Investigators have been researching the near-crash of an Airbus A320 jet operated by Lufthansa in 2008 for nearly two years. Germany's Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation on Thursday released findings that will be uncomfortable for the companies - especially Airbus.

The 132 passengers aboard Lufthansa Flight LH 044 had experienced the fright of their lives by the time their plane rolled up to the gate at the Hamburg airport in Germany. But they weren't yet aware of just how much danger they'd been exposed to. In fact they might never have found out were it not for an amateur video taken on the ground. It shows the Airbus A320 aircraft trying to land in a storm: As the plane begins to touch down, a strong gust tips it to one side, so it scrapes a wing on the runway before the pilot aborts the landing and begins to ascend.

The near-crash occurred on March 1, 2008, in weather caused by the intense low-pressure front Emma. Initially, investigators at Germany's Federal Bureau of Aircraft Accident Investigation (BFU) believed little more was at play than a flight error. "But we were suddenly presented with new facts," Johan Reuss, the official responsible for investigations at the Braunschweig, Germany-based agency, told Spiegel Online. On Thursday, his team published an 82-page report (link is to a PDF file in English) - a document that includes 12 safety recommendations drawn from the incident.

The report's surprising finding: The Airbus aircraft demonstrated a behavior that had not been clearly described in standard documentation. Airbus, in other words, had left pilots unclear about how the aircraft might respond in this particular situation. Airbus spokesman Stefan Schaffrath said Thursday that his company would research the matter. "We will analyze the report very carefully," he said, "because safety is our top priority."