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A320 Memory Items: What They Are and How to Learn Them
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A320 Memory Items: What They Are and How to Learn Them

October 31, 2026

A320 Memory Items: What They Are and How to Learn Them

Pilot rehearsing an immediate response in an A320 simulator

A320 memory items are the few emergency actions you perform from recall, without opening a checklist, because the situation leaves no time to read. They cover events such as windshear, EGPWS warnings, TCAS alerts, loss of braking, emergency descent, stall recovery and unreliable speed. The exact wording and steps come from your airline’s approved manuals, so learn them from those documents and rehearse them in a simulator, not from a flashcard deck alone.

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TL;DR

  • Memory items are immediate actions for events where reading a checklist first would risk loss of control, incapacitation or damage to the aircraft.
  • On the A320 they attach to a short list of events, including windshear, EGPWS, TCAS, stall, loss of braking, emergency descent and unreliable speed.
  • Wording can differ between operators. Your airline’s FCOM and training policy decide, so verify every item against your own manuals.
  • Spaced repetition and active recall build retention, but only simulator practice under pressure makes the actions automatic.
  • After the memory actions, you confirm and continue with the printed checklist or QRH, never improvise.

Table of Contents

What memory items are, and why they exist

EASA’s investigation of a checklist memory-items incident defines memory items (also called recall or immediate action items) as actions taken so quickly in response to a non-routine event that referring to a checklist is not practical. The reasons it gives are potential loss of control, incapacitation, or damage to components that would make safe flight improbable.

That is the whole logic. If the aircraft is close to the ground with a terrain warning sounding, or a stall is developing, the seconds spent finding a page are the seconds you do not have. So the manufacturer and the operator decide which few actions must live in your head.

Three practical consequences follow:

  1. The list is deliberately short. Human memory can be impaired under stress, and EASA’s report treats that as a factor to weigh when designing procedures and training for memory items. The same report notes UK CAA design recommendations: list memory items at the start of a drill and ideally keep them to four steps or fewer.
  2. They are not the whole procedure. Crews are trained to perform the memory items without a checklist, then verify them against the printed checklist afterward.
  3. They are performed exactly as written. AOPA’s turbine mentor column warns against improvising on system failures: execute the established memory items first, then go straight to the QRH, because manufacturers have researched the most effective order, which is sometimes counter-intuitive.

Which A320 events have memory items

Pilots preparing for a type rating or an airline interview usually want one list. The honest answer is that the list is defined by Airbus and then adopted, and sometimes adjusted, by each operator. Community revision sheets for the type group the events by phase of flight. One widely shared A320 memory items revision sheet sorts them roughly like this:

Phase Events typically revised
Taxi and before takeoff Loss of braking, unreliable speed, abnormal slats/flaps
Takeoff and climb Windshear warning, EGPWS warning, TCAS warning, engine failure
Cruise and descent EGPWS cautions, emergency descent, stall warning and recovery

Two cautions about any list you find online:

  • Some sheets mix true Airbus memory items with items the author considers worth knowing by heart. The sheet above itself flags one entry as not being on the Airbus list. Treat extras as good habit, not as the official definition.
  • Older and informal lists differ from current ones. Airbus revises procedures, and your airline may adopt them on its own schedule.

The point for your preparation: build your list from your operator’s current FCOM and QRH, then use any outside material only to check you have not forgotten an event.

Why the actions are not printed here

We are deliberately not reproducing a step-by-step card. Memory items are safety-critical, the wording is controlled by the manufacturer and your airline, and a copy from the web may not match the revision you are approved to fly. A stall recovery or an emergency descent learned from the wrong source is worse than not knowing it. Use your approved documents, and use your instructor to confirm what you have memorized.

Why wording differs between airlines

If you have moved between operators, or compared two cadets’ notes, you have probably seen items that do not match word for word. That is expected. The A320 FCTM states that the FCTM should be read together with the FCOM, and that the FCOM is the overriding authority. It also says variations can occur because airline training policy may differ in some areas, and where it does, airline training policy takes precedence.

In practice, check these in order:

  1. Your airline’s approved training policy and operations manual.
  2. The FCOM and QRH revision your operator has issued.
  3. The FCTM, for the technique behind the procedure.
  4. Operational Engineering Bulletins. Airbus SOPs ask crews to review all applicable OEBs during preliminary cockpit preparation on each flight, and an OEB can change what you do.

The FAA frames the same idea for US carriers. Its advisory circular on air carrier training says carriers must develop programs that make flightcrews proficient in their duties, and that training requirements should reflect the OEM or flight standardization board recommendations. The aircraft manufacturer sets the baseline; the operator’s approved program tailors it.

If you are a foreign pilot converting to a US operator or moving to a new airline, expect to relearn some wording even if the underlying actions feel familiar. Plan time for it.

How to study memory items so they stay

The research on this is plain: pilots should review regularly, use active engagement, spaced repetition and active recall, prioritize the areas that need work, and take adequate breaks, according to a community A320 revision sheet. That matches what we see in good candidates. Staring at a page does little. Retrieving the item from nothing does a lot.

A simple weekly routine

  • Day 1: Read each item from your FCOM or QRH, then close it. Write or say it from memory, including the callout.
  • Day 2, 4, 8: Retrieve again before looking. Mark the ones you stumbled on and give those extra passes.
  • Daily, five minutes: Do a flow in the chair. Say the callout, touch where each control is, and say what you expect to see.
  • Weekly: Have a colleague or instructor quiz you in random order, not in list order. Real events do not arrive in sequence.

If you want to automate the schedule, a guide to spaced repetition intervals explains how to space reviews so that items you know come back less often and items you miss come back sooner. Whatever tool you use, build cards from your own operator’s wording, not a stranger’s.

Study traps to avoid

  • Memorizing without the trigger. Knowing the steps is half the job. You also need to recognize the cue: the warning, the callout, the flight-path behavior that starts the drill.
  • Learning the order but not the intent. If you understand why thrust, pitch or configuration comes first, you hold the sequence better under stress.
  • Cramming the week before a check. Short, frequent retrieval beats one long night, and EASA’s point that stress impairs recall is the reason to over-learn well ahead of time.
  • Treating the checklist as optional afterward. Memory items stabilize the situation. The checklist verifies and completes it.

Why the simulator is where memory items become automatic

Reciting items at a desk and executing them while the aircraft is shaking are different skills. The IATA Evidence-Based Training implementation guide is the professional reference here: practice that integrates memory actions into realistic, high-stress scenarios builds psychomotor proficiency and crew coordination, so recall becomes instinctive and the crew can stabilize the aircraft before moving to managed, checklist-driven procedures.

What that means for your preparation:

  • Rehearse the handover. Practice the moment memory actions end and the QRH begins. Who calls for the checklist, who reads, who confirms.
  • Practice as pilot flying and pilot monitoring. Many candidates only drill their own side. On the A320 you also need to know what to expect from the other seat, and how to challenge.
  • Add distraction. Real events come with an ECAM message, a radio call and a decision to make. A drill done in silence proves less.
  • Repeat to the point of boredom. The goal is that your hands and voice start before the thought is fully formed.

The FAA says its aim in approved training programs is that pilots fly as they are trained and are trained as they are expected to fly. A simulator that matches the aircraft’s motion, visuals and cockpit is how that principle works for memory items.

What assessors and instructors look for

In an airline assessment or a proficiency check, memory items are rarely tested as a quiz. You meet them inside a scenario: a windshear on rotation, a terrain warning on approach, a stall warning at a bad moment. Examiners tend to watch for the same things:

  • Did you recognize the cue quickly and call it?
  • Did you perform the right actions without reaching for the book?
  • Did the crew divide the work cleanly, with the right callouts?
  • Did you move on to the checklist or QRH afterward and manage the aircraft, not fixate on the drill?

We cover the format of those sessions in more depth in our guide to the A320 simulator assessment, and our proficiency check prep plan lays out a four to six week build-up. If you fly for an operator that runs a recurrent cycle, the A320 recurrent training checklist shows where memory-item recall fits inside an EBT-aligned program.

Our perspective

We train pilots in Level D full-motion simulators, with instructors who are current and former airline pilots and examiners. From that seat, the pattern is consistent: candidates rarely fail a memory item because they never learned it. They fail it because they learned it in a quiet room, from a source that did not match the operator’s wording, and then met the event for the first time with a motion platform, a warning horn and a time limit.

So our advice is practical. Get the right document first. Ask your airline, or the airline you are applying to, which FCOM and QRH revision applies. Learn from that, in short repeated sessions. Then book simulator time before the check, not after a failed one, and ask the instructor to hit you with the events in random order and with realistic distractions.

Our perspective

We also see foreign pilots and cadets assume that familiarity with another Airbus operation transfers cleanly. Often most of it does. The few differences are exactly where checks go wrong, and they are cheap to find in a session and expensive to find in an assessment.

Memory items are a small part of A320 competence, but they are the part where there is no second chance to read the page. Treat them as a skill you rehearse, not a list you have read.

— Jake

Practice memory items in a Level D A320 simulator

If you have an airline assessment, a type rating or a recurrent check coming up, we offer A320 simulator training in hourly and block sessions on Level D full-motion equipment. You can use the time to drill the events your operator expects, with an instructor who flies or has flown the aircraft for an airline. If you are starting from scratch on the type, our A320 type rating program covers the CEO and NEO, and our team handles scheduling, documentation and checkride coordination inside one program. Pricing is not published, so contact us through the admissions page for details.

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Checking your list before a check

Before any assessment, run through this short audit:

  • Do I have the current FCOM and QRH revision for this operator, and have I read any open OEBs?
  • Can I say every memory item, with callout and trigger, from a blank page?
  • Do I know which seat does what, in both pilot flying and pilot monitoring roles?
  • Have I practiced the transition from memory actions to the checklist?
  • Have I rehearsed in a simulator with distractions, not only on paper?
  • Have I checked my list for items that are not official, so I do not confuse extras with requirements?

If you cannot tick all six, you know what to work on this week.

FAQ

How many memory items does the A320 have?

There is no single number that fits every operator. Community sources often cite roughly ten Airbus memory items, but your airline’s approved manuals define your list. Count from your own FCOM and QRH, and confirm with your training department.

Do I have to memorize the wording exactly?

Learn the actions and their order exactly as your operator publishes them, and the callout that starts the drill. If you only remember the gist, stress will degrade it. Your instructor or examiner tells you how strictly your airline expects verbatim recall.

What happens after I complete the memory items?

You stabilize the aircraft, then verify what you did and continue using the printed checklist or QRH. EASA’s report describes crews performing memory items without a checklist and then checking them against the printed version. Do not skip that step, even if the event seems resolved.

Are online flashcards and PDFs enough?

They are fine for repetition, but they may not match your operator’s revision, and they cannot train the physical actions or crew coordination. Use them to rehearse, verify against your manuals, and then practice the drills in a simulator.

Why do two airlines’ memory items look different?

Airline training policy can differ from the manufacturer’s guidance in some areas, and the FCTM says that policy then takes precedence. The FCOM remains the overriding authority for operational procedures. Always follow the documents of the operator you fly for.

Sources

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