Boeing's safety culture faces Senate scrutiny in two hearings

Boeing (BA) is being put under the microscope on Capitol Hill. Two Senate subcommittees are holding hearings on the company's safety culture. In one, an independent expert panel put together by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is set to testify. That's followed by another hearing in which a Boeing quality engineer turned whistleblower, Sam Salehpour, is expected to call for the worldwide grounding of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner jet, claiming the fuselage of the jets were not connected properly and could potentially break during flight after being worn down over time.

Yahoo Finance Reporter Alexis Keenan breaks down the hearings involved with Boeing, what to expect, and how it could impact the company moving forward.

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This post was written by Nicholas Jacobino

Video Transcript

- Now for a deeper dive into one of those big stories that we are watching. We ought to start with Boeing. An independent expert panel is testifying before a Senate committee on Boeing's safety culture. Now, this hearing will be followed by another at 11:15 AM Eastern Time, where we will hear from a whistleblower who's going to lay out some concerns about the company's 787 Dreamliner jet.

Joining us now, what we can expect, and what this ultimately means for Boeing our very own Alexis Keenan. Alexis.

- Hi. Yes. So this first hearing, it is basically an agency within the FAA that's going to be giving a report to lawmakers about their findings on a report that was looking into the safety culture at Boeing. And what they say in this report that is on paper right now-- we'll hear their testimony to get more color on this-- is that there is a disconnect between the senior management at Boeing and the rest of the organization. And they say that is causing problems in internal safety culture at the company.

But secondly is this 11:15 hearing, and that will also be in front of Senate lawmakers. And that is going to be from Boeing quality engineer turned whistleblower. His name is Sam Salehpour, and he is expected to call for the worldwide grounding of the 787 Dreamliner. That's that wide-body jet that Boeing has struggled to get off the production line in the expedient fashion that they had wanted to back in 2011 when these planes started to come off of the production lines there.

Now, there are 13 of these planes in service, but what Salehpour is saying is that in his experience working on the Dreamliner-- he says he was since retaliated against by Boeing and moved to another section of the company-- but he said that gaps in the fuselage of this plane, which is made by different companies and comes together at the Boeing factory, that the gaps, which are about the width of a human hair, that they're too big, and they're too wide, and that under the stress of flying conditions over a long period of time, that the plane could actually break apart in mid-air.

Now those are some serious claims. That's why he's saying he wants this plane to be grounded. But in response, here is what Boeing is saying.

They say that, "These claims about the structural integrity of the 787 are inaccurate. The issues raised have been subject to rigorous engineering examination under FAA oversight. This analysis has validated that the aircraft will maintain its durability and service life over several decades," they say, "and these issues do not present any safety concerns."

Boeing held a reporters briefing on Monday to elaborate on what they mean here, and what they say is that the stress conditions, the testing that they have put this aircraft under over its time being in production, that they have gone far beyond the life span in testing this aircraft from what would be expected. They say that they have put it through 165,000 takeoff and landing pressurization scenarios, and that would be 3.75 times the designated life span of this aircraft.

So they're saying something wildly different than Salehpour is saying, but we're expecting a lot more detail as we listen to him later this morning.

- And we're looking at live footage right now from Capitol Hill as well as this first hearing that you mentioned starts to kick off. I'm curious though, how much are we going to learn today? How much news can we actually get out of this, particularly given some of the executive changes that have been going on at Boeing?

- Right, so we aren't going to hear from Boeing at this hearing. They were invited to have a voice here, so we're not going to hear that. We're not going to hear a response. Certainly, I would think Boeing would want to have a controlled response to these very, very serious planes. These planes are in the air. There are 13 of them that have been delivered to customers.

But look, we don't know. He's represented by counsel-- Salehpour-- so we might very well learn more about the details of these gaps. Boeing has put out quite a lot of information about their design and their testing, but maybe he will have some insight as to why he thinks that 165,000 hours is not enough

Boeing has certainly said along the way that already the aircraft in service, they've been tested as well. They undergo regular service requirements, and they say in those conditions, then too they did not see any problems with these gaps in the aircraft. So maybe a lot to learn, maybe a little to learn, but we'll certainly bring you the information on the back side of this hearing.

- All right, Alexis. Thank you so much for bringing this to us and for covering it as it breaks here. Really appreciate it.