WOEING: Second Boeing whistleblower dies suddenly after claiming safety flaws ignored.
A whistleblower who accused Boeing of ignoring safety flaws in the 737 MAX airplanes has died.
Joshua Dean, a former Spirit AeroSystems quality auditor, claimed he was fired for flagging concerns about lax standards at the company’s manufacturing plant in Wichita, Kansas.
His sudden death at the age of 45 on Tuesday came after suffering from a fast-spreading infection, according to his family and lawyer.
Dean’s lawyer Brian Knowles said it is a ‘loss to the aviation community and the flying public’.
Knowles told Al Jazeera: ‘He possessed tremendous courage to stand up for what he felt was true and right and raised quality and safety issues.
‘Aviation companies should encourage and incentivise those that do raise these concerns.
‘Otherwise, safety and quality are truly not these companies’ top priorities.’
They certainly don’t seem to be these days, Joan Sammon writes at the Pipeline: Boeing: From Aviation Excellence to ESG Disaster.
The disastrous list of failures offers a prescient example of how influences from outside a company and even from outside an industry can distract a board and C-suite from its core business and cause irreparable damage. The accounts reveal how the decisions of three decades ago have intersected with the decisions of three years ago, leaving in their wake the death of innocent people, the stench of mediocrity, and a litany of leadership lessons from which other corporate leaders can learn.
In the days following the January door plug blow out, a post appeared on an aviation blog written by an anonymous, purported current employee. The author flatly asserted that four bolts that were supposed to hold the door plug in place were “…not installed when Boeing delivered the plane [to Alaska Airlines], our own records reflect this.” The whistleblower further described the Renton, Washington-based 737 production system as a “…rambling, shambling, disaster waiting to happen” — even asserting specific details about the exact plane that lost the door plug mid-air.
This check job [of the door plug] was completed on 31 August 2023, and did turn up discrepancies, but on the RH [right hand] side door, not the LH [left hand] that actually failed. …it was inevitable something would slip through- and on the incident aircraft something did.
While the account is stunning on its face, it aligns with similar details revealed in a whistleblower lawsuit brought by former Boeing employee John Barnett about the 787 program in South Carolina. Details of that complaint describe a similar fundamental shift away from the two factors that had made the Boeing brand an industry leader — precision engineering and quality manufacturing. The suit describes a contentious work environment that fostered speed over quality. It describes how managers worked to force out senior employees who remembered the higher standards and Boeing’s brand promise of decades ago.
Barnett ended up dying from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound, after day two of what was supposed to be three days of testimony about what he allegedly knew about the Boeing failures, and what he had done to try to correct or effect the defective manufacturing processes. Barnett’s curiously timed death is considered by family, friends and his attorneys to be suspicious.
America’s Newspaper of Record adds: Boeing Sadly Announces Whistleblower Shot Self In Back While Falling Off Skyscraper Directly Into Wood Chipper While Wearing Cement Shoes.