Cantwell Stresses Boeing’s Need to Strengthen Its Safety Management System, Listen to Frontline Employee Safety Concerns

04.17.24

Cantwell Stresses Boeing's Need to Strengthen Its Safety Management System, Listen to Frontline Employee Safety Concerns

Cantwell: "We all represent big aviation states, we want this to be right and we definitely believe in the workforce that we have in our states."

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), chair of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, held a hearing with authors of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Organization Designation Authorization (ODA) Expert Review Panel's final report on Boeing's safety culture.

At the hearing, Sen. Cantwell stressed the need for Boeing to take serious steps to strengthen its safety management system (SMS) and safety culture and emphasized that the expert panel's recommendations provide a clear road map for future aviation safety reform legislation.

"The expert panel's 53 recommendations regarding Boeing's ODA, Safety Management System and safety culture serve as an important catalyst for future aviation safety legislation," Sen. Cantwell said at the opening of the hearing. "While we have made safety improvements through the aircraft certification reform law-and some of that is still playing out with the new Administrator who I think is more aggressively taking the responsibilities of the Act seriously-we look to build on those advancements with a 5-year FAA reauthorization bill and some enhanced safety features. But we're not going to stop there. There is more to be done to implement the recommendations from your report."

"Although the final report gave Boeing 6 months to make this action plan a reality, the expert panel's recommendations, the FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker has cut this to 90 days," Sen. Cantwell continued. "I expect the company to comply with this deadline and submit a serious plan that demonstrates the commitment to these kind of safety measures. The FAA must also demonstrate that it is going to be a strong regulator on these issues."

Today's witnesses included Dr. Javier de Luis, Aeronautics and Astronautics Lecturer at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), who lost his sister in the 2019 Ethiopian Airlines flight 302 737 MAX crash; Dr. Tracy Dillinger, Manager for Safety Culture and Human Factors at NASA; and Dr. Najmedin Meshkati, Aviation Safety Professor at University of Southern California.

The landmark Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act (ACSAA), authored and championed by Sen. Cantwell, required the FAA to convene the independent expert panel comprised of aviation safety experts to review the effectiveness of Boeing and other manufacturers' safety management systems, their ability to foster a strong safety culture, and whether they make sound organizational and delegation decisions prioritizing aviation safety.

About the report: Over the course of a year, the 24-member Expert Review Panel reviewed more than 4,000 pages of Boeing documents, conducted seven surveys, and completed over 250 interviews and meetings with Boeing employees across six company locations. The panel's final report made 53 recommendations to improve safety deficiencies and found a disconnect within the company's safety culture between senior management and the workforce and that Boeing's SMS safety procedures were not structured in a way to ensure all employees understand safety procedures.

Sen. Cantwell expressed her concern that employees are unable to have their concerns heard and acted upon, asking the witnesses, "how do we ensure that those who are speaking up about safety measures get listened to?"

"Well, in a properly functioning SMS and a properly functioning safety culture, those questions wouldn't be asked," Dr. Javier de Luis responded. "Because people would be empowered, people would have confidence that they wouldn't be smacked down if they spoke up."

"[O]ne of our recommendations, we recommended that Boeing establish what are called ASAP programs, Aviation Safety Action Programs. They're very common in airlines, and an ASAP program is a tripartite program. It has the FAA, the labor, and management, and if you initiate an ASAP event, you're protected. But more importantly than being protected, the event gets visibility at the FAA level, as well as the management level."

Sen. Cantwell also asked Dr. Meshkati how human factors impact safety culture:

"The report states that during the development of the 757 and 767, human factors in the flight deck operations "were the gold standard," in part because "human factors specialists worked closely and collectively in Seattle," said Sen. Cantwell. "Then the report goes on to say, "the role of human factors and its influence eroded through a series of administration issues, including reorganization, decentralization, downsizing, and relocation of the company's headquarters."

"Human factors works very good when you're very close to engineers and system designers. They exchange information, they've worked together, they work on the design of the system, and then they work on the training and that, and then they solve that problem together," responded Dr. Meshkati.

In a later exchange, Sen. Cantwell asked Dr. Javier de Luis about what steps the FAA, as the safety oversight regulator, should take to improve its own safety system.

"We focused a lot about, especially since January 5, on the need to put more FAA boots on the ground in the factory," Dr. Javier de Luis responded. "I keep going back to something that was said earlier, about the need for the FAA to really step up its own SMS. I think that's critical. If you have that, then you have a chance of being able to appropriately interface with the people you're supposed to regulate."

Transcripts of Sen. Cantwell's opening remarks and Q&A with the witnesses are available HERE.

Video of Sen. Cantwell's opening statement: HERE

Video of Sen. Cantwell's 1st round of Q&A available HERE.

Video of Sen. Cantwell's 2nd round of Q&A available HERE.

Video of Sen. Cantwell's 3rd round of Q&A available HERE.

Video of Sen. Cantwell's 4th round of Q&A available HERE.

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