Posted on 01/29/2024 1:23:35 PM PST by Red Badger
Regulators put limits on Boeing 737 MAX production; grounded MAX 9 jets have resumed flying after required inspections
Bolts needed to secure part of an Alaska Airlines jet that blew off in midair appear to have been missing when the plane left Boeing’s BA -0.14%decrease; red down pointing triangle factory.
Boeing and other industry officials increasingly believe the plane maker’s employees failed to put back the bolts when they reinstalled a 737 MAX 9 plug door after opening or removing it during production, according to people familiar with the matter.
The increasingly likely scenario, according to some of these people, is based partly on an apparent absence of markings on the Alaska door plug itself that would suggest bolts were in place when it blew off the jet around 16,000 feet over Oregon on Jan. 5.
They also pointed to paperwork and process lapses at Boeing’s Renton, Wash., factory related to the company’s work on the plug door.
The National Transportation Safety Board has been conducting metallurgical analysis of the plug door but hasn’t released the results of the testing. Laboratory tests might show whether the bolts were in place or not there at all. An update in the NTSB probe is expected as soon as this week.
New evidence could later emerge before accident investigators reach final conclusions. It couldn’t be determined how many people were involved with work on the plug door at Boeing’s 737 factory.
Supplier Spirit AeroSystems delivered the 737 fuselage to Boeing’s factory with the door plug installed. The plug door itself was constructed in Spirit’s Malaysian factory, while the fuselage was assembled in Wichita, Kan.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
AVIATION PING!>....................
installing fasteners is racist
Sounds like joe’s aviation “diversity” to include those with psychological issues may have already started at boeing.
Somebody forgot to use Loctite on bolts and torque to specs. I have not flown in 4 years, but unforunatelyly I have to fly this spring and I am scared.
Guess those diversity hires worked out well for them!
Sounds like Boeing production facilities can no longer be considered “trusted sources”. If each airline needs to disassemble and check every bolt, connection, and so on when taking delivery of an aircraft, that will have a major effect on the sales price of future deliveries.
Ain’t Affirmative Action wonderful?
THIS is probably the real culprit here. Parts made overseas and shipped in assembled where there were either missing instructions to suppliers OR missing instruction to US installers about completing the operation of a finished fuselage installation.
It’s called DIEversity!
I’ll bet you a purple-haired Gen Z’er with a nose ring failed big time on this one.
Spirit and Boeing are apparently different companies. Their quality and assembly systems are different. The door had to be disassembled for some installation to happen and then it was reassembled. But because Sprit’s system called the disassembly one thing, which didn’t require an inspection and Boeing’s system called it something else that did require inspection, no inspection to verify the placement of the locking pins was carried out. This is a major fupaw. It also hints that other similar problems may exist and just comparing the thousands of pages of instructions would take, I’d guess, a year or more. But there are other issues at play as well as other airlines have found inadequately installed hardware. Just investigating this will take millions of dollars.
I think I can tell you why there are two companies involved. To sell into a worldwide market requires technology transfer. A country that buys a dozen planes for its national airline will want some of that money and the jobs it represents to stay local. So they cut a deal to make this or that part or subassembly and those get sent to Boeing and can end up in any airplane anywhere. I was on a classified project that required everything we used to be produced in the lower 48. When we were all done, it got married to a Korean built copy of our customer’s computer. At least the computer worked.
There is absolutely no excuse for this.
There is something very wrong at Boeing.
They just finished a grounding to check for loose rudder linkage bolts
Installing and torquing bolts is kind a basic skill when it comes to aircraft.
I really can’t understand how this could happen.
Have been involved with heavy aircraft maintenance in the past and never seen anything like this
Otherwise known as management that cares only about production and not quality or safety.
If the instructions are expected but missing, the parts should be refused, just as though they were missing a piece.
Boeing is having problems with their quality lately. I wonder if they’re workforce is inundated with pot smokers. After all, it is Seattle ya’ know?
How are those woke, transgender mechanics working out?
Driving your car will be much safer.
Boeing has been a great company for decades. Perhaps management has lost its collective mind.
But so many screw ups sound intentional to me. Possibly DEI, or just plain sabotage. Not necessarily mutually exclusive.
What did you expect. The Lakers were on that night and LeBron was hot and the bolt inspector, hired under the new DEI policies, had one eye on his phone and one on the part with the bolt.
Nobody’s perfect.....chill out bro.....
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