The mid-flight blast that threw Boeing Co. into a crisis of confidence was no surprise, considering deficiencies in the company’s safety culture, an aerospace expert plans to tell lawmakers Wednesday.
Javier de Luis, an aerospace engineer and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, plans to tell the Senate Commerce Committee that the plane maker’s pace and commitment to change falls short of what’s needed after the two 737 Max crashes in 2018 and 2019 killed 346 people. He was among several experts summoned by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration who earlier this year wrote a damning report on Boeing’s safety culture.
In written remarks prepared for the hearing, de Luis cited what he called “distressing” comments last month by Boeing Chief Financial Officer Brian West, who said the company’s emphasis on aircraft production over quality needs to change, and that the company’s leadership “got it” after the Jan. 5 accident, in which a fuselage panel caused a 737 Max 9 to explode shortly after takeoff.
US investigators said the plane was apparently missing four bolts intended to hold the piece in place.
“I would have thought they would have ‘got it’ five years ago,” de Luis said in his written remarks. He is the brother of Graziella de Luis, one of the passengers killed in the crash of an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max in March 2019.
A Boeing representative declined to comment. According to the Senate Commerce Committee, the company is preparing a 90-day plan to review its quality and safety practices in response to the panel’s findings before the May 28 deadline.
The remarks come ahead of how Boeing’s safety culture will come under public scrutiny Wednesday, when two separate Senate hearings will delve into a whistleblower’s claims about shoddy assembly processes and deficiencies revealed in the panel’s extensive study commissioned by Congress .
De Luis plans to testify at a hearing called by Senator Maria Cantwell to examine the company’s safety culture. Released in February, the committee’s report accused Boeing of ineffective procedures and a breakdown in communications between senior management and other staff members.
The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations will hear testimony next Wednesday from a Boeing quality engineer who said the company’s 787 Dreamliner planes are at risk of structurally weakening over time, claims Boeing has denied.