IAM Strike At Boeing Leads To Supply Glut

Even with the nearly two-month Boeing strike by the International Association of Machinists now resolved, ripples are still being felt by the aerospace company's suppliers.

The Seattle Times reported Monday that Vought Aircraft, which produces rear fuselage segments for the composite-bodied 787 Dreamliner at its plant in Charleston, SC, has slashed production nearly to a crawl due to a bottleneck in the supply chain.

Boeing was forced to halt almost all commercial airliner production due to the IAM strike. However, Vought continued building the fuse segments throughout the strike, hoping a quick resolution would surface.

That didn't happen, though... and with production lines at Boeing still idled, that led to an overage of parts waiting to be shipped to Everett, WA. Vought stopped production October 24, with fuselage segments through airplane 19 ready to be shipped.

The halt to further production work at Vought also necessitates massive layoffs, as the line isn't expected to be restarted until sometime next year. Joy Romero, Vought's 787 program manager, says about 170 Vought workers in Charleston and another 20 contract workers will be handed their walking papers Thursday.

As many as 400 workers total will be handed their walking papers, or roughly half of all Vought employees responsible for the 787 program. The company also has a 787 engineering and support facility in Dallas, TX.

"Boeing cannot simply 'turn the switch on' and be back up to speed instantaneously. It will take them time to ramp back up to schedule," Romero wrote in a memo to employees Monday. "Obviously, Boeing cannot absorb our 787 fuselage sections beyond the capacity of their own assembly line -- which has not been moving.

"Up to now, we have continued to work on our fuselage sections, getting them ready for delivery to Boeing," Romero added. "Now we must extend our temporary shutdown to include most of our assembly operations, except for installing engineering changes on airplanes 5 and 6. This will take place within the week."

The Times notes planes 5 and 6 are the next slated for completion in Everett. Romero said she doesn't know when the plant will resume production.

"The length of this temporary shutdown will be determined after we receive a revised 787 schedule from Boeing, which we expect within the next 30 days," she wrote in the memo. "However, we would anticipate that the shutdown would be at least the same length as the strike, likely longer."

FMI: www.voughtaircraft.com/, www.boeing.com