The oldest 7 years in the history of Boeing – and the man who won’t stop fighting for answers

After the hearing in October, the families joined Pearson and Jacobsen at a Mexican restaurant. Mick with a boom from a documentary crew was drifting over Pearson’s head. Jacobsen removed a suitcase from under the table, and Pearson gave awards for glass from their base, honoring the management of families for aviation safety. Pearson improvises speech for each of them.

Chris Moore thought, well, it was unexpected. “You don’t think, oh, I can’t wait to get a prize someday.” But at that moment, in the terrible five -year battle he never wanted, “shaking a fist on the clouds,” as he said it, a sign of Zoom’s Group’s efforts felt pleasant. Moore knows that all this establishing facts and the search for accountability also serves for another purpose: to help him protect him from his bottomless grief.

Pearson still fights his own grief, a completely different kind. Can he do more to prevent catastrophes? “I don’t think I will ever …” he misses a long exhalation. “I will ever stop feeling like that.”

Listening, I thought about something that Doug Pasternak, the leading investigator of Max’s report, told me about his conversations with Pearson. “He was devastated. He had a sense of “guilt” may not be a word but a responsibility. He just wants to have something that could be done to prevent these horrific accidents. “

Pearson could not prevent catastrophes, even though no one I talked to did not think he could do more. But he could become the man who adment would not let another max fall from the sky. He could hug any report to make possible explanations in RV kitchenette. He may be the fired person who insists the authorities look-not really, See– Under every last Boeing scale. If the corporate and regulatory culture of yes -men and women led to the deaths of 346 people, then Pearson will gladly be the person who is not present.

The new documents, with all their promises to bring home the contested electrical theory of Pearson, eventually amount to less than he had hoped. NTSB told Pearson that he would not hand over the documents to the investigators with Max crashes – the cases are over, the council said, but he can do it himself.

Boeing hesitates in Limbo, before the civil and penalty courts, in the FAA, in the congress, expecting the latest report of the NTSB door crack. Observers say that 2025 will be the main year of Boeing: the company either turns under its new CEO or lends itself to Doom Loop. Pearson promises to continue talking.

“It was always for me not to let them close me,” he says. The foundation recently received its first donations and now has a salary. They are beginning to watch other models of aircraft and talk to a university to analyze data for the whole industry-“be pain with the same option in the ass,” says Pearson. The man Boeing was sure to hope that he would disappear so far, instead he is institutionalized to stick.

When Pearson said goodbye to me in DC, his separation words were, “Don’t lie max.” I couldn’t make myself tell him. This is exactly what I was booked, 19:41 from Dulles to San Francisco. It was the one I could capture after the event to report to the Capitol Hill and still enter my house that evening. After all, the trade flight was for convenience, collapsing the country’s distance on Tuesday night. At that moment of aviation history, we passengers should Be able to choose a flight on time yourself.

Rotating on the air tonight in Seat 10C, I read the MAX investigation by the US Committee, an investigation into illusions. Like many flyers, I have long made my risk deal. I was comforted in statistics, called on the belief in engineers and workers in meetings, pilots, system. I would divert the knowledge – paralyzing if you drop it – this is an exceptional act of confidence. Deep in the report, I reached the senior manager part at the Boeing factory in Renton, a man named Ed Pearson who at first glance knew what we all know when we calm down, thinking, Would not let him fly if it wasn’t safeS We all rely on someone to be “they”.

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