Boeing was sanctioned for “blatantly violating” regulations when it revealed private information to media and speculated about the cause of the cabin-panel blowout that occurred on a brand new airplane operated by Alaska Airlines in January.
The National Transportation Safety Board said that it was cooperating with the Department of Justice in deciding whether or not to prosecute Boeing, after it declared it had violated a settlement regarding two fatal crashes in 2018, and 2019,.
The NTSB opened an investigation after a plug on a 737 Max 9 blew off shortly after the plane took off in Portland, Oregon. This forced an Alaska Airlines crew engineer an emergency landing. It found that the panel was missing four bolts.
The NTSB issued an excoriating report on Thursday. It said Boeing had violated the regulations of the agency and the signed agreement it has with the company, by providing “nonpublic investigative information” during a press briefing and “speculating” about the possible causes of the January incident.
Boeing is one of the few companies that has been involved in many NTSB investigations during the last decade. Few entities are better at knowing the rules than Boeing,” said the NTSB. Boeing won’t be able to access information produced by the NTSB as part of its ongoing investigation due to new restrictions and sanctions.
Boeing held a media briefing on Tuesday to address the concerns regulators, airline passengers and other stakeholders have about the quality and safety of its production line.
The NTSB stated that an executive of the company had “provided information on the investigation and provided an analysis of information already released”. Boeing’s agreement signed with the agency at the beginning of the Alaska investigation prohibits both actions.
Boeing, according to the NTSB, had portrayed the agency’s probe “as an attempt to find the person responsible for the work on the door plugs” during the briefing. It clarified that this was not the case: “The NTSB focuses on the probable causes of the accident and does not place blame on anyone or assess liability.”
The NTSB, after hearing the briefing, demanded more information from Boeing. Boeing provided a transcript, which the agency claimed showed that unreliable and unauthorized data was disclosed. Boeing also provided opinions and analyses on factors that it believed were causal in the accident.
The NTSB has said that it will “provide details” about the incident to the Justice Department’s Fraud Division.
Boeing’s spokesman said: “We continue to be transparent and take full responsibility for our safety and quality plans. We also conducted a detailed briefing about the lessons learned from the accident on 5 January.
We regret that our comments intended to clarify our role in the accident and explain our actions, went beyond the NTSB’s role as a source of investigative data. We apologize to NTSB, and are ready to answer questions as the agency conducts its investigation.
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