purchasing Lockheed Martin C-130 transport planes instead.
AIN Online reported that the U.K. Royal Air Force is not satisfied with Airbus' report and will longer before letting its two A400Ms fly again.
