Squiz Shortcuts - Boeing's safety issues

Your Shortcut to Boeing’s safety issues

Boeing has been in a rough patch for the last half-decade, even before the side of a plane came off during a flight in January. Now, with the CEO stepping down and Boeing facing serious scrutiny, we look at:

• The timeline of Boeing’s woes, 

• The problems inside the company now,

• What might happen next to one of the world’s largest suppliers of planes.

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So, global aeroplane manufacturing… what do we need to know?
There are really only 2 companies that matter when it comes to building commercial aeroplanes: they are Boeing and Airbus. Boeing is an American company with about 171,000 employees worldwide, while Airbus is European and employs around 134,000 people. They are, of course, fierce rivals…

How fierce?
The competition between the companies is sometimes called “legendary”... they’re constantly trying to one-up each other on new aviation technology, plane design, market share… 

Who’s winning?
‘Winning’ is too strong a word, but one thing to note is that, in recent years, Airbus has pulled ahead of Boeing in terms of the number of aircraft they deliver each quarter. So, Boeing is under a bit of pressure…

Tell me more about Boeing and the company’s issues…
One place we can start the story is in 2018, when a Lion Air flight travelling between 2 airports within Indonesia crashed 13 minutes after takeoff, killing all 189 people on board. The aircraft was a Boeing Max plane.

That’s awful…
It gets worse. Less than 5 months later, another Boeing Max plane went down. This time it was an Ethiopian Airlines flight, and 6 minutes into the flight it crashed and killed all 157 people onboard. The truly remarkable thing, though, was that both crashes were caused by the same fault.

What fault?
It turns out the new model of Boeing Max plane had a piece of software in it that was meant to stabilise the nose of the plane if the aircraft was angled up too steeply… But in both of these crashes the system malfunctioned because the sensor which was measuring the angle of the plane sent the wrong data. That meant the system caused the nose of the plane to dip down repeatedly, even when the plane wasn’t angled upwards.

Resulting in the plane crashing…
Yes, both planes crashed at high speed. In the aftermath of these crashes, a crucial fact that emerged was that Boeing hadn’t actually explained the nose control system in its documentation of the plane - and further than that, Boeing had actually advised that pilots wouldn’t need training about the new system.

What was the global reaction?
Within days of the second crash, all Boeing Max planes were grounded. The Ethiopia crash was on 10 March 2019, and here in Australia, we banned Boeing Max flights on 12 March. That Australian ban lasted a long time, too - it was only lifted in February 2021, nearly 2 years later…

A bad time for Boeing, then?
There are estimates that the company lost US$60 billion in cancelled sales and paid US$20 billion in fines. On top of that, Boeing’s CEO Dennis Muilenburg, stepped down. He was replaced by a man named Dave Calhoun… but Boeing’s troubles were not over.

Uh oh, what happened next?
After the Boeing Max crashes the company faced enormous scrutiny, and reports began to emerge of sloppy work in a factory that was building a different type of Boeing plane, the 787 Dreamliner. Those complaints made their way to US aviation authorities, and what followed were years of inquiries and delays in the delivery of Dreamliner planes, as Boeing ironed out the various issues.

That’s a bad look for Boeing…
And the hits just keep coming. There have been various minor mishaps in the air over the last few years. There was even one recently on a flight between Sydney and Auckland, where a LATAM Airlines flight (operating a Boeing Dreamliner) suddenly lost altitude, causing passengers to be thrown into the ceiling. But there was one very dramatic incident that put Boeing back in the spotlight…

What was it?
The main reason we’re talking about the company again this year is because of an incident that happened in January. You probably have already seen the images of the inside of a plane, mid-air, with part of its cabin wall missing…

Gulp, yes…
That was an Alaska Airlines flight, and what we now know is that a ‘door plug’ had been used to seal up an emergency exit door… but when Boeing serviced the plane, the 4 bolts that were meant to hold the door plug in place were missing.

Hence, bye-bye door plug, hello night air…
Exactly. After the January incident, scrutiny returned to Boeing, and the US aviation authorities ordered Boeing to come up with a plan to address its quality control issues. That plan is due in mid-May - and in the meantime, the officials say Boeing “must commit to real and profound improvements”.

So Boeing is in the hot seat… But do we know why they’re having all these problems?
Based on reporting from the last 5 years, the common narrative is that they are simply trying to create and build planes too quickly. That cutthroat competition with Airbus has meant that Boeing is speeding over quality checks and is reluctant to look into problems with their manufacturing… Which has caused the issues in the air that we’ve been talking about.

Any other factors?
One other explanation that’s been floated has to do with the pandemic. During that time, Boeing cut a lot of jobs, and even though they’ve hired back a lot of those positions, that staff turnaround saw a lot of long-term expertise leave the company. Also, speaking of job losses…

Yes…?
Dave Calhoun, the CEO who took over in 2019, has announced that he’ll be stepping down at the end of this year. We’ll just have to wait and see what changes he makes to the company’s safety practices before then. Tough gig…

Onto our recommendations

Listening: NPR’s Lifekit podcast has 6 tips to help you overcome your fear of flying. It’s quite helpful if flying is an issue for you.

Watching: The 2022 Netflix documentary Downfall: The Case Against Boeing is still relevant – they talk to company insiders and close watchers about the problems plaguing the manufacturer.

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