An Air Canada Airbus A320 airplane prepares to land at Vancouver International Airport in 2019. (Ben Nelms/Reuters)
Airbus said Friday half of the jets in its global A320 fleet needed to be grounded to fix an urgent issue with the planes, which disrupted thousands of flights around the world.The company said airlines needed to immediately address a "software change" to ensure flight control is sound.The recall comes after a JetBlue plane’s nose dropped for several seconds without the pilot’s input during a flight in October, according to a European safety agency.The number of temporarily grounded flights ranged by airline, from hundreds for American Airlines to "very few" for Air Canada.One aviation expert told CBC News that such a widespread recall is "unprecedented" for the industry, though the effects won’t last long.