Boeing CEO pummeled on compensation, 737 MAX flaws at U.S. hearing
WASHINGTON, (Reuters) Boeing Co Chief Executive Dennis Muilenburg was repeatedly hammered by U.S. lawmakers at a hearing yesterday over his compensation and key mistakes in development of the 737 MAX that he newly acknowledged.
Enduring hours of aggressive questions related to 737 MAX crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia, which killed 346 people, Muilenburg repeatedly told lawmakers that he would not resign as chief executive of the world’s largest planemaker.
The back-to-back hearings in the Senate and House of Representatives are the highest-profile congressional scrutiny of commercial aviation safety in years. They have heaped fresh pressure on a newly rejiggered Boeing senior management team fighting to repair trust with airline customers and passengers shaken by an eight-month safety ban on its 737 MAX.
The CEO began his remarks by turning and looking directly at family members of the victims seated closely behind him as he apologized for the lives lost in the two crashes.
In the most intense exchange at the hearings so far, Representative Steve Cohen from Tennessee on Wednesday thundered at Muilenburg, “What does accountability mean – are you taking a cut in pay? Are you working for free from now on until you can cure this problem? These people’s relatives are not coming back, they’re gone. Your salary is still on,” he said, gesturing to the family members at the hearing.
“Congressman, it’s not about the money for me,” Muilenburg said. He later added that he and other executives would not receive bonuses this year. Representative John Garamendi of California ticked off “serious quality issues” on other Boeing flagship aircraft such as the 787 Dreamliner and KC-46 aerial tanker.
“You have a systemic problem in your company,” Garamendi said. “You are pushing profits over quality and safety.”
Boeing’s shares were down nearly one percent in afternoon trading.
The hearing focused on the company’s anti-stall system known as MCAS - which automatically and repeatedly pushed the plane’s nose down in both crashes as pilots fought for control.
Lawmakers released Boeing documents that showed the company had considered adding an MCAS failure alert on the flight control panel to the 737 MAX. Another Boeing document warned that if a pilot failed to respond in more than 10 seconds to the software, activation could lead to a “catastrophic” failure.
Muilenburg acknowledged, “We made some mistakes” when developing MCAS.