Airbus Fly-By-Wire visionary Bernard Ziegler passes away

Bernard Ziegler, one of Airbus’ engineering pioneers, who was instrumental in the introduction of the world’s first digital Fly-By-Wire (FBW) and side stick controls in a commercial passenger aircraft with the A320 in 1988, has passed away. He was 88. Ziegler’s career spanned some four decades. He realised the full potential that digital FBW could bring, including flight envelope protection incorporated into the control software. Ziegler’s legacy lives on with digital FBW on all current generation Airbus aircraft, and its adoption as the standard on all modern passenger aircraft globally. Born in 1933, in Boulogne sur Seine, Ziegler graduated from