‘BOEING 737 MAX PRODUCTION FALLS’
Regulators stepping up checks, workers completing outstanding jobs, say sources
BOEING MAX jetliner production has fallen sharply in recent weeks as United States regulators step up factory checks and workers slow the assembly line outside Seattle to complete outstanding work, said industry sources.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has imposed a cap of 38 jets a month following a blowout on a 737 MAX in January, blamed on an assembly error. But the monthly output rate is fluctuating well below this level and fell as low as single digits late last month, they said.
Boeing said it had made efforts to reduce the amount of so-called “travelled work”, or planes moving down the line with jobs still needing to be fixed from earlier work stations. The effect is to slow overall production and, in turn, deliveries.
Boeing has faced increased scrutiny following the loss of a door plug on an Alaska Airlines jetliner in January.
Boeing’s production slowdown is also expected to ripple through the airline industry, with carriers shaving flights from their schedule or extending existing jet leases to meet demand.
Traditionally, production and deliveries went hand in hand, but the grounding of the MAX in 2019 and 2020 and disruption from the Covid-19 pandemic created a stockpile of surplus jets that mean it is harder now to glean the production rate from deliveries.
To try to understand how fast Boeing’s main cash cow is being built, independent experts study the number of first test flights being carried out for individual new jets each month.
Rob Morris, global head of consultancy at Cirium Ascend, said Boeing flew 13 MAXs last month, following 11 in February. The rate peaked around 38 a month in the middle of last year, Cirium data shows.
Airbus, by contrast, flew an average of 46 a month of its A320neos in the first quarter, Morris said.