US aircraft maker Boeing said it will hold a quality stand down on Thursday, January 25, at the Seattle-area location where it makes 737 aircraft, pausing production and delivery operations for a day.
During the stand down, employees will attend quality workshops and “pause, evaluate what we’re doing, how we’re doing it and make recommendations for improvement,” said Boeing Commercial Airplanes President Stan Deal, Reuters reported.
The first stand down will occur at the Renton, Washington-area factory where the 737 is built.
All other Boeing commercial production facilities and fabrication sites will have stand downs over the next few weeks, Boeing said.
The move comes in the wake of the grounding of a portion of its 737 Max 9 fleet earlier this month following a mid-air cabin panel blowout on an Alaska Airlines jet.
The 737 Max 9 aircraft were also involved in a few other incidents.
Meanwhile, Boeing chief executive officer Dave Calhoun is to meet US senators to answer questions about the 737 Max 9 grounding, as executives for longtime customer United Airlines raised questions over billions of dollars of orders for Max 10 jets.
Calhoun is set to hold meetings starting on Wednesday, January 24, on Capitol Hill.
He is scheduled to meet Senators Ted Cruz, Mark Warner and Maria Cantwell, who chairs the Commerce Committee.
Last week, she said she plans to hold a hearing after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded 171 Max 9 airplanes.
Boeing Max 9 grounding impact
The FAA grounded most of Boeing’s Max 9 jets for checks after a plug replacing an unused exit door tore off an Alaska Airlines jet on January 5, forcing an emergency landing.
Industry watchers have been seeking concrete signs that Boeing’s woes with the Max 9 and the legacy of earlier Max safety groundings are undermining support for the larger Max 10, which makes up more than a fifth of outstanding Max orders.
The Max 10 does not have the same kind of door-plug system as the Max 9, but the grounding has raised concerns that the incident could delay regulatory approval and delivery of the Max 10, as well as temper broader plans for higher production.
Alaska Airlines CEO Ben Minicucci said the airline found “some loose bolts on many” Max 9s during inspections in an interview with NBC News that aired on Tuesday.
The FAA is still reviewing data from inspections of an initial group of 40 planes and has not said when it may allow the grounded Max 9 jets to resume flights.
The FAA on January 21 urged operators of 737-900ER planes with door plugs to immediately inspect them after some airlines had noted “findings with bolts” during maintenance inspections.
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