Boeing whistleblower: ‘Absolutely’ a culture of retaliation

A Boeing whistleblower told a Senate committee Wednesday that he was silenced and threatened after he raised concerns with gaps in the airline giant’s manufacturing process.

Sam Salehpour, a quality engineer at Boeing, alleged the airline giant retaliated against him after he raised concerns that portions of the fuselage of the company’s 787 Dreamliner were improperly fused together, which could cause the plane to break apart midflight after an extended period of use.

“In a rush to address the bottlenecks in production, Boeing hit problems, putting pieces together with excessive force to make them appear that the gaps don't exist even though they exist,” Salehpour said. “The gap didn’t actually go away, and this may result in premature fatigue failure. Effectively, they are putting out defective airplanes.”

The allegations hit the already embattled airline manufacturer, which is facing multiple investigations from regulators and lawmakers after the door plug of a 737 Max 9 plane blew off shortly after takeoff on an Alaska Airlines flight on Jan. 5.

Boeing CEO David Calhoun was invited to testify alongside the whistleblower, but he did not attend the hearing.

After he consistently brought the manufacturing issue to Boeing, Salehpour says he was isolated, transferred and threatened.

“I want to make clear that I have raised these issues over three years. I was ignored. I was told not to create delays. I was told frankly to shut up,” Salehpour said.

When Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) asked if he believed there was a culture of retaliation at Boeing, Salehpour said “absolutely.”

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who chairs the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Investigations, held up a photo of a tire punctured by a bolt, which he said Salehpour provided as an example of the retaliation and threats he faced. 

While Salehpour said he has no concrete proof, he believes the tire was punctured while he was at work. Salehpour said that when he had the tire replaced, he was told the bolt was not picked up through “normal driving.”

Salehpour also said his boss told him he would have “killed someone” who said what he said in a meeting, and called him incessantly on his personal phone. He also said he was blocked from documenting issues and sharing information with subject matter experts.

“There are mounting, serious allegations that Boeing has a broken safety culture and a set of practices that are unacceptable,” Blumenthal said, noting the subcommittee has launched a bipartisan inquiry and expects both Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to appear before the committee.

Boeing did not immediately return a request for comment from The Hill. But a Boeing spokesperson previously told The Hill that the company "understands the important oversight responsibilities of the Subcommittee and we are cooperating with this inquiry. We have offered to provide documents, testimony, and technical briefings, and are in discussions with the Subcommittee regarding next steps."

Ed Pierson, executive director of The Foundation for Aviation Safety and a former Boeing manager, told the committee that the blame lies in part with the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the independent agency responsible for investigating transportation accidents.

“The gold standard is now fool's gold because the only thing that is more dangerous than a dangerous environment is the illusion of a safe environment,” Pierson said.

Pierson alleged the agencies ignored manufacturing issues at Boeing until the Alaska Airlines incident, alleging that the NTSB relies on Boeing employees to provide technical assistance in their accident investigations.

The FAA is investigating Boeing

The FAA is investigating Boeing, and an agency spokesperson pointed out that FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker has said “this won’t be back to business as usual for Boeing.”

“The company must commit to real and profound improvements and we will hold them accountable every step of the way,” the FAA spokesperson told The Hill. "We will continue our aggressive oversight of Boeing and ensure the company comprehensively addresses the findings of our recent audit and the recommendations from the expert ODA panel."

In February, the FAA issued a scathing report by a panel of aviation experts that criticized Boeing’s “inadequate” and “confusing” safety culture and offered 50 recommendations to bring about critical changes.

“The procedures and training are complex and in a constant state of change, creating employee confusion especially among different work sites and employee groups,” and there is “a lack of awareness of safety-related metrics” across all levels of the company, according to the report.

The Hill has reached out to the NTSB for comment.

“The good news is the employees of Boeing and these agencies can overcome poor leadership, we need them to be successful,” Pierson said. “They're highly capable, they need to be supported and encouraged, and these problems are fixable. But it starts with telling the truth.”

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), the subcommittee ranking member, said that while he did not want to “scare the you-know-what out of the American public” and wants the “public to be confident in getting on an airplane,” the “testimony is more than troubling.”

Pierson had a more dire message: “Unless action is taken, and leaders are held accountable, every person stepping aboard a Boeing airplane is at risk.”

Updated at 1:45 p.m.