Lawmakers question FAA’s resolve amid Boeing investigations

WASHINGTON — As senators conduct hearings on Boeing Co.’s door plug blowout and other issues, many are starting to question whether the Federal Aviation Administration’s oversight of the aircraft manufacturer has been too lenient.

In tandem hearings Wednesday on Boeing’s safety culture and management systems, Republicans and Democrats alike on Senate Homeland Security and Commerce panels indicated they were concerned the FAA has not been aggressive enough in enforcing safety standards on the aircraft manufacturer.

Although many have lauded current FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker for taking a stronger approach with Boeing, some whistleblowers claim that the FAA has not done enough to address the company’s safety culture and quality control processes since crashes involving 737 Max aircraft in 2018 and 2019 that killed 346 people.

The whistleblowers further alleged that the FAA has known Boeing’s quality control processes were faulty and ignored reports of safety concerns.

An independent panel commissioned by the FAA released a report in February confirming a disconnected safety culture at Boeing and a safety management system that “causes confusion” among employees at different levels. The FAA also completed an audit of Boeing following the door blowout incident in January that found the company “allegedly failed to comply with manufacturing quality control requirements.”

Some former Boeing employees hold that the report and FAA audit came too late.

“There was a time when the FAA was pretty demanding, and what you’ve seen is over the last 10 years or so, there’s been a decline … there’s this belief that their job is to help Boeing, when their primary job is to protect the public,” Ed Pierson, executive director of The Foundation for Aviation Safety and former Boeing manager, said in an interview. He testified at the Wednesday Senate Homeland Security Investigations Subcommittee hearing.

“When the FAA comes out and says, ‘We just did a safety culture audit, and we found all this shocking information, look how bad Boeing is.’ It’s like, wait, hold on a second, you guys are the ones that are supposed to be monitoring and regulating, right? You were the ones who should have determined this and could have determined this years ago,” he said.

Pierson added that the Transportation Department is not involved enough in FAA’s oversight, and the aviation safety group has urged the DOT to audit the effectiveness of the FAA’s maintenance oversight and airline safety reporting.

Clay Foushee, former director of FAA’s Office of Audit and Evaluation, said in an email that the agency has investigated Pierson’s allegations along with those of other whistleblowers who testified before the committee Wednesday. The FAA followed up with Boeing management, requesting more information and implementing corrective actions in some cases, he said.

Foushee likened the FAA’s actions to amend whistleblower claims to a game of “whack-a-mole” — Boeing would claim to address something only to have a similar issue crop up somewhere else.