The airline said it received the emergency airworthiness directive from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) at about 3am yesterday, and immediately activated its business continuity plan.

“Thanks to meticulous planning and strong group-wide coordination from our engineering teams, and supported by our ecosystem partner ADE, compliance work for the A320 fleet was completed within 24 hours.

“Our operations teams continue to work to minimise disruptions. This concerted response is reflective of the agility, guest centricity and teamwork that define AirAsia,” said AirAsia Group CEO Bo Lingam.

He said AirAsia responded immediately and thoroughly as safety was at the centre of the trust travellers had in the carrier.

AirAsia has close to 200 A320s in its fleet, some of which were affected by the EASA directive.

On Friday, Airbus said it was ordering immediate repairs to 6,000 of its widely used A320 family of jets in a sweeping recall affecting more than half the global fleet.

The setback appeared to be among the largest recalls affecting Airbus in its 55-year history and came weeks after the A320 overtook the Boeing 737 as the most-delivered model, Reuters reported.

The fix mainly involved reverting to earlier software and was relatively simple, but must be carried out before the planes can fly again, according to an Airbus bulletin to airlines.

Airbus said a recent incident involving an A320-family aircraft had revealed that intense radiation from the sun could corrupt data crucial to flight controls.

The incident that triggered the unexpected repair action is believed to involve a JetBlue flight from Cancun, Mexico, to Newark, New Jersey, on Oct 30, in which several passengers were hurt following a sharp loss of altitude.