Boeing 787s at Boeing’s Washington assembly line in June 2022.
Taylor Rains/Insider
A whistleblower has made claims about the safety of at least 1,400 Boeing aircraft.
He said production cuts have led to misaligned fuselages on Boeing 777 and Boeing 787 planes.
Boeing said the complaint does not reflect the “quality and long-term safety” of its planes.
This is a machine translation of an article from our US colleagues at Business Insider. It was automatically translated and checked by a real editor.
Another Boeing whistleblower has come forward and pointed out safety deficiencies in at least 1,400 wide-body aircraft from the aircraft manufacturer’s family.
In one Complaint to aviation authorities in January, which was made public for the first time on Tuesday, Sam Salehpour, who claims to be a longtime Boeing employee and engineer with 40 years of aerospace experience, said parts of the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and the Boeing 777 were misaligned during assembly and could pose a safety risk.
Die „New York Times“ first reported his allegations on Tuesday.
“Culture of prioritizing schedules over safety”
Through his lawyers, Salehpour said he observed problems while working on both programs and documented his concerns to send to the FAA and Boeing leadership.
He said employees were pressured to “overlook the concerns” of what he described as a “culture of prioritizing schedules over safety” that he said affects more than 1,000 Dreamliners and at least 400 777s.
Regarding the 787, Salehpour said he observed “shortcuts used by Boeing to reduce bottlenecks during the 787 assembly process,” including “overusing key aircraft connections” and leaving drill cuttings between certain key connections.
This could “significantly” shorten the plane’s lifespan due to metal fatigue and cause an accident, Salehpour said in a phone call with reporters on Tuesday.
Boeing denies allegations
Salehpour also pointed out the 777 hin and said in its complaint that when it redesigned the plane’s assembly process to speed production, “unmeasured and unlimited” force was used to put the fuselage together.
“I literally saw people jumping on the pieces of the plane to get them aligned,” he told media at a press conference on Tuesday. He pointed out that his concerns about the 787 and 777 planes were supported by data from Boeing, but that his complaints were ignored.
The complaint is currently being investigated, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said at BI’s request. Salehpour will also testify before a Senate subcommittee on April 17, the NYT reported.
Boeing has stood by its wide-body aircraft despite the whistleblower’s complaint, saying in an emailed statement to BI on Tuesday that Salehpour’s claims are not representative of the work the company has done to “ensure the quality and long-term safety of the aircraft.” to ensure aircraft”.
“The issues raised have undergone a rigorous engineering review under FAA supervision,” Boeing said of the 787. That analysis confirmed “that these issues do not pose safety concerns and that the aircraft will maintain its service life for several decades.”
Boeing said that the 787 can fly for more than 30 yearsbefore it requires extensive maintenance to extend its lifespan, and that the company has full confidence in the safety of its Dreamliners in production and in service.
“Based on previous fuselage testing of up to 165,000 cycles and Boeing’s extensive data collection, testing, modeling and analysis from 2020 to date – which was transparently shared with the FAA – Boeing currently believes that these issues will affect the expected life of the “We will not alter or impact the 787 fuselage,” Boeing said.
The 787 has long been plagued by manufacturing problems
The complaints come after years of production problems with the 787, leading to a 15-month delivery stop due to a number of production errors, including the gaps mentioned by Salehpour.
The Boeing 787 is the company’s best-selling wide-body aircraft and is distinguished by its different variants, which come in three sizes – small, medium and large – all with different ranges and capacities. It is one of Boeing’s biggest cash cows.
The allegations also likely won’t help Boeing face increased scrutiny of its operations Escape quality control after a door jam on an Alaska Airlines 737 Max 9 fell off mid-flight.
“I do this not because I want Boeing to fail, but because I want Boeing to succeed and prevent crashes,” Salehpour said. “The truth is that Boeing cannot continue as before; Things have to get a little better.”
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