Boeing Whistleblowers Testify Before Senate

These whistleblowers have come forward at great personal risk. In fact, a number of them and others have suffered harassment, isolation, transfers, and even threats of physical violence.

(00:16)
Just as an example, this tire was in a car that belonged to Mr. Salehpour. He will testify about the circumstances that led to in effect a bolt being driven into a tire in his car, which posed not only a symbolic message to him, but also a personal risk to his safety. It is simply one example of retaliation and reprisals and threats that he endured.

(00:56)
Boeing is at a moment of reckoning. It’s a moment many years in the making. It is a moment that results not from one incident or one flight or one plane or one plan. It reached the public consciousness after the death of 346 people, 346 innocent travelers in 2018 and 2019. That led Boeing to promise that it would overhaul its safety practices and culture.

(01:33)
That promise proved empty. We know it was empty because of incidents that have occurred since then. Most recently, the Alaska Airlines panel blowout. We know it was empty because the FAA itself audited Boeing’s production and manufacturing and in March concluded “non-compliance issues in Boeing’s manufacturing process control, parts handling and storage and product control” were prevalent.

(02:09)
I want to welcome particularly Sam Salehpour who came to us because of the gravity of his concerns and because of what happened to him when he tried to raise these concerns to Boeing’s management, not once, twice, but consistently and constantly over a period of years, and as a result, he was isolated, transferred, even threatened for refusing to stay silent. What Boeing did was in effect, try to silence him, conceal and cover up the facts that he was trying to bring to their attention about basic defects in manufacturing, the failure to properly fuse fuselage parts, the kind of concerns that led to the blowout of that panel on the Alaska Airlines flight.

(03:10)
In the wake of the 737 Max crashes, many current and former Boeing and FAA officials like Ed Pearson and Joe Jacobson, both of whom are with us today, came forward to raise those kinds of concern about safety culture at Boeing. And tragically last month, John Barnett, a former Boeing quality control manager in South Carolina, who became a whistleblower committed suicide after alleging that managers had been pressuring workers not to document defects and properly address safety risks.

(03:49)
Since this hearing was announced, our subcommittee has received outreach from other individuals affiliated with Boeing, who have contacted us to voice their concerns. For example, a former Boeing South Carolina manager, wrote to us with examples of what he described as “culture of shortcuts, pressure and hostility” that he experienced while working at Boeing between 2009 and 2020.

(04:26)
Another Boeing mechanic who asked to remain anonymous wrote to us and said “the Boeing South Carolina plant was run by a good old boy network that played by their own rules. When we raised concerns that the work was not in accordance with the process and procedures, we were ordered to just do it and told there were hundreds of others waiting in line outside the gate wanting our jobs.” I’m going to ask without objection that these two letters be entered into the record.

(05:05)
The outreach that we’ve received, important and serious contacts with substantive information in just the last few days suggest that there may be others out there who live in fear like Mr. Salehpour, like John Barnett, and they have witnessed the shortcuts or defects that could lead to the next tragedy, and their coming forward may help prevent it.

(05:39)
To Mr. Salehpour, to Mr. Pearson, to Mr. Jacobson and others who have come forward and will come forward in the future, I just want to say thank you. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for speaking truth to power in the best sense of that word. Thank you for facing down one of the most powerful companies in the world.

(06:12)
We intend to uncover what has enabled the culture of safety disregard to exist so that we can change it for good. To create a genuine and comprehensive culture of safety, Boeing must create workplace condition where everyone feels comfortable reporting quality and safety concerns, even in situations where concerns turn out to be unfounded, even where the complaints are mistaken. Boeing’s culture must be one where employees are encouraged to speak up.

(06:57)
Boeing is fortunate to have one of the most skilled, competent, honest, dedicated workforces in the world. The United States is fortunate to have them working at Boeing. They deserve to be rewarded, not punished for doing their job properly and speaking up when it’s appropriate.

(07:29)
Fortunately for Boeing and for passengers around the world, this moment of reckoning and the changes that must follow can still happen before any more lives are lost. Our committee has initiated a bipartisan inquiry. We expect both Boeing and the FAA to fully cooperate and appear before our committee.

(07:53)
Today’s hearing, as I mentioned earlier, is the first of several we intend to hold to get to the bottom of Boeing’s broken safety culture. We expect Boeing’s CEO to appear before us to tell the American people why the promises made five years ago by this company have not been fulfilled.

(08:15)
I don’t want anyone to mistake our objectives here. Our goal is not to drive Boeing to fail. In fact, just the opposite. We want and need Boeing to succeed. It is a company that once was preeminent in engineering and safety. We want to restore the luster of that reputation and its business, which have been so sadly battered.

(08:47)
Boeing’s workers remain as skilled and talented as ever, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t recognize that many of these workers are represented by unions like the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers and the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace, and they have helped to protect a number of their employees against retaliation and reprisal.

(09:14)
We want Boeing to learn from its mistakes and be accountable. We want the Department of Justice to take this evidence and other facts that it has obtained to examine the deferred prosecution agreement, whether conditions of that agreement have been violated, whether criminal prosecution is appropriate.

(09:39)
I’m not jumping to conclusions. I’m a former prosecutor. I know that investigations have to proceed carefully and methodically, but these investigations are important to accountability. Again, thank you to the witnesses for being here today and I turn now to the ranking member.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I also want to start by thanking our witnesses, your courage in coming forward as whistleblowers. I want underscore what you did say that we all want Boeing to succeed. I would ask that my written opening statement be entered in the record.

(10:22)
Prior to this hearing, I talked to stakeholders, I talked to airlines, your Boeing’s customers. I talked to Boeing representatives. It was a overall theme that everybody wants Boeing to succeed. We need them to succeed because as a traveling public, we want to feel safe in the air, and I think I entered this investigation acknowledging the fact that airline travel is still probably the safest way to travel. It’s what I keep telling myself when I hop on a airplane and even when I hop on a 737 Max, it’s been taken care of. We need more whistleblowers not only in Boeing, but we need them in the airline, in their maintenance departments. We need whistleblowers from the FAA. This is a very complex business. They’re complex products. It’s a complex problem, and so I appreciate this hearing. I’m a little concerned. What I don’t want this committee to do is scare the you-know-what out of the American public.

(11:29)
In the end, I want the public to be confident in getting on an airplane and experiencing their travel. But I have to admit, this testimony is more than troubling. And as I was reading the testimony last night, as I’ve read more things this morning, as a matter of fact, I’m going to enter an article that I was given to this written on April 3rd in City Journal. The title is: An Insider Explains what has Gone Disastrously Wrong With Boeing. We have to be concerned about what’s happening and we’ve got to get the bottom of this. This is going to take a lot of work. This is going to take a lot of investigation, and again, we need to hold these hearings, but we need to do the detailed work and we need more information. We need people coming forward on all sides.

(12:24)
But I do want to just quote from this article. It’s an interview with an insider, a whistleblower that’s not coming public, but he tells a story of elite dysfunction, financial abstraction, and DEI bureaucracy that has poisoned the culture, creating a sense of profound alienation between the people who occupy the executive suite and those who build airplanes. Goes on.

(12:49)
Right now we have an executive council running the company, Boeing, that is all outsiders. The current CEO is a General Electric guy, as is the CFO who we brought in. We have a completely new HR leader with no background at Boeing. The head of our commercial airplanes unit in Seattle who was fired last week was one of the last engineers in the executive council. The headquarters in Arlington is empty. Nobody lives there. This is an empty executive suite. The CEO lives in New Hampshire. The CFO lives in Connecticut. The head of HR lives in Orlando.

(13:22)
We just instituted a policy that everyone has come to work five days a week except the executive council, which can use private jets to travel to meetings. And that is the story. It’s a company that is under caretakers, it’s not under owners, and it’s not under people who love airlines. In this business, the workforce knows if you love the thing you are building or if it’s just another set of assets to you. At some point you cannot recover that process … or you cannot recover with process what you have lost with love. And I think is probably the most important story of all. There’s no visible center of the company and the people are wondering what they’re connected to.

(14:01)
Now, again, I read this this morning after having read the troubling testimony. There’s some real problems with Boeing that need to be fixed, and I’m not exactly sure how they’re going to get fixed, but again, this investigation has to include not only Boeing, it’s got to include how airlines maintain Boeing products, but it’s also got to look at the FAA and government and where government has potentially dropped the ball as well.

(14:31)
So again, this has to be detailed investigation and the end result has to be toward helping Boeing succeed by exposing the truth. So again, I appreciate the hearing and I’m looking forward to the witnesses, again, thank them for their participation.

Thank you very much, Senator Johnson. I think you’ve heard bipartisan accord on the direction we’re going to take and I want to introduce the witnesses for today’s hearing. Sam Salehpour, current Quality Engineer at Boeing is a person with four decades of aerospace experience, including work as an aerospace engineer for a NASA contractor and 17 years as an engineer at Boeing. In his role at Boeing, he monitors production, analyzes defects, and develops strategies to prevent the kinds of incidents that we’ve seen from reoccurring. Mr. Salehpour has come forward to our subcommittee after documenting years of safety concerns while working on the 777 and the 787 aircraft.

(15:44)
Ed Pearson, Executive Director of The Foundation for Aviation Safety and a former Boeing manager. Mr. Pearson is a former senior manager and the current Executive Director of The Foundation for Aviation Safety. He spent 10 years at Boeing and oversaw teams who manufactured Boeing’s 737 Max airplanes. Prior to joining Boeing, Mr. Pearson spent over 30 years in the United States Navy. I believe you’re a graduate of the Naval Academy.

(16:19)
Joe Jacobson. Mr. Jacobson is a Safety and Aerospace Engineer who spent more than 25 years at the FAA. He retired in 2021. Prior to joining the FAA, he was an engineer at Boeing for 11 years. He now serves as a Technical Advisor to The Foundation for Aviation Safety.

(16:44)
Dr. Shawn Pruchnicki. He has a PhD. He’s a professional practice assistant professor for Integrated Systems Engineering at Ohio State University. He is also an Aviation Safety Consultant. He has served as an aviation accident investigator and he’s a former commercial airline pilot.

(17:14)
As is our custom, I will swear you in and then we’ll hear your individual testimony if you would please rise.

(17:27)
Do you swear that the testimony you’re about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God? Thank you.

(17:36)
Mr. Salehpour, you may begin. Thank you.

Chairman Blumenthal, ranking member Johnson and the honorable members of this subcommittee, thank you for convening this hearing. My name is Sam Salehpour and I’m a quality engineer at the Boeing. I have over 40 years of …

[inaudible 00:17:56] not the source of this subcommittee.

I have over 40 years of experience as an engineer. I’m not here today because I want to be here. I’m here today because I felt that I must come forward because I do not want to see 787 or 777 crash. I have serious concerns about the safety of the 787 and 777 aircraft and I’m willing to take on professional risk to talk about them.

(18:25)
First, little bit about me. I came to United States in 1973 and got a mechanical engineering degree from University of Missouri where Senator Hawley is from. After that, I worked for companies that they were involved in space shuttle. I had a friend engineer that worked on the space shuttle. He was always complaining about the quality of the O-rings that we had in the space shuttle solid rocket boosters. He was scared that they might fail. He raised his concerns and he was heard and he wasn’t heard, and seven brave astronauts including the teacher in space died when the Challenger O-rings ultimately failed just as he predicted. At the moment, I know that if I were ever in a similar situation, I would have to come up and speak up.

(19:20)
I have analyzed Boeing’s own data to conclude that the company is taking manufacturing shortcuts on the 787 program that may significantly reduce the airplane safety and the life cycle. Since 2013, there have been serious issues on the 787 program, not properly closing thousands of gaps in its assembly of the fuselage on major joints. Boeing’s standard says that these gaps must be closed usually by a small shim or filler called the shim when they exceed five thousandths of an inch. This seems very small. Boeing’s PR team like to call it the width of a human hair.

(20:04)
When you are operating at 35,000 feet, details are that the size of a human hair can be a matter of life and death. In a rush to address its bottlenecks in production, Boeing hit problems pushing pieces together with excessive force to make them appear that the gaps don’t exist even though they exist. The gap didn’t actually go away and this may result in premature fatigue failure. Effectively, they are putting out defective airplanes.

(20:37)
I repeatedly produced reports for my supervisors and Boeing management demonstrating that the gaps in the 787 not being properly measured or shimmed in two major joints of the 787. Evaluating from Boeing from the 29 inspected airplane data, I found gaps exceeding the specification that were not properly addressed 98.7% of the time. I want to repeat that. 98.7% of the time, the gaps that they were supposed to be shimmed, they were not shimmed.

(21:12)
The other issue that I found, when you have these gaps and you drill through them, you get some debris in the stack ups. This is known to be a problem, not a good thing for the airplanes by Boeing. But Boeing data also from the inspection of the data shows that the debris ended up in the gaps 80% of the time. Again, you have debris in the gaps 80% of the time.

(21:41)
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. At one point, Boeing management got sick of me and raising these issues and moved me out of the 787 program into the 777 program.

(22:01)
On the 777 program, I found problems again. I found that Boeing started a new process to build the airplane without taking into the consideration of the design of the airplane and how the airplane was designed. As a result, I witnessed severe misalignment when the planes were assembled. Boeing manufacturing used unmeasured and unlimited amount of force to correct the misalignment and this also weakens the airplane in the long run. I literally saw people jumping on the pieces of the airplane to get them to align. I call it the Tarzan effect among other improper methods.

(22:43)
Again, I raised concerns internally. I was sidelined. I was told to shut up. I received physical threats. My boss said, “I would have killed someone who said what you said in a meeting,” and then this is not a safety culture when you get threatened by bringing issues of safety concerns.

(23:04)
I hope that your work on this issue signals to Boeing that they must make real changes and get back to building the airplane safely. I’ll be more than happy to answer your questions.

Thank you very much, Mr. Salehpour. Mr. Pearson.

Chair Blumenthal, ranking Member Johnson, distinguished members of the committee, good morning. Thank you for inviting me today. My name is Ed Pearson. My father was a Washington DC homicide detective and my mom was a nurse. I learned the importance of telling the truth from them, my teachers and coaches, and this was reinforced at the Naval Academy. The military, like all high-hazard jobs, demands that people tell the truth and admit their mistakes because if you don’t, people will die.

(23:53)
Since the first Boeing Max airplane crash, I’ve spent every day thinking about the victims, their families, and the millions of people that fly Boeing airplanes. I’ve done everything I can to continue telling the world the Max airplane is still unsafe and to alert authorities to Boeing’s dangerous manufacturing.

(24:13)
I’m here today to share four key messages. First, the manufacturing conditions that led to the two 737 Max disasters also led to the Alaskan accident blowout accident, and these conditions continue. In 2019, I testified as a Boeing whistleblower. I had previously warned the 737 general manager before the Max crashed to shut down the factory. I also warned Boeing’s general counsels, the CEO and the board of directors before the second crash to shut it down.

(24:43)
They ignored my warnings. During my 2019 testimony, I described the chaotic manufacturing, the dysfunctional safety culture, and the horrible job government authorities were doing investigating the two crashes. The world is shocked to learn about Boeing’s current production quality issues. I’m not surprised because nothing changed after the two crashes. There was no accountability. Not a single person from Boeing went to jail. Hundreds of people died, and there’s been no justice.

(25:10)
Unless action is taken and leaders are held accountable, every person stepping aboard a Boeing airplane is at risk. Government authorities ignored Boeing’s manufacturing problems until the Alaska accident. Passengers shouldn’t have to rely on whistleblowers to provide the truth. They should be able to get on airplanes and not have to worry about what model it is, whether it was designed and manufactured to the highest of standards, whether the airline is operating and maintaining it properly, or whether government agencies are providing proper oversight.

(25:40)
FAA, DOT and NTSB leaders frequently state our aviation system is the gold standard. There’s a reason commercial aviation has been historically safe, and that’s because people worked extremely hard for decades to keep them safe. They told the truth, they admitted their mistakes, and they didn’t downplay safety incidents.

These agencies have become lazy, complacent, and reactive. The deterioration has been occurring over several years. My second point is 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. Two brand new airplanes crashed after exhibiting production-related electrical and electronic defects within their first month of operation, and the NTSB did not investigate the factory. The evidence indicates the MAX crashes were triggered by manufacturing defects, not MCAS software. The NTSB is investigating the factory now. However, the reality is the NTSB is overly dependent on Boeing and the FAA to provide technical assistance in their accident investigations. They are not an independent investigative authority. There is an inherent conflict of interest. The Department of Transportation has been completely useless in helping the FAA do their jobs. They have continued to take a hands-off approach this entire matter.

(26:58)
My third point is, if the leaders of those government agencies had done their jobs, investigators would’ve uncovered a mountain of important information. The FAA would’ve known Boeing’s production processes were a mess, and the safety culture was terrible. The FAA could have prevented an ever-increasing list of production quality defects. Instead, they’re surprised each time it occurs, showing how ineffective and reactive their oversight has become. Just last month, the FAA reported on uncommanded rolls of MAX airplanes due to wiring that is being chafed. Boeing and the FAA have known about these manufacturing defects for more than two years and did not inform the public about this potentially catastrophic condition. There are also Canadian reports of new MAX airplanes with chafed wire bundles containing burn marks and evidence of electrical arcing. Routine… Excuse me. Boeing routinely states that their airplanes meet or exceed all safety standards.

(27:52)
This is untrue and misrepresents the safety of the airplanes. The company illegally removed thousands of quality control inspections on individual airplanes without the FAA’s knowledge and without the knowledge of the airlines. Although many of these inspections have been reinstated, hundreds of airplanes have left Boeing factories without those thousands of inspections. My last point is the Department of Justice and FBI relied on the slanted results of the first MAX accident investigation to develop an illegal and unjust deferred prosecution agreement. The NTSB chair reiterated to Congress last week that Boeing has said there are no records documenting the removal of the Alaska Airlines door.

(28:31)
I’m not going to sugar coat this. This is a criminal coverup. Records do in fact exist. I know this because I’ve personally passed them to the FBI. A five-minute testimony is not nearly enough time to explain how insidious the story is. Boeing’s corporate leaders continue to conceal the truth, they continue to mislead and deceive the public about the safety of the planes. That is the safety culture at the top of the Boeing company right now. The good news is the employees of Boeing and these agencies can overcome poor leadership. We need them to be successful. They’re highly capable. They need to be supported and encouraged, and these problems are fixable, but it starts with telling the truth. Thank you.

Thanks, Mr. Pierson. Mr. Jacobsen.

Thank you, Senators. My name is Joe Jacobsen. I’m an aerospace engineer with almost 40 years of experience. I worked for Boeing from 1984 to 1995 on the 767 and 777 programs. From 1995 to 2021, I worked in aircraft certification at the FAA. I retired from the FAA in 2021, and have been volunteering as an independent aviation safety advocate since mostly in support of the ET302 families. On November 6th, 2018, a week after the Lion Air 610 crash, I received an email from a colleague asking if we had done any issue papers on MCAS. This was the first day that I heard about MCAS. The next day, although not assigned to the crash investigation, I received an email from a colleague at the FAA, which contained flight data recorder information from the Lion Air crash. It was immediately obvious to me that the 737 MAX had a serious design flaw.

(30:17)
I saw that the horizontal stabilizer was repeatedly moving at a high rate because of a faulty angle of attack input. I guessed that a software error was responsible. A few days later, I was shocked to discover that the airplane was purposely designed and certified to use just one AOA input for this flight critical function. When the house report was released in September of 2020, I finally understood why I hadn’t known about MCAS. Boeing meeting minutes from June, 2013 recorded the reason saying if we emphasize MCAS is a new function, there may be a greater certification and training impact. Boeing intentionally hid the design from FAA engineers and airline pilots. Had we known at least a half dozen experienced FAA engineers in Seattle, in the Seattle office would’ve immediately rejected the original MCAS design. Boeing concealment led to two crashes and 346 deaths. After working on the recertification of the MAX after the second crash, I sent a letter to the parents of Samya Stumo shortly before my retirement in March of 2021.

(31:32)
I saw their anger and grief and wanted them to know the true story and not the false narrative presented by Boeing and FAA. Over the last three years, Samya’s parents have connected me with many other crash families. I frequently communicate with the devastated people who have lost loved ones in the ET302 crash. I’ve heard many inspiring stories about those who were lost, stories about Samya, Mick, Camille, Melvin, Bennett, Danielle, Graziella and others. The recertification of the MAX has been characterized as the most comprehensive in the history of aviation. This is also a false narrative. During the recertification of the MAX, FAA leadership supported Boeing’s effort to narrow the scope to primarily focus on MCAS. MCAS was a mess for sure, but other critical items were off the re-examination table. The MAX crew alerting system doesn’t meet current design requirements, and by my account, the old standard went along with that at high levels. They went along with that, the redirect from the Boeing company.

Mr. Salehpour, I showed you earlier a photograph of a tire wheel from your car. That boat was inserted by someone as a threat, perhaps as a risk to you.

Yes, I was losing just air on my tire and I bring it somewhere and they say, hey, you have a nail in tire. That’s about one month old tire so I brought it back to the shop that they fixed it and they fixed it. I went to pick it up and the gentleman told me that you know this nail was not picked up through normal driving. I didn’t know anything about that. He’s the one who brought it to my attention. And I came home and I had to go all the way back there to get the tire to just save the tire. It was like 25 mile drive. But anyway, but the bottom line is that yes, the nail was inserted in there. I believe it happened at work. I have no proof of that.

You mentioned also a threat to your physical safety. Someone saying they would’ve killed you if they heard-

Yes, someone told me they’re going to kill… They would’ve killed someone like me if you said something, what you said.

The FAA issued an absolutely scathing report about Boeing, and Boeing has said that it’s developing an action plan. I’d like to ask you, Mr. Pierson, should we rely on Boeing to in effect, develop its own action plan, evaluate itself and go on about its business or do we need continuing investigation?

We absolutely need continuing investigation and honestly, I’m so tired of hearing about plans. We need action and you can plan all day long, but if you don’t actually carry through with it it doesn’t matter.

You’d like to see action.

Yes, sir.

I think that’s one of the common themes here. We need action, not just more talk. I’m going to yield at this point. We’re observing a seven minute round and we’re going to try to stick to it. Senator Johnson.

So let me point out, I think the 800 pound grill in the room is the tremendous pressure society-wide to keep these planes flying. I mean, if we were to literally ground stop 737s, what would happen to our economy? Again, that’s why we don’t even like contemplating that reality. But I want to start focusing on the 737 because that’s the one issue. You got the 787, then you have the subcontractors from my standpoint the three, and then the overall culture of Boeing. But there’s a discrepancy between our two witnesses here. Mr. Pierson, you were saying that it was a manufacturing defect, and Mr. Jacobsen, you’re focusing on the MCAS, which is what the public was all told, it was that control system, and with only a single indicator that if that went defective… So again, that was the story told. What is the truth? We’ll start with you. Mr. Jacobsen.

Well, the truth is it’s more than one thing. It’s the entire system. You have to look at manufacturing. You have to look at also at the design. Since the MAX has gone back into service, this is the list of manufacturing. These are unsafe conditions that are identified by the FAA. In the manufacturing area, engine [inaudible 00:50:52], exhaust duct fasteners, compromised seal and adhesion within the center fuel tank, loose bolts in the rudder assembly, stuck rudder pedals, misinstalled electrical wire bundles in the wing spoilers, and then of course the door blowout was also a manufacturing defect. So we have a long list of unsafe conditions from manufacturing defects. We also have a long list, equally long list of design defects. So what that tells me is it’s a company-wide problem. It’s not-

So the MAX was taken out of service for how long? Quite some time, right?

It was about 20 months.

20 months. And again, the public, I was certainly hoping, assuming that that 20 months they would correct those defects that they did install more of the indicators, right? So they somewhat fixed that problem. I mean, are all these other problems completely unaddressed, not fixed?

There were many problems that were unaddressed. The crew alerting system is the big one. That one was not addressed. That contributed to the crashes. The pilots had a lot of false indications going off,

— off, which delays their response, and they’re trying to figure out what’s going on. In the meantime, the stabilizer is running and the nose is running down, so it’s a combination of things that need to be addressed.

What have the pilots had to say about this? I mean, one of my things that comforted me is that pilots are concerned about safety. They do some safety checks even before they get on the airplane, but they’re the ones that have to fly these things. What do pilots have to say about the 737 MAX right now?

Well, I’ve heard some reports. Dennis Tajer has been very vocal. He’s an American Airlines MAX pilot. Also works with us at The Foundation for Aviation Safety. He’s been very vocal about the shortcomings of the MAX.

Does he fly them?

He does.

And he still flies them?

He still flies them. And he says, “Why is Boeing putting all these extra hazards into my cockpit? It’s a big enough job to fly this airplane and take care of the passengers in the back, I don’t need extra problems to be dealing with like manufacturing defects, design defects. And they’re one after another. There’s a long list that I’ve put in my [inaudible 00:53:19].”

Mr. Pierson, do you have anything to add to that on the 737.

No, I totally agree with Mr. Jacobsen. When investigated the accidents, they narrowly scoped it and they kept it very tight. And as an example of that, when the MAX airplanes were returned to service, they said that they fixed the MCAS software and they provided the pilots the training that they needed. And then they said, “We fixed some wiring,” but it was unrelated to the accidents. Well, a couple months ago, we found the service bulletin that was sent out to the airlines to fix some wiring. That document was 343 pages long. It identified at least 12 areas on the airplane that had improper electrical insulation. And I will tell you that when those planes were being built, we were having repeat problems getting our functional testing done correctly.

(54:14)
And this is something that we continued to push, and push, and push the planes out the door, and we were having difficulty getting our aircraft systems testing. What people don’t know, and I’ll just give you a couple of examples very quickly, is in the Lion airplane, that angle of attack sensor was removed the day before, replaced with a refurbished sensor, on the next flight the plane almost crashed, on the next flight it did crash. When that plane hit the ocean, it went right into the seawall. They never recovered that sensor that was just installed, but they had the original Boeing installed sensor and they tested that sensor, and it had an open circuit in it, it had evidence of arcing and burn marks. And so that is an example. And then, I’m just pointing that out that this is-

That’s getting a level of detail right now I don’t have-

Okay.

Appreciate that. Again, this shows you, Mr. Chairman, we need to get the airlines in here. Whether they want to or not, they have to come in here and talk about what they’re doing in response to these technical [inaudible 00:55:15]. We need to get pilots in here. We need to talk to the pilots because, from my standpoint, they’re almost the last line of defense in terms of safety for the flying public, because I would never get on a plane that’s autonomous. Never.

Senator, I echo what you’re saying, but I think we also need to broaden that aperture. We need to talk to the mechanics-

Oh, I agree.

… and the technicians, and all those individuals.

No, again.

Yes, sir.

As you said in your testimony, five minutes testimony doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface. Hour and a half hearing doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface. That’s why I said this needs to be an in-depth investigation. There’s a lot of elements to this thing. In preparing for this, I did listen to one NBC news report, and this is on the 787 on this gap, and they were reporting that Boeing had apparently stress tested a plane, 165,000 takeoffs and landings, which is three times normal life. They inspected 689 of the 1,100 planes that are in service, zero evidence of fatigue. So how am I supposed to interpret that?

Well, I think Boeing tries to put a lot of misinformation out there. The problem is that 165,000 was on the original airplane. It did not see the excessive forces that we’re talking about. If you haven’t done the excessive force on those plane, they’re just throwing that out there to muddy up the water so that information is so clogged up that they are not … they’re saying they’ve done 40,000 tests or whatever. Did they put the information out there under what circumstances, what airplanes? What was the situation? None of that is shared. I have asked Mrs. Fahl, Lisa Fahl, that it was on that thing, two months ago or three months ago, when I met her, I said, “Hey, I’m going to complain.” I’m complained to her about the 787. She said, “I’ll have somebody get you the information. You probably haven’t seen the information.” I have not seen any information whatsoever. As a matter of fact, they’re just throwing that stuff. If you want to change the information, like the 165,000, then you need to rerun that test with 165,000 with the new excessive force and show that it’s good.

You got to share. Just one quick question for Mr. Pierson. You said you had delivered records to the FBI. First of all, how did you obtain those records and have you heard back from the FBI?

The records were sent to me.

From a internal whistleblower?

From an internal whistleblower. And I provided those records to the FBI. And again, for the last couple months, there’s been talk that there’s no records and that’s obviously not the case.

And this is on the Alaskan Airline, [inaudible 00:58:02].

This is on the Alaska Airlines.

That Boeing apparently overwrote the video that would’ve shown … again, I’ve talked to Boeing, they said that’s just normal. It’s 30-day cycle and the video’s not there to document the maintenance, it’s really to document other things potentially, but it’s overwritten regularly.

Yeah, I’m talking about the actual documentation that they’ve been saying has not been available. It is available.

It is available and the FBI has it.

And it has been available for months.

Okay. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thanks, Senator Johnson. We’re going to go to Senator Marshall, then Senator Hassan, and Senator Hawley.

Great. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Salehpour, you’ve described several significant events since you came forward with your claims. One was the nail on the tire. You described your life was being threatened. Do you feel that this style of retaliation against you has been part of Boeing’s efforts to silence and prevent you from sharing your story?

I think the retaliation, somebody even was calling me on my personal phone time after time. This is my personal phone.

Well, what were they saying?

Well, my boss was calling me there, and for 40 minutes he berated me and chewed me out. I have a work phone that he can use, but he’s calling you on your personal phone. And it reminds me of people who they stalk people or something like that, they call you on your personal phone to let you know that they know where you live, they know where you are, and they can hurt you. And after the threats and after this, it really scares me, believe me. But I am at peace. If something happens to me, I am at peace because I feel like by coming forward, I will be saving a lot of lives and I’m at peace. Whatever happens, it happens.

Well, we certainly do appreciate you coming forward, and certainly the brave and courage it takes for all of you to do this. Do you think that there was a culture of retaliation against whistleblowers at Boeing?

Absolutely. And also, there’s a culture of when you address the quality issues, and that’s all I have done, I haven’t made it personal, all I’ve done is said, “Hey, we are not measuring the gaps properly. We are not shimming the gaps properly,” then you get threatened, and this and that. All I’m trying to say is the system needs to be changed.

Do you still have your job?

I have my job. The only reason I have my job because I had my attorneys, we filed for the whistleblower system before I spoke up this time.

What’s it like when you go back to work?

Well, last time, if you can think of it, I went to a meeting on the 777 and I brought up my concern in that meeting to say that the way we building that airplane, it does not correlate to what the design of the airplane is. Because of that, we are resulting in a lot of misfires and a lot of problems. After 300 plus airplanes, we should be able to make that airplane.

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And my boss sent somebody to the meeting, pulled me out of the meeting, and called me on the phone and says I throw the person under the bus by asking the question what are we doing to make our design compatible with our build system to overcome these mislocated holes, and this and that? And then he says what was my intention? And really berated me. And a week later, he was going to talk about that again. I thought it’s resolved, but a week later he was talking to me about that. Why should you even be prosecuted for something that all you’re doing is saying, “Hey, the design that we used to have, we went to determine in assembly, it’s not working. What can we do? Have you guys thought about anything to bring that so that they are compatible?”

So your intention was to build a safe airplane?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Not with force.

I want to try to understand this.

Okay.

The diagram that you all supplied us. This is a Boeing 787.

787, yes.

And you’re talking about where these joints come together?

Yes. I’m talking about the one on the most forward. Yeah, right there. And one in the aft. That’s a 4143. No, the one this way. This one. Yeah, right. That one.

Between that and the nose.

That’s a 4143. It’s a major joint. And then one on the aft.

So instead of shimming them, they’re basically just using force to bring them together.

Absolutely.

And you’re concerned that it hurts the composite?

Well, it just violates every one of our common practices because you don’t force the stuff together. Because when you force stuff together, you increase the stress concentration on that. If you think of a paper clip, if you bend it back and forth, after a little while, it breaks.

Yeah. Speaking of action, that’s what I want to talk next about is action. I’m not sure if any of you are familiar with NIAR at Wichita State University, the National Institute of Aviation Research. They specialize in aerial space R&D, including composite advanced materials, and they do wind tunnel testing where they would take an entire wing, an entire fuselage from a plane like this and stress test it. Mr. Jacobsen, do you feel like that type of stress … we have different opinions, but that’s where I would have confidence and America would have confidence if there was stress testing, take some of these randomly and do that stress testing. Or maybe it’s already been done. I don’t know.

Well, I’m not a structure specialist, so I can’t really comment on the details of any of those hypotheticals. But I mean in general, all of this, there’s design, then there’s testing, there’s quite a process, and you can’t violate any part of that process.

Okay. I’m sorry but is anybody else familiar with NIAR and that type of stress testing where you put them and do wind tunnel testing on these? I just think that’s the action that I would’ve confidence in is a scientist who have tested thousands of jets and airplanes, and are experts in composite, to see exactly if this is a challenge or not. I think that would be a great answer to this question. That’s action. Go ahead, Mr. Salehpour.

One thing, the issue that we talking about is pressurizing the fuselage from the inside. When we pressurize and depressurize, basically that’s we call a flight cycle. Every time you go up and you come down, that’s one flight cycle.

I’m sure that we can reproduce that at NIAR. So I think it’s a great point though. And lastly, my last question is it feels like the FAA and the DOT has dropped the ball as well here though. Mr. Pierson, Go ahead. And this is the action.

I’m sorry. It was the DOT and the-

FAA.

Yeah, 100%. I mean, people don’t understand, the FAA is a subordinate agency to the Department of Transportation. And as the FAA has been struggling with revolving leadership and everything else, there’s been numerous opportunities for the Department of Transportation to get involved and engaged. And what we’ve seen from them is nothing. They just are on the sidelines, as has been described.

To me, the action would be to ask the staff to sit down with the FAA, and the DOT, and the people, and some type of report. We can’t bring them in here for another six-hour hearing, but I would love to see a little bit more report on how they would defend themselves. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.

And Senator, if I could just add, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt, but we met with the head of the FAA and the deputy Secretary of Transportation in March 8th. Our foundation did. And we met with them, and we went through 35 problems, and we made recommendations to each one, and we offered to assist whatever we could because we want them to be successful, but they need to get in the game is all I can tell you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Senator Marshall. I might just point out, we’ve been in touch with the FAA. We hope that they will appear at a hearing as well. And they’ve issued a scathing report detailing the findings of an expert panel review of Boeing’s management practices. The panel found, for example, “a lack of awareness of safety related metrics at all levels of the organization.” So I’m hoping that the FAA will be cooperative and aggressive in our continuing investigation as well. Senator Hassan.

Well, thank you very much, Chair Blumenthal and Ranking member Johnson, for holding the hearing today. Thank you to all of our witnesses for appearing today, as well as your commitment to aviation safety and protecting the public. To Chris and Clarice Moore, thank you for being here. I am so sorry for your loss. The picture of your daughter is a reminder of the reason we’re here today and why aviation safety is so important, so thank you for being here. And to Mr. Salehpour, you mentioned in your testimony, as I understand it, that the Challenger disaster was a wake-up call and an example of why safety is so important.

(01:07:56)
The teacher who was lost in that disaster was Christa McAuliffe from Concord, New Hampshire, and her loss is still felt today, as is her example. So thank you for invoking her memory today. And I wanted to start with a question to you, Mr. Salehpour, and apologies if some of this has been covered because we are in and out, but as a whistleblower, you raised two safety concerns regarding quality controls during the manufacturing and assembly process. Can you describe the internal Boeing culture around reporting safety and quality concerns?

Right now, basically, I have very, I guess, negative attitude towards the quality concern. When I bring something to my boss to say we have problems with this, and he prevents me from even documenting and prevents me from even sending the information to the SMEs, to the subject matters experts, to me that’s a problem. A quality manager telling you not to write your concerns and not to send it to the subject matter expert, let’s say I don’t know for sure, they close the gap of three-quarters of an inch without shim. That’s concerning. Our rules are 010, so I said I want to write that. “Well, don’t send it.”

So not only were you discouraged and really told not to document it. What’s your impression of how comfortable other Boeing personnel are with raising their concerns to management both before and after you came forward?

Well, I think it’s very negative. We had situation where they had debris in the gap, and my friend put some inspections in there, and the boss was telling them that, “Are you trying to stop the production?” Those are significant problems that you have to inspect to get a good quality airplanes out. And what I’m trying to say is the attitude at Boeing from the highest level is just to push the defective parts regardless of what it is, unfortunately.

So what you’re really saying is from the top down, people are discouraged from coming forward, and so people are quite reluctant to come forward in this culture?

Absolutely. And the fact that I asked for the data, I complained to Mrs. Fahl, and she said she’ll have somebody send me the information on 787. To this date, I haven’t received any.

Okay. Another question for you, sir. In 2020, Congress reformed safety and certification requirements for aircraft manufacturers following the 737 MAX disasters. What was your experience with how those reforms were implemented and whether Boeing appropriately followed them?

My personal opinion, from what I’ve seen from bottom up, it’s been nothing.

Okay. And Mr. Jacobsen, as a former FAA official, do you have any thoughts about how effective that agency was in implementing and overseeing those reforms?

The attitude from day one was not good at upper levels of the FAA. The message that I heard right after AXA was passed was, “We’re already doing all of this.” That’s the wrong attitude from day one. And then what I saw, I tracked a lot of the implementation of AXA working with Senator Cantwell’s office, and what I saw there was a half-hearted look at all of these recommendations and requirements. They tended to lump them all together and called them work streams, and said, “We’ve got that covered. That’s in this work stream or that work stream.” And instead of taking each individual provision very seriously and attacking them, that was not the attitude.

Thank you. This is a question to both Mr. Pierson and then again to Mr. Jacobsen. You both raised concerns about the 737 MAX, one of you directly with Boeing and the other with the FAA. Given the safety failures that have led us to this hearing, how can Congress better empower whistleblowers, protect them from retaliation, and reestablish a willing adherence to safety standards? So we’ll start with you, Mr. Pierson.

As I said, Senator, we really shouldn’t have to rely on whistleblowers. But with that said, I think that all these programs need to have much more oversight because what happens, for example, right now, if a Boeing employee wants to submit a whistleblower report to the FAA, they submit a hotline report, and those hotline reports go in, and then it could take months potentially for them to investigate it, and sometimes we’ve been told that employees don’t really know what happened. And so I think that there needs to be a lot more attention and, again, I think what we need to talk about is leadership at all levels. Not just at the senior level, but even at the very frontline level, we need to treat people with respect and we need to value these employees, and I think that will help a long way. I think we’re not providing enough training to these employees, I know that in the factory, and we’re putting individuals in responsible jobs and they need a lot more training. And I think that will help a long way of preventing having to use whistleblowers.

Thank you. Mr. Jacobsen?

Yeah. I’m hopeful that Mr. Whitaker, the new FAA administrator, will really take on the challenge of changing the culture at the FAA so that FAA is back to doing their job as a regulator. If they just rubber stamp everything that the manufacturers do, then they’re not doing anything useful. And so we need to get back to them doing a useful job as regulators.

Thank you for that. And Dr. Pruchnicki, I have a question for you, but I’m out of time, so I will submit it for the record. I’m just really looking for your recommendations about how to eliminate these grave safety risks. So we’ll submit that for the record. Thank you.

Thanks, Senator Hassan. Senator Hawley.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thanks for convening this hearing. Thanks to each of the witnesses for being here. Mr. Salehpour, let me just start with you. I just want to back up and make sure I understand your testimony because it seems extraordinary to me, and I’m reading the letters that you’ve submitted from your attorney when you first contacted the FAA, when you contacted the committee. My understanding is you worked on both the 787 and the 777, correct?

Yes, sir.

And you identified major safety concerns with both of these lines, shall we say?

Yes.

And you identified these to your superiors?

Yes, sir. I have written many memos time after time that we can provide.

Over a period of years, I think?

Yeah, this is like three year. For the 787, it’s been three years of effort.

And so who knew about your concerns? How far up the chain do you know that they went?

I have gone as high as Mark Stockton and Lisa Fahl, who’s the vice president.

The vice president of the company?

Yes.

So they were and are aware of these major safety concerns. And this is what you do for a living. I mean, you’re an engineer, right?

I’m an engineer. I went to quality about three, four years ago, and when you put your quality hat, we are the eyes and ears of the public for the safety of the airplane. That’s how I feel about our job. And so when I see concerning information or concerning, let’s say, production issues, then it is our responsibility to make sure that if we are causing the airplane to have increased risk factors, our job is to eliminate those risk factors.

Are these planes safe?

Right now, it’s like an earthquake. The big earthquake is coming, but when that hits the building that, let’s say, if you’re talking of a building, have to be prepared to accommodate that type of a, let’s say, shakeup. It has to be built properly. Right now, from what I’ve seen, the airplanes are not being built per spec and per requirement.

So your testimony is the 787 line and the 777 line you think are not safe?

Well, they are doing stuff that increases the risk factors. When you increase the risk factors, it’s not just one, you are doing stress concentrations, that those stress concentrations, like breaking a paper clip, you do it once or twice, it doesn’t break, but it breaks at some time. As the plane gets older, all of these things that you said it’s not a safety issue, it becomes a safety issue.

And the company’s response to you was to threaten you?

Threaten you, sideline you, transfer you.

You raised concerns about the 787 and so they transferred you to the 777, right?

Well, yes. Initially, they just cut me off of all the meetings, they took my name out, so I was just doing nothing. I wasn’t informed of what. Then they transferred me. And they do it pretty stealthy. “Oh, we have a job over here. We want you go over there.” So they move you down there. And I come from 40 years of engineering background,

And I’ve taken a lot of stress classes. Even though I’m not a specialist on that, but when there’s a problematic area that you see, you can recognize.

So I just want to make sure I got the sequence right. So you raise these concerns, you get on the 787. You get transferred over to the triple 777. You raise your concerns there. They ignore it in both. They haven’t addressed any of these concerns. Is that your testimony?

Yes, sir.

And at some point they start to threaten you. You’re talking about your boss calling you on your personal phone and berating you. And when did that start?

Well, that started right after when I said we have made over 300 plus airplanes. We still don’t know how to put the load and sell. What I mean by that, if you’re building a house, it’s like putting the foundation. We have made over 300 airplanes, we’re still changing our process, like build a foundation to put the airplanes. We are struggling with that because they have changed the process from stable to unstable situation. They’re not building the same datums that we were building, so you are causing your own problem, but you don’t want to admit it. Yes, force fit the problem, force fit the misaligned holes and everything else, and move on. And that’s what they have been doing. And that’s what I have brought up to their attention.

(01:19:23)
I told my boss that. In the report, I said, we have made 300 plus airplanes. That should have been more than adequate for us to resolve these things. All the problems that we’ve had, we put band-aid over band-aid to resolve the problems, and band-aid over band-aid doesn’t cover it. Maybe we need to consider some engineering fundamentals with a little bit of GD&T to figure out what the problem is. And right after that, he came back to my desk, and like I said, he made the threat. And then after that he says, “Are you in or are you out?”

Meaning what? Are you in or are you out with Boeing? I mean, are you going to be a good citizen and keep your mouth shut? Was that the implication?

Well, that’s how I can interpret. Then he would walk by me and he said, “You better.” Then he said, “I want you to write it in writing. Tell me, are you in or are you out?”

Put it in writing whether or not were going to-

I’m in or out. And what that means, are you going to just shut up?

Right.

That’s the only thing-

That would be in. If you wanted to be in, you needed to be quiet, you needed to stop this. Don’t say anything more. Certainly, don’t tell the public.

That’s how I interpreted it. But he told me to write it in writing. And now I’m trying to write it, and there was 10 emails just because, “I haven’t received your email on this. Send it to me,” and this and that.

So then he’s pressuring you.

Yeah, he’s pressuring you. And then, his manipulation even got further than that. I’m trying to take a class on my own time that I have to flex the time, he wouldn’t let me do that. I have a doctor’s appointment, he cancels my doctor appointment at the same day. I mean, [inaudible 01:21:01]

Retaliatory behavior.

… different things to retaliate to make your life miserable. And then I started talking to go somewhere else. You just try to escape from that because this is hell that I was subjected to. And then he threatens you with that. And really, with my background, it really has made me where three o’clock in the morning I’m waking up with somebody stabbing me. I’m still receiving psychological help to just get back on normal.

Well, it is unbelievable to me that in the midst of this safety crisis at this corporation, that what they’re doing is threatening their own engineers whose job it is to help identify potential safety concerns, and rather than saying, “You know what? You’ve got a point. We need to maybe do something about this,” they’re telling you to hide it, they’re reassigning you, they’re threatening you, they’re trying to shut you up. In the meantime, I noticed this guy, Dave Calhoun, I think he’s the CEO. I guess he’s leaving at the end of the year, and I wonder how much he’s getting paid. I bet it’s a lot.

Yes. It’s a lot more than my pay grade.

I bet it’s a lot more than your paycheck. I bet it’s a heck of a lot. Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this hearing. I think we’re just scratching the surface here, but this is extraordinary. It’s just extraordinary. Thank you.

I really appreciate that.

Thank you.

Given us the opportunity.

Thank you very much, Senator Hawley. And again, I just want to say, I could not agree more with the points that have been made about the need for continuing investigation by our subcommittee as well as by the FAA and the Department of Justice. And I’m anticipating we’ll have strong bipartisan consensus about the next steps that we will take. But we’re going to have another round of questioning, and it’s going to be shorter than I would like, because we have a deadline for being in our chairs in the United States Senate, on the floor, for a completely unrelated purpose. But I want to begin where Senator Hawley ended. Mr. Salehpour, in your testimony, you told us that since 2021, multiple colleagues have told you about sharing your concerns. Most of them have not come forward. Why?

It’s the fear. If you think of how much problem I have created by coming up with my being persistent about talking about the defects and everything else. Ever since the Space Shuttle O-rings, that has really put a mark on me. That thing should not have happened, but it happened because the faulty engineering. And that’s exactly what we have here, is we have faulty engineering that they’re trying to shove on our throats to just say, “Hey, whatever we do, it’s okay.” From one side they put reports, that it says it’s not okay from other side. When they violate it, they try to whitewash the influence.

Whitewashing, concealment.

Whitewashing the spec to say it’s not important for the spec. If you don’t meet, it’s not that big of a deal. Let’s just push the airplanes out. And then the attitude of the people for, like I said, not being receptive. Because of the threats or anything else, that’s because of that, people haven’t come forward.

You’ve been very careful in the way that you have phrased the potential danger here. You’ve talked about the increased risk.

Yes.

One could compare it to something a little bit like Russian roulette. We never know exactly-

When it’s going to happen.

… when or where or how it’s going to happen, but fatigue building and the potential vulnerability of that fuselage to tearing apart is a risk that has been increased. And it’s a risk that should never have been increased.

Absolutely.

And yet these processes are continuing. Are they not?

Yes, sir. From what I know, it’s continuing. And right now, Boeing is coming back and really… Remember, whatever they put out there, they say that “Everything is okay,” because they never learn from their mistakes. That’s what the really significant thing that I want to take from this, is that they never learn. It’s like a lie. When you say one lie, you have to lie 10 more times to cover that lie. Hey, we made a mistake. Let’s correct it and move on. But that’s not what’s happening.

You’ve referred to numerous memos that you’ve written. I have one of them, which is a 2021 memo. The recipient of it has been deleted, but the memo speaks volumes in my view. And one part of it, one sentence I think is a coda for the lesson that Boeing should have learned, and I’m quoting, “Kicking me out of the program because I am raising safety concerns over the unintended consequences of the increased fit-up forces and potential escapements as a result, does not help anybody.” It does not help anybody. It doesn’t help Boeing.

No.

At all. And again, this focus on stock price, on quarterly profit, on money over safety, is a bad investment. It is malpractice beyond simply a broken self-safety culture. The expert panel of the FAA said something that I thought was a pretty telling quote. “A safety culture is not something that springs up ready-made from near-death experience. Rather, it emerges gradually from the persistent and successful application of practical and down-to-earth measures,” like giving you a bonus for your courage and your insights, rather than in effect threatening and penalizing you.

Yes.

Dr. Pruchnicki, am I correct in that kind of observation about safety culture, that it has to be the result of persistent, step by step, down-to-earth actions by management that is really committed to safety, not just in word, but in deed, and it has to put its money where its mouth is?

No, you’re exactly right. And this is part of the four parts of a safety culture, that you do have these reward systems in place and you are proud when people come forward like this, and you embrace that and you celebrate that. There’s many different ways you can do that, and various companies can do this. But if I may take this time to just add one thing very quickly, is one part of a healthy safety culture is that the accountability goes all the way to the top of the company, all the way to the CEO. And when I go to help companies with their safety culture problems, I talk to CEOs. And one of the questions I ask them is, how much time do you spend weekly with your safety department? Because different companies might spend time with their marketing people, their finance people and all their money people.

(01:29:25)
And what I find across the board is they don’t spend time with their safety people, yet they say they’re accountable and they sign documents, they’re accountable. And most of the time they’ll tell me, “Well, this person meets with them,” or whomever. That is not accountability to the top. And I tell them that, “Well, if you have time to meet with marketing and your finance people, then you should have time to meet with your safety people weekly.” And if I had time to talk to Boeing, I’d be fascinated to know how many times per week their CEO people actually talk to their safety people. That shows accountability. It would be an interesting answer to that question.

So, deans of business schools across the country and CEOs of corporations big and small, are you listening? Will you take a lesson from Boeing’s experience?

Yeah, because if they’re not doing this, they’re wrong. Flat out. And we’ve seen this time and time again with accidents. And I go all over the world and I help companies straighten this out. It’s flat out.

I’m going to yield to Senator Johnson.

So let me just underscore from my own manufacturing background. I think the key to a safety system, a quality system, is accountability. In my little plastics manufacturing plant, every roll of plastic that went out had the operator’s name on the name tag, on the roll tag. If that was rejected, we knew exactly who produced that, who approved it. And so accountability is crucial, which takes me back to the 737 MAX and the deferred prosecution agreement. First of all, I want some clarity. Was it or was it not the MCAS system that caused that crash?

The MCAS system, senator, obviously played a significant role, so did the lack of pilot training. But as Mr. Jacobsen has said, there was other factors, and our analysis, my analysis, shows that those airplanes also had manufacturing defects that triggered the MCAS software.

Mr. Jacobsen?

Yeah.

So what were those other defects? Was it the sensor? I mean, only having one sensor was part of that system though.

Well, as Mr. Pierson has talked about, the sensor showed problems, the original sensor on the Lion Air airplane showed a lot of manufacturing defects when it was examined. What I found curious was after the Ethiopian crash, they said the sensor was taken off by a bird. They had no evidence for that, none whatsoever, but they concluded that it was the bird that did it. And so I think it’s much more plausible and likely that it was an electrical fault of some sort, either arcing or something like that.

So of all the troubling testimony that I’ve read here leading up this hearing where I’ve heard here today, probably the most troubling is the fact that Boeing did not notify regulators of this significant change in the MCAS system. Would you agree with that?

I would. I think both crashes would not have happened if they’d been fully transparent and forthcoming with the design of-

So we come back to accountability.

Yes.

Has anybody been held accountable for concealing that from the FAA? I mean, 300 and some lives were lost, and again, my condolences to those family members of those. Lives were lost. This was beyond negligence. This is an overt act. And nobody has been held accountable in any way, shape or form, financially, losing their job, criminally held liable.

Look, we’ve been dancing around an issue here that quite frankly, being a systems engineer, I design a lot of automation and the interaction between human and automation. And what they did is quite obvious. They snuck the MCAS system through the certification process. Period. It’s that simple. But they did that over money, sir.

Is that or was that criminal? Again, I’m not a lawyer, I’m not a prosecutor. Is that criminal? Do we have laws in the books?

I can’t answer-

That type of… What’s the right word? Not evasion. Was that criminal behavior? Should somebody been held liable criminally?

I can’t answer if that’s criminal, but as a cognitive engineer, and I know how the certification process works, and I know how this accident works. They snuck it through the process and it was all about money. It was all about getting those airplanes to Southwest and it was all about money, and that’s why those people died.

Has the deferred prosecution agreement been made public, or is that sealed?

I’m not aware if it’s been made or not.

It has been made public, senator, and probably the most embarrassing thing in my career I’ve seen is how those families were treated. And that deferred prosecution agreement should never have happened. It was absolutely criminal that they did that. It was just heart-wrenching.

So who’s in charge of that deferred prosecution? Who agreed to that?

That’s the Department of Justice that agreed to that.

Let me just intervene since I am a former United States attorney and a federal prosecutor. The Department of Justice deferred prosecution agreement is public. In fact, I was very critical of it at the time it was reached. And I’ve urged since then that the Department of Justice investigate whether in fact it has been violated, and I think the ranking member raises a very pertinent and important question. Mr. Pierson has raised it as well. He’s presented evidence that the Department of Justice should consider. Through the FBI, we have brought to the Department of Justice’s attention evidence that should be considered. They’re going to have to make a judgment. We can’t because we’re not prosecutors. But accountability is critically important.

And that is the reason I’m going down this line of questioning, is accountability all along the process. Within the company, within their quality system, their top management. But then, the FAA and then Department of Justice when they see the evidence, not doing anything about it. And again, I’ll go back to the reality of the fact that we all want Boeing to succeed, that we don’t want to think that there are conditions in these planes that should really force regulators to ground these planes. What that would do to our economy, what that would do to people’s lives. That’s just a reality. It’s an awful reality, but that’s what we’re all facing, I think that’s what’s driving the lack of accountability. People don’t want to be held accountable because people don’t want to take the actions that might be required here. I think that’s just an awful reality.

I just want to emphasize again that the airlines play a huge role in this. They obviously want airplanes, they need airplanes to do what they want to do, but they have very much a responsibility to make sure those planes are safe. I’ll just give you an example. We did an analysis, and in Alaska Airplanes, we did it, we produced, we published this thing in September 2023. They had 53 brand new MAX airplanes. We found over 1200 aircraft system malfunction reports that they had submitted to the FAA. 1200 on 53 brand new planes within two years old, and I’m not talking tray tables or headrest. I’m talking the systems that Mr. Jacobsen has been talking about. So we need to make sure that those things are investigated and resolved, and they’re supposed to be.

Which is why I’ve reached out to the airlines, I’ve talked to a couple CEOs. We need to talk to their pilots, we need to get their mechanics, we need all these people talking together. Just individual hearings aren’t going to do it. I mean, this requires a full-blown investigation with all these people being interviewed, people feeling free they can come and they can come before us, with whistleblower protection, either staying anonymous or provide whatever protection we can. Again, we need a lot of information and we need a lot of witnesses. We have an awful lot of information to uncover and discover here, a lot of truth to be exposed. But thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this hearing.

Let me just conclude, and I would like to continue this hearing, but Senator Johnson and I will be held accountable if we’re not in our seats on the floor of the United States Senate before 1 PM. I want to thank all of you for being here. For all the reasons that you know too well. You have taken risks throughout your career, every one of you. I want to thank my colleague for his very understandably passionate and insightful comments, which I share, about the need for accountability. As a prosecutor, accountability is about deterrence. It is about teaching lessons, with real consequences for intentional mistakes and wrongdoing.

(01:38:53)
And I’m hopeful that we will be in touch with the Department of Justice to indicate our interest in cooperating with them. And in the meantime, this record will remain open for 15 days for other questions that may be submitted in writing and also documents that may be submitted by others. And we hope that there will be others who will come forward. So, thank you all for being here today. This hearing is adjourned.