BOEING CEO DEFENDS HIS SAFETY RECORD, SPARS WITH SENATORS AND APOLOGIZES TO CRASH VICTIMS RELATIVES

Boeing CEO David Calhoun defended the company’s safety record during a contentious Senate hearing this week, while lawmakers accused him of placing profits over safety, failing to protect whistleblowers, and even getting paid too much.

Relatives of people who died in two crashes of Boeing 737 Max jetliners were in the room, some holding photos of their loved ones, to remind the CEO of the stakes. Calhoun began his remarks by standing, turning to face the families, and apologizing “for the grief that we have caused,” and vowing to focus on safety.

Calhoun’s appearance was the first before Congress by any high-ranking Boeing official since a panel blew out of a 737 Max during an Alaska Airlines flight in January. No one was seriously injured in the incident, but it raised fresh concerns about the company’s bestselling commercial aircraft.

The tone of the hearing before the Senate investigations subcommittee was set hours earlier, when the panel released a 204-page report with new allegations from a whistleblower who said he worries that defective parts could be going into 737s. The whistleblower is the latest in a string of current and former Boeing employees to raise concerns about the company’s manufacturing processes, which federal officials are investigating.

“This hearing is a moment of reckoning,” the subcommittee chairman, Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said. “It’s about a company, a once iconic company, that somehow lost its way.”

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., placed the blame squarely on Calhoun, saying that the man who became CEO in January 2020 had been too focused on the bottom line.

“You are cutting corners, you are eliminating safety procedures, you are sticking it to your employees, you are cutting back jobs because you are trying to squeeze very piece of profit you can out of this company,” Hawley said, his voice rising. “You are strip-mining Boeing.”

Hawley repeatedly mentioned Calhoun’s compensation for last year, valued at $32.8 million, and asked the CEO why he hasn’t resigned.