A prominent Boeing whistleblower, a former quality manager who raised concerns about manufacturing practices at the company’s 787 Dreamliner factory in South Carolina, was found dead Saturday of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, local officials said.
The whistleblower, John Barnett, was in Charleston to testify in a lawsuit in which he accused Boeing of retaliating against him for making quality and safety complaints.
Quality problems involving both design and manufacturing have plagued Boeing for years — most notably after the crashes of two Boeing 737 Max jets in 2018 and 2019, and again since a fuselage panel exploded on a Max flight shortly after take off two months ago.
Mr. Barnett filed the complaint against Boeing with the US Department of Labor in 2017 under the AIR21 Whistleblower Protection Program, which protects employees of airplane manufacturers who report information about air carrier safety violations. He left the company that year.
Boeing’s lawyer deposed Mr Barnett on Thursday and he was questioned by his own lawyers for half a day on Friday. They were scheduled to finish testifying Saturday morning, said Robert Turkewitz, Mr. Barnett’s lawyer in the case.
When Mr. Barnett, 62, did not show up Saturday morning and did not return phone calls, Mr. Turkewitz said he became concerned and called Mr. Barnett’s hotel. Mr Barnett was later found dead in his truck in the hotel car park.
The Charleston County Medical Examiner’s Office confirmed the death, which it said appeared to be “the result of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.”
The Charleston Police Department noted the medical examiner’s finding in a statement and said it is investigating. “Detectives are actively investigating this case and await the official cause of death, along with any additional findings that may shed further light on the circumstances of Mr. Barnett’s death,” the department said.
Mr. Turkewitz said that Mr. Barnett’s experience at Boeing had affected him deeply.
“It was really weighing on him, what was happening and reliving all these things that had happened and the stress it had caused,” Mr Turkewitz said.
An administrative law judge with the Labor Department was hearing the whistleblower’s case, which was under discovery. The trial was set for June.
Mr. Turkewitz said he plans to proceed with Mr. Barnett’s case, on behalf of Mr. Barnett’s family. “What John wanted was to at least make a difference,” she said.
In a statement, Boeing said: “We are saddened by the death of Mr. Barnett and our thoughts are with his family and friends.”
Known as Swampy because of his Louisiana roots, Mr. Barnett worked at Boeing for nearly three decades until he retired in 2017. He had worked at Boeing’s plant in Everett, Washington, before moving to a new plant in North Charleston, SC , in 2010 to work on Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner, a wide-body jet that was the company’s most significant new plane in a generation.
After the crashes of two of Boeing’s 737 Max jets in 2018 and 2019, Mr. Barnett’s concerns about quality issues at Boeing featured prominently in the New York Times and other news outlets as examples of widespread problems with the company’s manufacturing.
Mr Barnett told The Times in 2019 that he had discovered clusters of titanium strips hanging over flight control cables on some planes. These strips were produced when the fasteners were placed on nuts.
Mr. Barnett said in interviews that he had repeatedly urged his bosses to remove the stripes, but that they refused and moved him to another part of the plant.
The Federal Aviation Administration in 2017 required Dreamliners to be cleaned of shavings before they are delivered to airlines. Boeing said at the time that it was complying with that directive and was working with a supplier to improve the design of the nut. However, the company said the issue did not present a flight safety issue.
Mr Barnett also told The Times in 2019 that he had reported to management that faulty parts had been lost, raising the possibility that they had been fitted to planes.
He said his bosses told him to finish the paperwork for the missing parts without understanding where they had gone.
The FAA investigated and found that Boeing had lost some damaged parts.
“As a quality manager at Boeing, you are the last line of defense before a defect occurs to the flying public,” Mr. Barnett told the Times in 2019. “And I have yet to see an airplane outside of Charleston that I would put my name to saying that it is safe and seaworthy.”
Mr. Barnett, who lived in Pineville, La., shared his concerns again in interviews with The Times this year as questions about quality issues at Boeing resurfaced after a Jan. 5 incident in which a panel blew up a Boeing 737 Max 9 airplane in the air during an Alaska Airlines flight.
“Over the years, it’s just been a steady drift away from quality” at Boeing, Mr. Barnett said, adding, “This is not a 737 problem. It’s a Boeing problem.”
Boeing needs to “go back to basics,” he said. “They need to get back to plane building 101.”
Mr. Barnett’s mother, Vicky Stokes, said in an interview Tuesday that her son’s experience with Boeing had taken a heavy toll, making him look older than his three brothers, even though he was the youngest. “He just carried it on his shoulders for so many years,” she said.
In an interview in January, Mr. Barnett said he no longer flew airplanes because of what he had seen during his time at Boeing.
“I’m not going to set foot on a plane today,” he said. “It’s sad. It breaks my heart. I love Boeing. I love what it stood for.”
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