PARIS — Four of the five countries that operate the Airbus A400M military transport plane said on Sunday that they were temporarily grounding their fleets after a fatal crash during a test flight near the southern Spanish city of Seville.
Britain, Germany, Malaysia and Turkey have all suspended operations of the 37-ton, four-engine turbo props as a precaution, Maggie Bergsma, an Airbus spokeswoman, confirmed by telephone from Seville, while France said it would await further information from Spanish crash investigators before deciding whether to ground them.
An A400M crashed about 15 minutes after takeoff in a field about a mile north of Seville’s San Pablo Airport on Saturday, killing four of six Airbus employees on board. One of the two survivors remained in critical condition Sunday, while the second was in stable condition and had been interviewed by investigators, Ms. Bergsma said.
The crash is the first fatal accident for the A400M, which is assembled in Seville and has been plagued by billions of euros in cost overruns and delays. Airbus has received a total of 174 orders for the A400M, although only a dozen planes have been delivered so far.
France currently operates the largest A400M fleet, with six planes that the country has deployed on multiple missions in West Africa and Iraq.
Jean-Yves Le Drian, the French defense minister, said officials were seeking more information from Airbus and crash investigators about the causes of Saturday’s crash.
“Once these are known with precision, I will make a decision about whether to suspend or continue flights,” Mr. Le Drian said in a statement.
The plane that crashed Saturday was on its maiden test flight and had been scheduled to be delivered next month to the Turkish Air Force, which has ordered 10 of the planes and has already received two.
Britain’s Royal Air Force currently operates two A400M planes, while Germany and Malaysia each have one.
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