I learned to fly when I was 3. Well okay, Dad took me flying and let me steer. Or he let me think I was steering. But I sure felt like I learned to fly, and I've been an aviation enthusiast and booster ever since.
That's why I'm so disturbed by this week's exposé of shoddy quality control and construction practices by Boeing in building the 787 Dreamliner, particularly at the Charleston, SC plant. (Charleston is one of two final assembly plants for the 787; the other is in Everett, Washington. Charleston is the non-unionized one.) The reporter is Al-Jazeera's Will Jordan.
A selection of quotes from the Al-Jazeera piece below:
"I feel that that legacy and that history and that competence has been hijacked by a bunch of corporate thugs."
-- Former Boeing employee Kevin Sanders
"With all the problems reported on the 787, there's 90% that's getting swept away, hushed up. It's an iceberg." -- anonymous Boeing Charleston factory worker.
"The people that actually work on it are the biggest problem. There is an uneducated, underskilled, and uncaring staff that are building these planes. And I'm not the only one that feels that way." -- anonymous Boeing Charleston factory worker.
"I think Everett (Washington) will do what's right to make the plane right. Because of the union, they have to. Here (Charleston), everybody is being pushed to meet this f****ng schedule, regardless of quality." -- anonymous Boeing Charleston factory worker.
"There's no doubt there's bad repairs going out the door on the 787 aircraft. I am worried that sooner or later there's going to be a structural failure on a fuselage."
John Woods, former Boeing composites engineer, fired for pushing too hard on safety.
The whole thing is 48 minutes long, and it's well worth your time. The must-see centerpiece is a series of hidden-camera conversations with workers at Charleston, griping about the shoddy practices in their own plant, and candidly telling a fellow employee that they would never fly on a 787. All I can add is, that when the people on the factory floor who actually build a product think it's a pile of crap, chances are they're right.