Aviation News, Boeing, Airbus

Mr Condit’s departure after 35 years with the company came just one week after Boeing fired its chief financial officer, Mike Sears, after it emerged that he had hired an US Air Force missiles expert while she was still working for the Pentagon and was therefore potentially in a position to influence the awarding of government contracts.

The company insisted there was no direct link between Mr Condit’s decision to step down and the scandal surrounding Mr Sears, or with a similar debacle in July this year when Boeing was punished by the Pentagon for stealing rocket secrets from its main defence competitor, Lockheed Martin.

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But in a statement, Mr Condit, 62, said he had resigned to “put the distractions and controversies of the past year behind us”. In a press conference, Mr Condit, speaking with a strained voice, said he had made the decision “after a great deal of soul-searching”, adding: “I think the best way for the company to keep on track is to step aside and bring in new leadership.”

Mr Condit, who was elected chairman six years ago and is only the seventh man to hold the post in Boeing’s 87-year history, has been replaced as chief executive by a former Boeing president, Harry Stonecipher, who has been brought out of retirement at the age of 67. The former Hewlett-Packard chairman and current Boeing board member Lewis Platt has been made non- executive chairman.

Mr Stonecipher praised Mr Condit’s strategy and vision for Boeing but said it had “missed a few steps along the way” in the execution of that strategy and that had impaired its integrity.

Questioned last night about his age, Mr Stonecipher, who before retiring two years ago served as President and Chief Operating Officer of the company, denied that he would only remain as a transitional figure. “I didn’t come here as a temporary caretaker,” he insisted. “I plan to do the job for as long as my health is good and I am performing to the board’s satisfaction.” He said one of his first tasks would be to seek board approval for the launch of a new 250-seater aircraft, the 7E7, at a board meeting later this month.

The 777-200 will be able to fly up to 10,100 miles, beating the 9,765-mile range of Airbus’s A340-500. First deliveries of the aircraft are set for September 2003. Phil Condit, Boeing chief executive, said Asian airlines would be among the biggest customers.

US REGULATORS are to conduct a special inspection of the Boeing aircraft company’s construction procedures in response to recently revealed problems. The Federal Aviation Authority inspection follows the disclosure that some tail bolts had not been correctly fastened.

Capitalizing on the need for new technology in fighting World War II, William Edward Boeing (1881-1956) became a key figure in American aviation.

William Edward Boeing went from being a general businessman to a giant in the aviation business during the 1940s. Most of this success came as a result of the need for new weapons. World War II was the first major war to be fought with the extensive use of airplanes in a variety of capacities, and airplanes were what Boeing provided.

Background

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Born in Detroit, Boeing studied at the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale University but left after two years without graduating. He then moved to Seattle, where he became a prominent timberman, landowner, and yachtsman. Inspired by the new field of aviation, he organized the Boeing Airplane Company in 1915 with a friend, Conrad Westervelt, hoping to build better airplanes than the wooden ones then being used. The Boeing Company began manufacturing airplanes in a seaplane hanger in Seattle, where he copied the designs of European planes used in World War I. Two of Boeing's seaplanes attracted the attention of the U.S. Navy, which encouraged Boeing to develop a new plane that would be used to train pilots. With America's entry into World War I the Boeing facilities expanded rapidly, but the company stagnated in the period between the wars. The company continued to have close ties to the military, and its reputation was based on building fighters during the 1920s and the 1930s. In 1934 his efforts were rewarded when he received the Daniel Guggenheim Medal for successful pioneering and achievement in aircraft design and manufacturing.

The Flying Fortress