
Boeing yanks eight 787s from service over structural issue - throwaway713
https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/boeing-pulls-eight-787s-from-service-over-structural-issue/
======
russb
"The pieces are fabricated and joined with the aft pressure bulkhead at
Boeing’s North Charleston, S.C. plant and then delivered for final assembly to
the company’s nearby final assembly building or flown to Everett, Wash."

Not the first time quality control has been an issue at the N.C. plant.

From a New York Times article back in 2019: "Ever since, Qatar has bought only
Dreamliners built in Everett." [0]

[0] [https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/20/business/boeing-
dreamline...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/20/business/boeing-dreamliner-
production-problems.html)

~~~
aaronbrethorst
Totally unsurprising that SC is having quality issues.

 _" We have a manager that will physically watch us while we're working on the
jet and watch us as we go to the bathroom," he says. "I'm a 40-year-old
military veteran and I have a 20-something-year-old manager asking me why I
use time to use the bathroom."_

[https://psmag.com/economics/a-tale-of-two-boeing-
factories](https://psmag.com/economics/a-tale-of-two-boeing-factories)

~~~
throwaway_pdp09
I'm no manager but I'd guess some of the most basic rules of management will
say "don't do this". Yet some managers do it, like they can't see the damage
it's doing to trust and morale, and that it will simply not (unless under
special circumstances) bring any higher quality or other value. Yet still it
happens. It's so strange.

~~~
HumblyTossed
Insecurity. "I'm the manager, therefore you WILL do as I say!". These people
can boss people around, but they don't know how to manage.

~~~
toomuchtodo
Good management can’t be taught, it can only be learned through experience.
Hence why MBAs used to require work experience or the concept of non
commissioned officers in the military. You must experience the suck to learn
how not to suck.

With that said, you have to still make an effort to filter out people with no
empathy or low emotional IQ from management roles. Having authority over
another human being is serious business.

~~~
wnevets
>With that said, you have to still make an effort to filter out people with no
empathy or low emotional IQ from management roles. Having authority over
another human being is serious business.

yeah but their resume, they went to "insert super important college here"!

------
Pfhreak
I think there's a reasonable case for nationalizing Boeing to remove the
profit motive.

I'm not saying it's the only play, but Boeing is a strategic interest to the
nation (both economically and strategically), it's already receiving _massive_
subsidies, and huge paychecks are being cut to executive leadership.

It might be worth it to continue to manufacture these planes in the US, with
an emphasis on safety and providing good jobs, even if that meant it wasn't
strictly profitable to do so. If we're giving them billions in tax cuts
anyways, which they then use to layoff workers and move plants, maybe we
should cut out the song and dance.

~~~
tboyd47
Is Boeing the company of strategic interest to the U.S., or just its
intellectual property and factories?

Its brand has been seriously damaged by these scandals. It used to be, "If
it's not Boeing I'm not going," now it's, "If it's Boeing, I'm not going."

Let the company go bankrupt, enact export controls on its capital and IP. The
free market will do a better job than the government could.

~~~
djsumdog
I agree. Boeing, if it cannot find investors to keep it afloat, can simply
sell off its IP. There are a considerable number of aerospace engineers who
would kill for a fresh start. Look at the recent article on the Colorado
startup with their supersonic experiment, or SpaceX. And yes, SpaceX does got
a lot from tax payers and there are issues with that, but it's also a case of
the State investing in something rather than owning it.

Nationalization for something like an airplane company is terrible idea.

~~~
castratikron
As SpaceX (and Tesla) have shown, sometimes in order to make real progress you
need to restart things from zero. Tech debt piles up and political lines
become entrenched to the point where nothing but marginal change can be made.
Nationalizing the company would basically make this impossible.

And maybe putting a real engineer in charge of a freaking engineering company
wouldn't be a bad first step either...

------
CryptoBanker
And Boeing announced last year they were planning to significantly reduce
their quality control inspectors. Whoops...

[https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-
aerospace/boein...](https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-
aerospace/boeing-overhauls-its-quality-controls-more-high-tech-tracking-but-
fewer-inspectors/)

------
abhiminator
Reading this while sitting in a 787-9 that's just about to take off isn't very
comforting.

Jokes aside, this again brings up the fact that Boeing as a company has deep
quality control issues and I really hope this "structural issue" (vague
sounding terms aren't comforting either) is limited to the 8 aircrafts in
question and hope many more don't pop up, else it'll be a serious blow to
public confidence on Boeing, especially after the MAX situation.

~~~
fatnoah
>Reading this while sitting in a 787-9 that's just about to take off isn't
very comforting.

In a similar vein, that reminds me of the time I was stuck in my seat on plane
that had pushed away from the gate, but was just sitting on the tarmac because
the captain "didn't like the look of an engine indication". About 45 minutes
in to just waiting there, there was a commotion as everyone's
phones/Blackberries started chirping. Apparently, some plane had just landed
in the Hudson river.

~~~
adanto6840
Did your flight eventually take off? Was the captain legitimately concerned
about an indication, or was he just aware of the emergency declaration of
Flight 1549 and waiting to see how it played out?

~~~
rootusrootus
The time between the beginning and end of the 1549 emergency was far less than
45 minutes.

~~~
adanto6840
I'm aware; there was certainly lag time between the event & the reporting,
though. It's relatively likely that the PIC knew of the emergency declaration
10-20 minutes before it was triggering push notifications on devices.
Regardless, I'm legitimately curious what the outcome of his flight was that
day.

~~~
rootusrootus
I'd bet the average pilot does not get any notification in advance of the
general public unless they are in the midst of an incident in progress, and
then it would be ATC notifying them. Even then, probably just enough info to
keep them safe.

So unless they were actually at the airport where 1549 took off, it's possible
they didn't even hear about it until the evening news.

------
msoloi
This is a good sign, they have realized that it would've destroyed the company
if they had another jet liner fall from the sky due to a problem they chose to
ignore. This way, they appear to be doing their due diligence, even though
they made a mistake in manufacturing.

~~~
SketchySeaBeast
The real question now is how are they identifying these issues now and how
many more have they identified or failed to identify.

~~~
ardy42
It sounds like they're combing over historical manufacturing records:

> The company “conducted a thorough review of the manufacturing data with
> respect to both shimming and skin surface profile. Based on that analysis we
> were able to determine that both conditions affected these eight airplanes
> only,” said the Boeing spokesman, who added that it has notified the Federal
> Aviation Administration “and are conducting a thorough review into the root
> cause.”

Who knows why they decided to review that data. Maybe they have a project to
try to spot problems they missed before, or maybe someone just noticed a
problem on a newer plane and they went back to find out if any others were
affected by that same problem.

~~~
stevehawk
Someone knows why and there's likely a non conspiracy reason behind it. Such
as: one of them went in for an inspection (they're inspected a lot) and
someone noticed something wrong in a significant capacity. Which then made
it's way through Boeing because it shouldn't happened and they realized a
potential problem.

------
ulfw
Al Jazeera reported about the horrible South Carolina plant issues six years
ago.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvkEpstd9os](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvkEpstd9os)

~~~
piva00
Coincidentally I wrote this comment [0] now, 20 minutes past yours, before
scrolling down... It's not a new thing on that plant.

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24306431](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24306431)

------
thrawayjpikaf
> The pieces are fabricated and joined with the aft pressure bulkhead at
> Boeing’s North Charleston, S.C. plant

At least one airline has refused to accept airplanes from boeing's SC plant
because of the poor manufacturing policies practiced there. if boeing does
shut down it's everett assembly plants as part of the downturn, i will stop
flying any recent (post classic 737) boeing equipment for my own safety.

~~~
liability
> _Classic 737_

I think there are only a few hundred of those left, they stopped making them
20 years ago. NGs seem fine to me, I've never thought twice before flying on
one.

~~~
thrawayjpikaf
yeah, i mean '737s made before the MAX body length extension.' thanks for
making me clarify.

------
fnord77
site is being slashdotted, the gist:

> The source of the newly-discovered structural issue has been traced to a
> mating point inside the aft fuselage between two carbon fiber composite
> barrels, known as Section 47/48 where the two barrels meet with a large
> bulkhead that caps the pressurized cabin. The pieces are fabricated and
> joined with the aft pressure bulkhead at Boeing’s North Charleston, S.C.
> plant and then delivered for final assembly to the company’s nearby final
> assembly building or flown to Everett, Wash.

------
Animats
_" Boeing has identified two distinct manufacturing issues in the join of
certain 787 aft body fuselage sections, which, in combination, result in a
condition that does not meet our design standards," said the company's
statement. It said it is conducting a thorough review into the root cause of
the problem._

Wow. And that's the PR-approved press release. More details will probably
appear in Aviation Week.

Is this a problem with joining carbon fiber?

~~~
scarier
>Is this a problem with joining carbon fiber?

Fundamentally? No. That said, I imagine there's a lot of pressure from the
management to make big, expensive, slow-to-manufacture subassemblies fit
together, even when they maybe don't quite. Not sure if it's an issue with
their tolerances, or if something bigger is going on (the skin roughness they
mention is troubling, because it implies the carbon layup might not have been
compressed enough during its cure, and would require significant reinforcement
at the very least to meet minimum strength requirements--an aircraft that
can't even reach its limit load is fantastically unsafe to fly), but joining
composites is mostly about having good procedures and following them
religiously.

------
linuxftw
It's almost as if there was a documentary released 6 years ago that documented
the serious structural problems and manufacturing incompetence.

Boeing has outsourced all core competencies, including manufacturing the main
fuselage. They are more or less a last-step assembler at this point. There's
no reason to get in a 787, and I'll never, ever step foot into a MAX.

~~~
deeblering4
> and I'll never, ever step foot into a MAX

Aka the 737-8, which is what they have low-key renamed the MAX.

------
noctune
Bizarre - the site has javascript that disables selecting text on the article
because "Content is protected".

~~~
rasz
It gets better, open chrome devtools and look at the Source tab - its empty?
Reload with devtools open on source tab gets it populated, weird.

Anyway, for 'copy protection' they are using wpcp_disable_selection
[https://myprogrammingnotes.com/protect-web-page-copied-
using...](https://myprogrammingnotes.com/protect-web-page-copied-using-
javascript.html) , it hooks document.onselectstart and document.onmousedown.
onselectstart is very abuse-able and has no place in User Agents just like the
likes of onbeforeunload navigator.sendBeacon and window.opener, meaning you
should probably hardcode disable it (userscript, or directly modding own
browser). onmousedown is a bit more problematic and cant be dealt in automatic
fashion. You will have to manually go to devtools every time and delete all
onmousedown event listeners.

------
thehappypm
Boeing has a really interesting strategy right now, essentially, they want to
do DaaS —- Design as a Service — and leave that icky business of manufacturing
to contractors. It’s a bold move; for decades Boeing has been doing design and
build, pretty solidly verticalized. But now, they seem to want to outsource
manufacturing entirely, and leave their core competency to be design, supply
chain, regulatory logistics, and sales. A huge shift. And one that is not
going super well. But perhaps there’s wisdom to it.

------
tyingq
If it's really slow loading:

[https://archive.is/vz3kE](https://archive.is/vz3kE)

------
jpm_sd
It'll be interesting to see whether similar problems occur with Boom's
supersonic all-composite airframe.

~~~
scarier
This isn't a fundamental issue with composites. Although they do require more
stringent process control than traditional metal structures, with good
procedures and QC they are extremely strong (and have significant advantages
over metal structures--we've just been working with metal for so long that we
know a lot about its issues).

The main question is whether or not Boeing fundamentally has good procedures
and QC--if those have been compromised, they can't really be trusted to make
mostly-metal airplanes, either.

------
tus88
That's why I make my planes out of titanium.

------
fallingfrog
It’s a good sign, they’re learning to take these things more seriously.

~~~
coliveira
This is not the first time such issues have been reported. I wonder if there
will be any change in behavior, specially now that the company is in a bad
financial situation.

------
fred_is_fred
It might be easier to just list what is still in-service at this point. 737
Max, 737-7s both have issues. 747s are being retired. Unsure what's left.

~~~
DuskStar
737-200, -300, -400, -500.

737-6, -8, -9. (Assuming that the -7s are temporarily out of service as you've
said)

747 (cargo)

757

767

777

787 (all but these 8)

So still quite a few lines flying.

~~~
sjm-lbm
your listing of 737's isn't quite correct:

737-600s, 737-700s, 737-800s and 737-900s are part of the 737NG/Next
Generation series that debuted in 1998. They are still flying and are safe.
737-8s are part of the 737MAX series (which includes 737-7s, 737-8s, 737-9s,
and 737-200s), and they are all unsafe/grounded. As far as I know, the 737-8
is the only MAX variant to actually have been delivered so far, but I can't
find a proof of that at the moment.

~~~
DuskStar
Yeah, I should have said -600, -700, -800, -900 instead of -6, -7, -8, -9.

For some reason I got that naming convention mixed up, and forgot that the
-800 was NG while -8 was MAX.

The 737-200 is one of the first-gen 737s, and still active today, though:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737#737-200](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737#737-200)

~~~
sjm-lbm
Sibling comment got it, but I was thinking about the MAX 200/737-8200, which
is a variant of the -8 that has more exit doors and therefore can have a
higher seating density.

Totally agree that the model numbers are confusing, though (obviously).

------
x87678r
There is so much publicity over Boeing problems. I'm wondering if 30-50 years
ago they were more thorough or just it was more accepted to have accidents.
Probably the latter. I'm just worried there is too much safety everywhere and
no one takes risks any more. Its a wonder Tesla autopilot is still allowed.

~~~
dave5104
> I'm just worried there is too much safety everywhere and no one takes risks
> any more.

If this is really true, then I personally think it's wonderful that no one is
taking a risk with my safety when I'm flying on an airplane.

~~~
x87678r
What I mean though if we always had this approach we probably wouldn't have
had airplanes.

~~~
dave5104
I highly doubt that. There's a difference in expectations on the safety of the
first airplanes versus airplanes for mass consumer daily usage. Or in other
words, a matured technology.

If what you think is true, no one would be bothering to explore self driving
cars. Once that technology is matured enough, I absolutely expect (and hope)
that they reach the same level of safety standards and requirements that
airplanes take on.

