An investigation carried out in Italy has revealed illegal practices on the part of Boeing subcontractors.
To save money, two companies deliberately made components with lower quality materials.
Decisions which can call into question the safety of aircraft, reports the Italian press.
The Italian press reports that the public prosecutor’s office in Brindisi, in the south of the country, has just completed an investigation into non-compliant parts delivered to Leonardo-Aerostrutture, a company in charge of building part of the plane’s fuselage. Boeing 787 Dreamliner.
According to media reports, seven people and two subcontracting companies for Leonardo-Aerostrutture are targeted by this investigation. Prosecutions initiated when parts of certain sections of the fuselage of the aircraft were “made with pure titanium instead of the intended titanium alloy”.
Security risks
The aluminum alloys that were used would also not comply with the specifications. A deliberate choice, which would have resulted in “significant savings on the purchase of raw materials” from these two companies, reports the AGI agency.
The use of these parts is not without impact. It turns out that it resulted in the construction of parts of the fuselage “with significantly lower static and stress resistance characteristics, having consequences for transport safety”notes the site of Corriere della Sera.
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In the Italian media, it is emphasized that the pieces “non-compliant could, in the long term, create risks for the safety of the aircraft, forcing the American company (Boeing, editor’s note) to launch an extraordinary handling campaign targeting the aircraft concerned.”
The expertise ordered by the Brindisi public prosecutor’s office and carried out by technicians specialized in the aerospace sector revealed the non-compliance of at least 4,829 titanium components and at least 1,158 aluminum components. The Boeing company was contacted during the investigation: it was thanks to it that the identification of non-compliant components could be attested.
