Why Boeing’s Top Airplanes Keep Failing

from The New York Times I'm Sabrina. Tavern and this is the. [Music]. daily questions have swirled for weeks. over what went wrong on an Alaska. Airlines flight where a piece of the. plane blew out into the sky terrifying. passengers and renewing concerns about. the plane's manufacturer. Boeing last week in Washington we. started to get some answers today my.

colleague Sydney Ember. [Music]. [Applause]. explains it's Monday February. [Music]. 12th Sydney welcome to the show hi hi so. Sydney last month there was this.

terrifying incident on an Alaska. Airlines flight a door fell off the. plane while it was in midair and since. then there's been this kind of laundry. list of unanswered questions about what. went wrong and ultimately you know who. was responsible for that and so last. week we started to get some of our first. clear answers but let's start with the. accident itself walk us through what. happened so Boeing has been under the. microscope for about 5 years after two. crashes in 2018 and early 2019 killed.

nearly 350 people and these planes which. are Boeing 737 Max eight planes. important plane for Boeing and for. airlines in the United States right. extremely important this had become one. of boeings bestselling planes you know. it was flying all around the world and. these crashes cost Boeing billions of. dollars and it vowed to make the max 8s. much much safer but then this incident.

in January happens this time with a Max. [Music]. 9 on January 5th Alaska Airlines flight. 1282 takes off from Portland. International Airport heading to Ontario. California and about 10 minutes after. takeoff at about 16,000 ft you just hear. a big boom there's a loud bang it was. silent for like 1 second and then you. would just feel and hear a lot of air. going around freezing for.

air the plane rattles the oxygen masks. drop lights flicker so at first I. thought it was just the window and then. I realized it was the whole panel. passengers start realizing there's a. giant hole now in the. plane me the nature of the emergency and. your intentions Seattle alas 122 we just. press we declar emergency we need a. defend God that is terrifying yeah this. is a really really scary moment for a.

lot of passengers I think a lot of them. are thinking the. worst and please your SE with your SE. secely until you are told to stand up. thank. you the pilots eventually make an. emergency landing back in. Portland and what had happened was a. panel called a door plug that panel had. fallen off the pl essentially there are.

no serious injuries but it could have. been catastrophic if this had happened. at cruising altitude roughly 30,000 ft. or or higher up especially if passengers. hadn't been wearing their seat belts or. if people had been moving around as they. often are when planes get up to cruising. altitude MH so really kind of miraculous. that no one was actually hurt I mean. they were pretty close to getting into a. Zone where there could have been some. pretty serious injuries so what's the. reaction to this I mean aside from the.

obvious Terror of the. passengers well the question immediately. is who is to blame is it Alaska Airlines. is it Boeing is it Spirit AOS systems. which built the body of the plane and. then shipped it to Boeing's Factory and. rent in Washington is it the FAA and. federal Regulators no one really knows. in the immediate aftermath and as these. questions are swirling what happens. almost immediately is the Federal. Aviation Administration the main. regulator for Airlines grounds Max 9. planes with this door plug so it amounts.

to about 170 max9 planes in this country. got it and that seems like a lot right. yeah I mean the two airlines in the. United States that fly Max 9's at this. point are just Alaska and United. Airlines but these are you know sizable. portions of their Fleet Alaska has 65. Max 9es and United has 79 the most of. any us carrier at this point so this. snarls their schedule pilots and flight.

attendants can't get to their next. destination they can't get home because. the planes that they were supposed to. fly on have been grounded so it's a. sizable number of planes that are doing. a lot of work and this becomes a big. problem for those Airlines and what do. the airlines themselves say I mean. specifically Alaska Airlines perhaps you. know these are Boeing's customers right. how do they respond to this Well Airline. CEOs come out pretty forcefully blaming. Boeing I'm more than frustrated and.

disappointed the Alaska Airline CEO I am. angry this he says I am angry my Demand. on Boeing is what are they going to do. to improve their quality programs in. housee and then in addition this Echoes. what a lot of CEOs say they want to hold. Boeing accountable they're really. frustrated with Boeing itself and near. the end of January something else. happens that puts some more pressure on. the airlines that ramps up the. frustration even more the FAA takes.

further action and orders Boeing to. limit its planned increase in production. of all of its 737 Max planes and help me. understand what that means so the. federal government is saying you can't. make this plane anymore basically the. federal government is limiting how many. planes Boeing can make and this. effectively limits how many planes they. can produce a year so they can focus on. safety at the end of the year they said. they were making about 38 planes a month. and they had hoped to increase that to. 42 planes a month this year and further.

increase that in. 2025 but this really limits that for the. foreseeable future and possibly for many. months I mean the federal government is. effectively saying we don't trust you to. make this plane properly it basically. says you cannot ramp up your production. until you've proven to us that you've. resolved your quality control issues but. even with these limits on production the. FAA still clears the previously grounded. Max 9's after inspections and after. they're deemed safe to fly okay but at. this point you you know a lot of fingers.

are pointing at Boeing but we still. don't actually know the answer for who's. responsible for this door blowout yeah. that's right we still don't know who is. at fault but in early February things. get worse for Boeing Boeing says that A. supplier found two milled holes on Max. planes and this was going to cause them. to have to rework about 50 planes and. potentially delay delivery of those. planes as well Boeing sort of got ahead. of this and announcing it but it's still.

painting a picture of something is a. Miss with Boeing and their quality. control which brings us to last week. when all of this ends up in Washington. that's right so on Tuesday morning there. is a house hearing with the faa's. administrator Mike Whitaker and he says. they're going to increase their on the. ground presence in monitoring Boeing's. manufacturing but he doesn't face the. kind of grilling about Boeing that I. think some thought or hoped he.

might the national Transportation safety. board has released new information on. the Alaska Airlines plane that lost a. door panel but the real bombshell comes. later in the day when the national. Transportation safety board releases its. preliminary report on the incident it. doesn't have the full accounting of. everything but it is our first official. snapshot of what happened what does it. say what's in the report four bolts like. this one. hold the door plug into the side of the.

737 Max 9 there are two at the top and. two at the bottom this report says there. are two pairs of bolts on the door plug. that was supposed to help hold the plug. in place on the plane's body that's. critical information as the ntsp tries. to determine why that door plug blew out. it appears it simply wasn't at all. connected properly to the fuselage. itself at the they weren't there wow it. says that the bolts were there when the.

plane arrived at Boeing's Renton. facility in Washington but that there. had been an issue that was flagged there. were damag rivets near the door plug and. in order to fix these rivets the door. plug had to be opened and so it was. opened at Boeing's facility and. somewhere in that process it was put. back together and there were no bolts. put back that seems like a pretty bad. oversight yeah and the NTSB is pretty.

careful not to say who exactly did this. they don't say who opened the door plug. or Who removed the bolts but what is. clear is this happened at Boeing's. facility in Renton Washington and that. pins the blame on Boeing even Boeing. itself would say this happened on our. manufacturing floor we are should be. held. accountable so all of this starts to. give us the answer to what happened but. we still don't know. how this happened especially at Boeing a.

company that's already been under. scrutiny after the two crashes of its. Max. [Music]. planes we'll be right. [Music]. back okay so Sydney we now know the what. what happened roughly more or less but. we do not know the answer of how right. this broader mystery how could this have.

happened again at Boeing so help us. unpack that well there are still truly. more questions than answers but one of. the things this incident did was raise. more questions about the relationship. between Boeing and its regulator the. Federal Aviation Administration in the. aftermath of two crashes in five months. us lawmakers grilled the Federal. Aviation Administration about its. relationship with Boeing and what we. learned after the crashes in 2018 and.

2019 was this relationship was really. complicated a problem with software. caused the planes to repeatedly nose. dive when it was meant to stabilize the. aircraft those crashes were caused by a. flaw in a new software that was supposed. to help stabilize the planes an. independent investigation has found the. FAA itself was not fully aware of a new. system on the plane and the FAA. delegated a high percentage of approvals. allowing Boeing to certify much of its.

own work the FAA handed Boeing the. responsibility for determining the. safety of that system and basically. delegated regulatory authority to Boeing. like Fox guarding the hen house type. thing exactly but there is a reason for. this the FAA has limited resources and. they don't have enough people to have. enough inspectors on the ground. themselves and also building an airplane. is really hard and the people who know.

how to do it the best and who know how. the plane works the best are the Boeing. engineers and Boeing Employees who build. it but this doesn't change the fact that. there were actually very few FAA. inspectors at Boeing's facility just a. small handful compared to the more than. 10,000 employees who worked in Renton so. even before the crashes Boeing Employees. were starting to blow the whistle about. this saying the relationship between. Boeing and the FAA could cause safety.

issues I mean this is a really hard. problem right I used to write about the. drug industry and the Food and Drug. Administration and it was the same thing. there you know a small tiny handful of. inspectors for drug companies with. thousands of people very difficult to. actually police the things when you're. the federal government you're. potentially underfunded like the federal. inspectors to some extent are totally. outgunned but there was supposed to be a. whole Reckoning after those earlier.

crashes right there were lessons that. had been drawn at that point about the. dangers of this fox guarding the hen. house what happened did anything change. there were some changes after the. crashes in 2018 and 2019 the FAA took. back the authority to determine whether. Boe planes were safe to fly and so now. it's the FAA who determines the. airworthiness of Boeing planes there. were also some other steps that both.

Boeing and the FAA took to ensure that. this system where the FAA delegate some. of the Authority for inspections to. Boeing works better and then in the. immediate aftermath of the incident in. January of this year the FAA did start. putting more inspectors at Boeing's. facility in Renton in fact the FAA. administrator said he put 20 additional. inspectors still this is not a huge huge. number of inspectors but you can see how.

there would be criticism that the FAA. itself doesn't have enough people over. seeing Boeing as it should okay so. federal inspectors are clearly very. outgunned but in this case you know as. we've said Boeing is really front and. center this incident happened at the. Boeing factory so my question I guess is. the same as I had for the federal. Regulators when it comes to you know. what's different from those past years. what changed at Boeing after those big.

crashes well after the crashes in 2018. and 2019 a lot of blame was put on this. cultural shift that occurred at Boeing. in the. 1990s when there was a merger between. Boeing and another airplane manufacturer. McDonald Douglas and what a lot of. people will say is the culture at Boeing. shifted from an emphasis on engineering. to an emphasis on profits and. shareholders and this is a criticism. that you'll hear a lot especially from.

oldtimers at Boeing or former Boeing. Employees so after the crashes Boeing. did make a handful of changes its whole. leadership changed its CEO was fired and. the company brought on new board members. who had engineering and safety expertise. and that was of course back then right. after those twin crashes in 2018 and. 2019 what are they saying now about. those measures. so they're very clearly saying that all.

of the changes they implemented after. the crashes were not enough that this. incident on January 5th indicates that. they need to still do a lot more and so. they've done a few things one of the. things they've done is they said they. would make changes to the quality. control processes and that includes at. its own Factory and also at its. suppliers Factory at Spirit Aeros. systems and then one of the biggest. things they did was when they announced. their earnings for the fourth quarter.

they suspended their financial guidance. for the year essentially saying this was. not the time to focus on financial. performance it was a time to focus on. safety so a few moves here by Boeing and. a healthy dose of PR it sounds like to. convince its customers you know the. airlines that it's actually focused on. safety and do the customers believe it. so that's still a little unclear Some of. the airline customers have said publicly. that they're sending their own. inspectors to Boeing's facility to.

monitor the manufacturing process but at. least one CEO the CEO of United Airlines. has suggested that he might move his. business elsewhere to another plane. maker like Airbus oh wow okay so that. seems quite significant you know that. customers would potentially be voting. with their feet and going to a. competitor is there any chance that this. could actually be existential for Boeing. like that Airlines will really start.

giving their business to Boeing's big. competitor I think that's still a really. open question I mean remember Boeing is. an American Juggernaut it's a really. important company for the American. economy and also there are only two real. airplane companies that make these. planes there's Boeing and there's Airbus. and it's a very complicated process to. change how you're going to design your. fleets and to Pivot if you're unhappy.

these planes take a while to make and a. while to deliver you know Airbus can't. possibly make all of the planes and. neither can Boeing so I I I don't think. this is going to be an existential. crisis for Boeing at this point but I. think there is mounting frustration. there is the sense of disbelief that you. had 5 years to improve these really. catastrophic crashes happened you vowed. to do better everyone vowed to do better. and yet here we are again. and so I do think Boeing has a lot of.

questions it needs to answer and a lot. of reassurance it needs to give. [Music]. customers so Sydney I'm going to ask you. the question that probably a lot of our. listeners will have at this point and. that is should I be worried about flying. on one of these planes I think this is a. question that's front and center for a. lot of people right now but the fact is. you have to remember that flying is. incredibly incredibly safe there hasn't.

been an fatal accident involving a major. US Airline in more than a decade oh wow. you're actually statistically more. likely to die in a car accident on the. way to the airport than you are on the. plane so it is really really safe to. fly but I think the fact that you're. asking this and others are asking this. really could be a problem for Boeing and. really suggest that Boeing needs to. solve the safety problems it's having. [Music].

Sydney thank you thank you. [Music]. Sabrina we'll be right. back here's what else you should know. today over the weekend Democrats went on. the defensive to discredit what they. said was a partisan hit on President. Biden by special counsel Robert her this.

is a report that went off the rails it's. chabby work product let's Bob Bower the. president's personal lawyer said on CBS. Face the Nation that the report was. substandard and so along with the legal. conclusion Comes This flood of. characterizations factual misation. perjorative comments about the president. that are inconsistent with doj policy. and Norms her's report issued last week. cleared Biden of wrongdoing in his.

handling of classified documents but. characterized him as elderly and. forgetful the report put a spotlight on. what was already a primary concern for. voters Biden's age in a New York Times. Sienna College poll this fall More than. 70% of battleground State voters agreed. that Biden was too old to Be an. Effective. president and I said you didn't pay your. delinquent you said yes let's say that.

happened no I would not protect you in. fact I would encourage them to do. whatever the hell they want you got at a. rally in South Carolina former president. Donald Trump claimed that while he was. in office he told leaders of NATO. countries that he would encourage Russia. to quote do whatever the hell they want. to countries that he deemed to be in AAR. to the alliance got pay you got to pay. your. bills it was an extraordinary claim. suggesting that he would was threatening. to incite an enemy to attack American.

Allies and foreshadowed what could be. far-reaching changes in the. international order if he wins the White. [Music]. House today's episode was produced by. cydney Harper Diana win Mary Wilson and. Clare tennis skar it was edited by Lexi. Di and Michael benis contains original. music by Marian Lozano and Pat mccusker. and was engineered by Chris Wood our. theme music is by Jim brunberg and Ben.

lansberg of. [Music]. [Music]. wonderly that's it for the daily I'm. Sabrina tavernes see you. [Music]. tomorrow.