Airworthiness Directives; Airbus SAS Airplanes

<RULE> DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION <SUBAGY>Federal Aviation Administration</SUBAGY> <CFR>14 CFR Part 39</CFR> <DEPDOC>[Docket No. FAA-2024-1895; Project Identifier MCAI-2023-01240-T; Amendment 39-23168; AD 2025-20-15]</DEPDOC> <RIN>RIN 2120-AA64</RIN> <SUBJECT>Airworthiness Directives; Airbus SAS Airplanes</SUBJECT> <HD SOURCE="HED">AGENCY:</HD> Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), DOT. <HD SOURCE="HED">ACTION:</HD> Final rule. <SUM> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUMMARY:</HD> The FAA is superseding Airworthiness Directive (AD) 2022-08-08, which applied to certain Airbus SAS Model A318 series airplanes; Model A319-111, -112, -113, -114, -115, -131, -132, and -133 airplanes; Model A320-211, -212, -214, -216, -231, -232, and -233 airplanes; and Model A321-111, -112, -131, -211, -212, -213, -231, and -232 airplanes. AD 2022-08-08 required repetitive special detailed inspections of certain double joggle areas on the fuselage and applicable on-condition actions. Since the FAA issued AD 2022-08-08, it was determined that additional airplane models are subject to the unsafe condition and additional requirements are necessary for airplanes repaired after accomplishment of certain airworthiness limitations item (ALI) tasks. This AD continues to require the actions in AD 2022-08-08. This AD also adds airplane models to the applicability and additional requirements for certain airplanes. The FAA is issuing this AD to address the unsafe condition on these products. </SUM> <EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">DATES:</HD> This AD is effective January 2, 2026. The Director of the Federal Register approved the incorporation by reference of a certain publication listed in this AD as of January 2, 2026. </EFFDATE> <HD SOURCE="HED">ADDRESSES:</HD> <E T="03">AD Docket:</E> You may examine the AD docket at <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> under Docket No. FAA-2024-1895; or in person at Docket Operations between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., Monday through Friday, except Federal holidays. The AD docket contains this final rule, the mandatory continuing airworthiness information (MCAI), any comments received, and other information. The address for Docket Operations is U.S. Department of Transportation, Docket Operations, M-30, West Building Ground Floor, Room W12-140, 1200 New Jersey Avenue SE, Washington, DC 20590. <E T="03">Material Incorporated by Reference:</E> • For European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) material identified in this AD, contact EASA, Konrad-Adenauer-Ufer 3, 50668 Cologne, Germany; telephone +49 221 8999 000; email <E T="03">ADs@easa.europa.eu.</E> You may find this material on the EASA website at <E T="03">ad.easa.europa.eu.</E> • You may view this material at the FAA, Airworthiness Products Section, Operational Safety Branch, 2200 South 216th St., Des Moines, WA. For information on the availability of this material at the FAA, call 206-231-3195. It is also available at <E T="03">regulations.gov</E> under Docket No. FAA-2024-1895. <FURINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:</HD> Timothy Dowling, Aviation Safety Engineer, FAA, 2200 South 216th St., Des Moines, WA 98198; phone: 206-231-3667; email: <E T="03">Timothy.P.Dowling@faa.gov.</E> </FURINF> <SUPLINF> <HD SOURCE="HED">SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Background</HD> The FAA issued a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) to amend 14 CFR part 39 to supersede AD 2022-08-08, Amendment 39-22011 (87 FR 23755, April 21, 2022) (AD 2022-08-08). AD 2022-08-08 applied to certain Airbus SAS Model A318 series airplanes; Model A319-111, -112, -113, -114, -115, -131, -132, and -133 airplanes; Model A320-211, -212, -214, -216, -231, -232, and -233 airplanes; and Model A321-111, -112, -131, -211, -212, -213, -231, and -232 airplanes. AD 2022-08-08 required repetitive special detailed inspections of certain areas and applicable on-condition actions. The FAA issued AD 2022-08-08 to address cracks in the double joggle areas at frame (FR) 16 and FR20, right-hand and left-hand sides, which, if not detected and corrected, could reduce the structural integrity of the fuselage. The NPRM was published in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> on July 24, 2024 (89 FR 59857). The NPRM was prompted by AD 2023-0212, dated December 6, 2023 (EASA AD 2023-0212), issued by EASA, which is the Technical Agent for the Member States of the European Union. EASA AD 2023-0212 states that the unsafe condition may also exist on Airbus SAS A318/A320/A321 “NEO” airplanes ( <E T="03">i.e.,</E> Airbus SAS Model A318-151N, -153N, and -171N; A320-251N, -252N, -253N, -271N, -272N, and -273N; and A321-251N, -251NX, -252N, -252NX, -253N, -253NX, -271N, -271NX, -272N, and -272NX airplanes), so these airplanes are added to the applicability. In addition, Airbus has developed additional, new structural repair manual (SRM) tasks that are considered additional alternative methods to the Airbus repair designs originally required by EASA AD 2021-0227, dated October 11, 2021, for the airplanes affected by that AD. In the NPRM, the FAA proposed to continue to require the actions in AD 2022-08-08 and add NEO airplane models to the applicability, as specified in EASA AD 2023-0212. The FAA issued a supplemental notice of proposed rulemaking (SNPRM) to amend 14 CFR part 39 to supersede AD 2022-08-08. The SNPRM was published in the <E T="04">Federal Register</E> on February 18, 2025 (90 FR 9695). The SNPRM was prompted EASA AD 2024-0217, dated November 18, 2024 (EASA AD 2024-0217) (also referred to as “the MCAI”), which superseded EASA AD 2023-0212. Since EASA AD 2023-0212 was issued, it was determined that AD-mandated repetitive inspections were incorrectly terminated for all the Airbus repair instructions; only those in which the termination of the AD-mandated inspections was explicitly written in the Airbus-approved instructions should have been terminated. Therefore, additional requirements are necessary for airplanes that have been repaired after accomplishment of ALI tasks 531153-02 or 531155-02. In the SNPRM, the FAA revised the NPRM by adding additional requirements for airplanes that have been repaired after accomplishment of ALI task 531153-02 or 531155-02. The FAA is issuing this AD to address the unsafe condition on these products. You may examine the MCAI in the AD docket at regulations.gov under Docket No. FAA-2024-1895. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Discussion of Final Airworthiness Directive</HD> <HD SOURCE="HD1">Comments</HD> The FAA received comments from an individual who supported the SNPRM without change. The FAA received additional comments from Delta Air Lines (Delta) and an individual. The following presents the comment received on the SNPRM and the FAA's response. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Request To Require Inspections Be Completed by the FAA</HD> An individual requested that the FAA be required to inspect all affected airplanes to determine if there is significant damage. The individual also requested that any safety requirements of the proposed AD be repaired before further flight. The FAA agrees to clarify. The actions required by this AD are the responsibility of operators. FAA regulations (14 CFR 43.3) stipulate who can perform maintenance on or alter an airplane on the U.S. registry, including inspections required by an AD. AD actions must be performed by people holding certain certificates or having specialized training that provides them the knowledge necessary to properly inspect and repair airplanes. In addition, this AD requires operators to address any cracks that are detected before further flight. The FAA has not revised the AD in this regard. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Request To Terminate Certain SRM Inspections</HD> Delta requested that the FAA add an exception to paragraph (h) of the proposed AD to specify that the repetitive inspections in paragraph (1) of EASA AD 2024-0217 supersede the repetitive inspections in SRM task 53-11-12-205-008 or 53-11-12-205-007, as applicable. Delta stated that, if cracking is found, two of the service bulletins referenced in the Corrective Action(s) paragraph of EASA AD 2024-0217 specify to repair using SRM task 53-11-12-300-012 or 53-11-12-300-013, which in turn specify doing repetitive inspections per SRM task 53-11-12-205-008 or SRM task 53-11-12-205-007, respectively. Delta also stated that SRM tasks 53-11-12-205-008 and SRM task 53-11-12-205-007 do not specify that these repetitive inspections supersede, replace, or terminate the repetitive inspections in paragraph (1) of EASA AD 2024-0217. Delta asserted this results in duplicative repetitive inspections of the same area at different compliance times since accomplishing the corrective action also does not terminate the repetitive inspections in paragraph (1) of EASA AD 2024-0217. The FAA agrees that the AD is not intended to require duplicative repetitive inspections. However, the FAA has determined that an exception is not necessary. This AD only requires the repetitive inspections to be done in accordance with paragraph (1) of the EASA AD except as specified in paragraph (7) of EASA AD 2024-0217. The provision in paragraph (7) of EASA 2024-0217 specifies “unless specified otherwise in the instructions provided by Airbus”, which applies to the statement in the material referenced in paragraph (1) of EASA AD 2024-0217 that states to repeat the inspection for the non-repaired hole(s). Therefore, paragraph (1) of EASA AD 2024-0217 does not require repetitive inspections of repaired holes at those locations. However, the repetitive post-repair inspections referenced in SRM tasks 53-11-12-205-008 and 53-11-12-205-007 may be required for compliance with paragraph (2) of EASA AD 2024-0217. The FAA has not revised the AD in this regard. <HD SOURCE="HD1">Additional Changes Made to This AD</HD> In the SNPRM, the FAA stated that accomplishing the required actions would terminate ALI tasks 531153-02-1 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Preview showing 10k of 24k characters. 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