In November 1997 Sabena had approved an order for 17 Airbus A320s (narrow-bodied aircraft) which it did not need. Even more oddly, it had doubled the order at the last minute to 34, a move which helped trigger the airline's collapse four years later.
Though nominally controlled by the Belgian government, Sabena was run by the parent company of Swissair, SAirGroup, which had owned a stake of49.5 percent since 1995 and which also went bust in 2001. A former Sabena manager, who arrived after the Airbus order was placed, says that the planes were not needed: "It was a fatal business decision." A Belgian parliamentary commission's recent report confirms that the Airbus order was a big cause of Sabena's collapse.