Inside Boeing’s struggle to make its best-selling plane again

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Written by Alison Lambert and Dan Catchpole

SEATTLE (Reuters) – Since a crippling strike at several of Boeing Co’s U.S. aircraft plants ended more than a month ago, progress in ramping up production of its best-selling 737 MAX jet has been deliberately slow.

Safety inspectors inside the 737 MAX factory outside Seattle painstakingly inspected the semi-finished planes for defects they may have missed during the seven-week shutdown.

Other workers flocked to booklets to restore expired safety licenses. The plant was initially so lifeless in mid-November that one employee left early because the stabilization boxes he had been tasked with renovating were not being used, according to a source inside the plant.

The result: No new 737 MAX aircraft were completed. Boeing said on Tuesday that it had resumed Max production last week, as first reported by Reuters.

Boeing’s cautious approach, following criticism that the planemaker has been rushing production for years, has won praise from regulators and some airline CEOs.

But it also has some smaller suppliers who cut jobs or working hours during the strike, reluctant to increase staff again, creating more uncertainty in an already fragile supply chain, according to three suppliers, an analyst and an industry source.

Both Boeing and rival Airbus are struggling to meet production targets due to delays in the supply chain. Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg told analysts in October that he expected a tough comeback from the supply chain strike after the strike.

One supplier told Reuters that parts that used to take one day to complete in the machining shop now take a week.

This report on Boeing’s efforts to resume production of its best-selling plane is based on interviews with dozens of Boeing factory workers and 10 suppliers, most of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

It appears Ortberg is sticking to his pledge to cautiously restart 737 MAX production, prioritizing safety and quality due to increased regulatory scrutiny after a panel exploded in the air in January on a nearly new plane.

The interviews also revealed that some suppliers are still struggling to recover from the strike, after suffering a decline in aircraft production during the Corona virus (Covid-19) crisis, and the grounding of the 2019 MAX model after two fatal accidents related to this model.

Boeing “will continue to steadily increase production as we execute our safety and quality plan and work to meet the expectations of our regulators and customers,” Boeing spokeswoman Jessica Kowal said. “We will also continue to work transparently with our suppliers, listen to concerns and look for opportunities to improve collaboration to ensure the entire production system operates safely and predictably.”



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