EVERETT, WA - The news goes from bad to worse for Boeing. Yet another whistleblower has come forward to alert the public and lawmakers about the safety of Boeing aircraft after a spate of incidents happened in three days last week, Fox News reports.
Appearing on Fox & Friends First last week, Santiago Paredes told hosts Todd Piro and Carley Shimkus that he was pressured to “falsify information” when logging defects in the fuselages of the company’s 737 aircraft. The fuselage is the aircraft's main body where the passenger compartment is located.
Paredes told the outlet it was a constant battle to do his job of identifying and documenting defects because there was pressure from upper management to move planes along.
“There was a lot of pressure from upper management,” Paredes said. Paredes coming forward would seem to go with a bit of risk since two other whistleblowers who came forward have died under unusual circumstances. One whistleblower, John Barnett, died of an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound on March 9.
The second whistleblower, Joshua Dean, died from an apparent staph infection earlier this month. Dean, who, along with Barnett, had been deposed in connection with a shareholder lawsuit, had reported dangerous faults in components of Boeing’s 737 Max aircraft.
Paredes worked for Spirit AeroSystems (not affiliated with Spirit Airlines) for 12 years, tasked with conducting final inspections of the fuselages.
In 2022, he was pressured to complete his inspections faster and to be less specific about any faults encountered, which Paredes called “unethical.”
“They asked me to document defects in a different way–basically falsify the information that was, on how the documents were logged,” he said.
Conversely, a spokesperson for Spirit AeroSystems told the BBC that the company “strongly disagrees” with the claims made by Paredes and would “vigorously defend” itself against those allegations.
Boeing’s latest problems came to light when a door plug blew out of the fuselage of a 737 Max 9 aircraft at 16,000 feet. Had the aircraft been at cruising altitude when the incident occurred, experts say it would have been a catastrophic decompression.
The company’s problems worsened last week when three incidents over two days again put the company under scrutiny.
The first incident saw a Boeing 737-300 aircraft in Senegal slide off the runway and catch fire. Ten people, including the pilot, were injured in that incident.
That same day, a FedEx Boeing 767 made an emergency landing in Turkey after its front landing gear failed to deploy. The aircraft landed safely, and nobody was injured.
Finally, a Boeing 737-800 carrying 190 passengers and crew experienced a ruptured tire on landing, again in Turkey. All passengers were safely evacuated, and no injuries were reported.
Paredes said the January incident involving the Alaska Airlines Max-9 did not surprise him. He had issued a warning about a major incident months prior.
“I was a former employee, one on the investors’ lawsuit that was filed on December 19 [2023] and updated later in March,” he explained.
“But on December 19, I had a statement that was recorded even before that, months before the Alaskan Airlines, where I said that it was just a matter of time before something significant could happen.”
Paredes was asked if he would fly on a Boeing aircraft, to which he replied,” It makes me very nervous.”
Last week, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) opened an investigation into the company for statements made by Boeing about its safety practices. Reuters reported that the SEC investigation will probe whether Boeing or its executives made statements intended to mislead investors.
Meanwhile, the FAA also opened an investigation into the company after Boeing voluntarily informed the agency that it may not have completed the required inspections to confirm adequate bonding and grounding where the wings join the fuselage on the Boeing 787 Dreamliner jet.
Fox News Digital reached out to Boeing for comment, however, the company declined to do so.
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