- A supplier of Boeing planes found misdrilled holes on 737 Max aircraft, The Wall Street Journal reported.
- The inaccurate drill holes were found on the fuselages of 50 aircraft, per The Journal.
- The impacted planes were still in production and had not yet been delivered, the outlet reported.
In the latest manufacturing error to plague Boeing, a supplier of 737 Max aircraft components discovered misdrilled holes on the fuselages of 50 planes that were in production for the aircraft company, according to a new report from The Wall Street Journal.
An employee of Spirit AeroSystems, which creates the fuselage, nacelles, and struts for various Boeing aircraft, alerted their manager to the inaccurate drill holes while the 737 Max planes were making their way through the production process, according to the report.
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The jets had not yet been delivered, and the discovery of the manufacturing issue would cause delays in completing their production.
“This is the only course of action given our commitment to deliver perfect airplanes every time,” The Journal reported president and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes Stan Deal told staff in a memo on Sunday.
Representatives for Boeing and Spirit AeroSystems did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.
Boeing’s 737 Max jets have come under increased scrutiny in recent months following a January 5 incident where a door plug on an Alaska Airlines flight came loose and a window blew out, causing the plane to make an emergency landing. No one was injured.
The incident involved a Spirit AeroSystems fuselage, per The Journal.
In response to the in-flight emergency, the airline grounded its fleet of 65 Boeing 737 Max 9 planes pending a safety inspection. The subsequent inspection revealed there “many” loose bolts were found on the commercial airline’s fleet.
United Airlines also announced that it found loose bolts that “relate to installation issues in the door plug.”
