A Cathay Pacific Airbus A330-300, registration B-HLF performing flight CX-412 from Hong Kong (China) to Seoul (South Korea) with 314 people on board, was enroute at FL350 about 250nm east of Hong Kong when the crew decided to turn around and return to Hong Kong reporting they suspected a flight control problem. The aircraft descended to FL340 and landed safely back on Hong Kong’s runway 07L about 90 minutes after departure.
A replacement Airbus A330-300 registration B-HLU reached Seoul with a delay of 4 hours.
The airline reported a mechanical problem within the flight control system occurred prompting the crew to return to Hong Kong as a precaution. A replacement aircraft took the passengers to Seoul.
Hong Kong Civil Aviation Department reported that the flight control system depending on hydraulics controlled by electronic devices making decisions on a variety of flight data computations, in total called fly by wire, suffered a problem. It is unclear whether the problem was associated with the hydraulics, electronics or displays, the system failed to show normal calculation data.
The Aviation Herald
Cathay Pacific A330-343 has FBW problems
