As if Boeing’s pasting in the public eye over the 737 MAX wasn’t enough, reports are surfacing that the company could be cutting corners at its Charleston, South Carolina, plant that builds the 787 Dreamliner. According to an exhaustive report in The New York Times, Boeing management has been accused by former and current employees at the plant of overlooking manufacturing issues to speed production and drive efficiencies.
The Times reviewed “hundreds of pages of internal emails, corporate documents and federal records, as well as [conducted] interviews with more than a dozen current and former employees” that “reveals a culture that often valued production speed over quality.” Over the weekend, Brad Zaback, general manager of the 787 program, said that the report “paints a skewed and inaccurate picture of the program and of our team (at the plant).”
Where the 737 MAX debacle has led to speculation that Boeing pushed ahead quickly with a substantial redesign of its evergreen jet, in lieu of creating an entirely new aircraft to battle Airbus, the revelations by employees in Charleston suggest a company trying to reduce production times and cost. According to the report, line workers have found evidence of “foreign objects” left from the manufacturing and assembly processes. “Tools and metal shavings have routinely been left inside jets, often near electrical systems. Aircraft have taken test flights with debris in an engine and a tail, risking failure,” the Times said. Dreamliners have taken off on test flights with loose hardware in the engines, and acceptance pilots for major airlines have reported finding their own examples of FOD (foreign object debris) on board new aircraft.
It’s worth noting that the 787, aside from the grounding after battery fires early in its service history, has not had an accident. More than 800 Dreamliners have been delivered while Boeing is reporting a current order book of nearly 700 aircraft to be built.
