Italy-based Manufacturing Processes Specification (MPS) screws up 787 parts.

... The parts include fittings that ... secure the floor beam in one fuselage section, as well as other fittings, spacers, brackets, and clips within other assemblies.

Undelivered planes will be reworked, and planes already carrying passengers will go through a review process with Boeing and receive FAA confirmation.

The defect was found as the planemaker grapples with other problems in its 787 that have caused it to cut production and halt deliveries since May...

Mark Forkner is first Boeing employee to be charged with failures of the aircraft

Boeing’s former 737 Max test pilot was indicted for allegedly lying to regulators about issues with the aircraft, which was later involved in two fatal crashes.
Mark Forkner, the company’s former chief technical pilot, becomes the first Boeing employee to be charged over the failures of the 737 Max.

A former chief technical pilot for Boeing has been charged with deceiving federal regulators who were evaluating the company's 737 Max plane...

... Two fatal crashes of the 737 Max in 2018 and 2019 killed 346 people.

A lawyer for the victims' relatives said Mr Forkner had not acted alone...

... described the decision to charge the company's former chief technical pilot with fraud as a "corporate whitewash".

Robert A. Clifford, founder and senior partner of Clifford Law Offices in Chicago, said: "The tragic loss of 157 lives could have been prevented had Mark Forkner spoken up but he certainly didn't act alone." "This inexcusable type of corporate greed goes far beyond the chief pilot at the company that haphazardly made these aircraft in an effort to increase profits," Mr Clifford said. He said the US Department of Justice should "go further in its criminal investigation and indictments to determine just how far the deception went..."

... "A deep-dive criminal investigation is owed to these families who gave the ultimate sacrifice and to the flying public that continues to buy tickets on the Max aircraft,"...

stock options? bonus? or just food on the table?

... have to throw away 20 bad ones to get one good one?

Insurers for several current and former Boeing board members will pay more than $230 million to settle a lawsuit that accused the directors of failing to address safety warning signs before two of the company’s Max jetliners crashed.

Boeing and the directors did not admit wrongdoing in the settlement...

... Insurers for the directors will pay $237.5 million to Boeing, minus fees and expenses, according to documents filed Friday. None of the directors — nor Boeing — will be required to pay anything...

... Boeing [also] agreed to add a board member with a background in aviation or aerospace engineering or product safety and create a safety ombudsman's office for at least five years...

... Boeing has agreed to pay $2.5 billion to settle a lawsuit that accused the company of fraud and conspiracy after two crashes of 737 Max jets...

... Boeing's directors, however, did not admit wrongdoing in the settlement.

Under the settlement, Boeing will pay a $243.6 million fine, $1.77 billion in compensation to airlines that were unable to use the company's Max jets while they were grounded, and $500 million into a fund for families of passengers who were killed in crashes in 2018 and 2019...

... the insurer for the current and former directors have to pay the settlement fund ... minus fees and expenses...

... In January 2021, Boeing agreed to pay a $2.5 billion settlement with US Justice Department to settle a criminal prosecution for misleading safety regulators of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and reportedly feeding them half-truths and cover-up actions. The payment would include money for the crash victims' families, airline customers, and a fine...

... Acting Attorney General for the Justice Department's criminal division, David Burns said, "Boeing's employees chose the path of profit over candor." The settlement was said to remove any uncertainty over criminal charges against the US aircraft maker...

... Since the shareholders filed suit on behalf of the company, the insurers of the board and top executives will pay the settlement amount of $237.5 million, less the attorneys’ fees and expenses, to Boeing...

... “We sued Boeing’s board because they failed in their fiduciary responsibility to monitor safety and protect the company,” ... “It is our hope, moving forward, that the reforms agreed to in this settlement will help safeguard Boeing and the flying public against future tragedy.”...

... The settlement comes after presiding Judge Morgan Zurn, ... in September criticized the board’s handling of the two fatal accidents in unusually sharp language.

Zurn ruled then that the case could proceed, based on allegations that the directors’ failed “to establish a reporting system for airplane safety” and turned “a blind eye to a red flag representing airplane safety problems.” Her ruling also bluntly asserted that “to preserve its image … The Board publicly lied about if and how it monitored the 737 MAX’s safety.” ...

... In the settlement, Boeing’s board admits no liability or wrongdoing...

Boeing has agreed a settlement with the families of the 157 people who died in the Ethiopia 737 Max crash in 2019.

The plane maker accepts liability for their deaths, according to court documents in Chicago.

In return, families of the victims will not seek punitive damages from the company.

Lawyers for the victims' families said Boeing would still be held "fully accountable", welcoming the agreement as a significant milestone.

The agreement opens the way for families outside the US, in countries such as Ethiopia and Kenya, to claim compensation through the US courts, rather than in their home countries, which might be more difficult and result in lower payments.

AP - Federal safety regulators say they will retain power to approve Boeing 787 airliners for flight rather than return that authority to the aircraft maker, which hasn’t been able to deliver any new Dreamliner planes since last May because of production flaws.

The Federal Aviation Administration said it told Boeing of its decision Tuesday.

The FAA said that once deliveries of 787s resume, it will perform final inspections and retain power to clear each new plane until it is confident that Boeing’s quality control and manufacturing “consistently produce 787s that meet FAA design standards.” It also said Boeing must have a plan for handling planes that need reworking.

“This will allow the agency to confirm the effectiveness of measures Boeing has undertaken to improve the 787 manufacturing process,” the FAA said in a statement.

For years, the FAA has relied on Boeing employees to certify the airworthiness of planes by deputizing some company employees to act on behalf of the agency. The practice came under intense criticism after two deadly crashes involving Boeing 737 Max jets and revelations that FAA officials knew little about a key flight control systems implicated in the crashes.

The 787, a larger plane than the 737, has been plagued by production flaws such as unacceptable gaps between fuselage panels. Deliveries were stopped briefly in late 2020, then again in May 2021 and have not resumed. The halt in shipments has deprived Chicago-based Boeing of cash that airlines pay when they receive new planes.

Leading congressional Democrats have asked the Department of Transportation Inspector General’s Office to review what they see as the Federal Aviation Administration’s failure to hold Boeing accountable for serious lapses that contributed to the two 737 MAX crashes.

U.S. House Transportation chair Rep. DeFazio, D-Ore., and aviation subcommittee chair Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Everett — who led a high-profile investigation into the crashes and made public key internal Boeing documents that revealed substantial failures — are pushing for civil action against Boeing and potentially against individual employees.

Dissatisfied with a response last month from FAA Administrator Steve Dickson about two specific concerns, DeFazio and Larsen sent a letter Friday asking DOT Inspector General Eric Soskin to intervene. “We respectfully request that you review FAA’s refusal to exercise proper oversight over Boeing’s apparent misconduct,” the letter states.

In an interview, DeFazio said he is “concerned about what is going on deep within the FAA.” Following the 1996 crash of Valujet Flight 592 in Florida that killed 110 people, DeFazio, then a young congressman, was instrumental in inserting into a FAA reauthorization bill language that made clear safety must be the agency’s top priority and stripped out the mandate that it should promote the U.S. aviation industry.

“It took years to wring that out of the culture,” DeFazio said. “I’m afraid it kind of crept back in.”...

... two egregious decisions at Boeing that were identified in a House investigation into the 737 MAX crashes in Ethiopia and Indonesia, which killed 346 people...

... Following the two MAX crashes ... “it just boggles the mind that there weren’t and haven’t been more consequences for individuals who were involved.”...

... “What, if anything, has FAA done to hold any of the individuals at Boeing accountable?”...

... The FAA recently issued new guidance designed to protect its authorized representatives at companies like Boeing from interference by business managers. However, the FAA has not focused on penalizing what happened during the MAX’s development...

... “the blatant lack of enforcement actions” for not complying with the certified design “could encourage manufacturers to ignore their approved type design in the future.”...

... to date, the FAA has not taken civil action against Boeing or any of its employees.

“I don’t think the consequences have been anywhere near adequate higher up in Boeing,”...

Someone finally said the quiet part out loud...

... the operational costs alone for a single Artemis launch—for just the rocket, Orion spacecraft, and ground systems—will total $4.1 billion. This is, he said, "a price tag that strikes us as unsustainable." With this comment, Martin essentially threw down his gauntlet and said NASA cannot have a meaningful exploration program based around SLS and Orion at this cost...

... the costs per flight, which will apply to at least the first four launches of the Artemis program: $2.2 billion to build a single SLS rocket, $568 million for ground systems, $1 billion for an Orion spacecraft, and $300 million to the European Space Agency for Orion's Service Module...

... What is striking about these costs is that they do not include the tens of billions of dollars that NASA has already spent developing the Orion spacecraft since 2005 and the Space Launch System rocket since 2011. If one were to amortize development costs over 10 flights of the SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft, the $4.1 billion figure cited by Martin would easily double...

... NASA is obscuring costs that it is spending on the Artemis program and that, in aggregate, his office believes NASA will spend $93 billion from 2012 to 2025 on the Artemis program.

"Without NASA fully accounting for and accurately reporting the overall costs of current and future Artemis missions, it will be much more difficult for Congress and the administration to make informed decisions about NASA's long-term funding needs—a key to making Artemis a sustainable venture,"...

... Martin, however, appeared to doubt that there would be significant cost savings due to the inefficiency of the program and its large aerospace contractors.

"Part of it goes to the efficiencies of the underlying contractors, like Boeing," Martin said. "One of the problems we saw in development of the SLS and Orion—it's a challenging development of course—but we did notice very poor contractor performance on Boeing's part, poor planning, and poor execution."...

... In reality, no one should expect Congress to care about the high cost of the SLS and Orion program. The legislature created the programs this way...

Which "Oligarchs" are creaming off all those funds?...

... The China Eastern Airlines Boeing 737-800 was flying from Kunming to Guangzhou when it plunged to earth in Guangxi province and caught fire.

The number of casualties and reason for the crash are not yet known. Rescuers have seen no signs of survivors...

... Flight tracking data suggested the plane lost height rapidly from its cruising altitude before plummeting to the ground...

... The Boeing 737-800 plane was seven years old, according to tracker websites. It is the predecessor model to the Boeing 737 Max line...