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The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) did not hold back at Wednesday’s public hearing.

The NTSB asserted that inadequate training, guidance, and oversight at Boeing led to last year’s stunning door plug blowout.

NTSB Chairman Jennifer Homendy called the mid-air scare “preventable,” caused by a chain of systemic failures that could have been deadly.

“I firmly believe there’s one reason flight 1282 averted catastrophe, and one reason only鈥攖he crew,” she said.

The NTSB outlined 19 action items for both Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). They include additional training and inspections, as well as a design change to Boeing doors, to eliminate the risk of another blowout.

The hearing spanned more than six hours.

Boeing door plug blows out in January 2024

The blowout aboard Alaska Airlines flight 1282 in January, 2024, occurred minutes after it took off from Portland, Oregon, and created a roaring air vacuum that sucked objects out of the cabin and scattered them on the ground below along with debris from the fuselage. Seven passengers and one flight attendant sustained minor injuries, but no one was killed. Pilots were able to land the plane safely back at the airport.

Boeing and Spirit AeroSystems鈥攖he company that made and installed the door plug鈥攁re redesigning them with another backup system to keep the panels in place even if the bolts are missing, but that improvement isn鈥檛 likely to be certified by the FAA until 2026 at the soonest. The NTSB urged the companies and the regulator to make sure every 737 Max is retrofitted with those new panels.

Both Boeing and the FAA have improved training and processes since the incident, according to the NTSB, but board officials said the company and agency need to better identify manufacturing risks to make sure such flaws never sneak through again. Homendy did single out Boeing鈥檚 new CEO, Kelly Ortberg, for improving safety since he took over last summer, though she said more needs to be done.

The NTSB recommended that Boeing continue improving its training and safety standards and make sure everyone knows when actions must be documented. Board members also highlighted the need to ensure that everyone throughout the company understands its safety plan as well as executives do.

The board also urged the FAA to step up and make sure its audits and inspections address key areas based on past problems and systemic issues. The agency was also encouraged Tuesday to assess Boeing鈥檚 safety culture and reconsider its longstanding policy not to聽聽to travel in their own seats with proper restraints.

Many of the NTSB recommendations echo a report the Transportation Department鈥檚 Inspector General issued last year and that the FAA is already working to implement.

The FAA said in a statement that it 鈥渉as fundamentally changed how it oversees Boeing since the Alaska Airlines door-plug accident and we will continue this aggressive oversight to ensure Boeing fixes its systemic production-quality issues. We are actively monitoring Boeing鈥檚 performance and meet weekly with the company to review its progress and any challenges it鈥檚 facing in implementing necessary changes.鈥�

Missing bolts put the focus on Boeing鈥檚 manufacturing

The panel that blew off was removed at a Boeing factory so workers could repair five damaged rivets, but bolts that help secure the door plug were not replaced. It鈥檚 not clear who removed the panel.

The NTSB said in a聽 that four bolts were not replaced after the repair job, but the work was not documented.

Investigators determined the door plug was gradually moving upward over the 154 flights prior to this incident before it ultimately flew off.

Boeing factory workers told NTSB investigators they聽聽and were asked to perform jobs they weren鈥檛 qualified for, including opening and closing the door plug on the particular plane involved. None of the 24 people on the door team was ever trained to remove a door plug and only one of them had ever removed one before. That person was on vacation when it was done on the plane at issue.

Investigators said Boeing did not do enough to train newer workers who didn鈥檛 have a background in manufacturing. Many who were hired after the pandemic and after two crashes involving the 737 Max planes lacked that experience, and there weren鈥檛 clear standards for on-the-job training.

NTSB staff also told the board that Boeing didn鈥檛 have strong enough safety practices in place to ensure the door plug was properly reinstalled, and the FAA inspection system did not do a good job of catching systemic failures in manufacturing. Boeing was required to adopt a more rigorous set of safety standards after a 2015 settlement, but the NTSB said that plan had only been in place for two years before the specific Alaska Airlines plane that suffered the door plug鈥檚 failure was made and that it was still being developed.

The FAA regularly conducts more than 50 audits a year on Boeing鈥檚 manufacturing, but there aren鈥檛 clear standards for what those audits cover. The agency routinely discarded past inspection records after five years and didn鈥檛 always base its inspection plan on those past findings.

Contributing: Gwen Baumgardner, 成人X站 Newsradio;