Created Friday, May 29th 2026 16:18Z, last updated Friday, May 29th 2026 16:18Z
A SAA South African Airways Airbus A320-200, registration ZS-SZE performing flight
SA-327 from Johannesburg to Cape Town (South Africa), was nearing Cape Town when the crew was informed that other aircraft had been unable to land and had gone around. The crew entered an enroute hold to assess their options, when ATC informed them that aircraft were now able to land at Cape Town. The crew decided to continue to Cape Town thereafter and had cabin crew prepare for turbulence on approach. ATC subsequently vectored the aircraft onto base for a monitored approach, ATC instructed the crew to maintain minimum clean speed because of traffic ahead at 6000 feet, the crew slowed the aircraft to minimum clean. Shortly afterwards the crew received a windshear alert with 20-40 knots loss of airspeed. Autothrust went into ALPHA FLOOR, the crew selected flaps 1 to mitigate for the stall, at the same time the aircraft entered alternate law due to an elevator aileron computer (ELAC) pitch fault and the autopilot disengaged, the crew was unable to re-engage the autopilot. Soon after the aircraft encountered another windshear increasing the airspeed, the crew retracted the flaps but still received an overspeed warning. The crew continued the monitored approach with alternate law active, upon lowering the landing gear the aircraft changed to direct law. The aircraft landed safely on Cape Town's runway 01 about 11 minutes after the first windshear encounter.
South Africa's AAID rated the occurrence a serious incident and opened an investigation.
The aircraft returned to service about 2:15 hours after landing and performed the return flight with a delay of about 1:45 hours.
The same day, about 3 hours earlier, another SAA aircraft diverted, see Incident: South African A320 at Cape Town, George and Port Elizabeth on May 11th 2026, landed below minimum fuel (420kg remaining).
Related Flight:
SA327,
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