The CEO of Ryanair says the airline would regularly find missing seat handles and tools under floorboards on Boeing planes
- Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary said Boeing has quality control issues.
- O'Leary said the company found leftover tools and missing seat handles in new Boeing planes.
The boss of Europe's largest airline told CNN last week that it would regularly find leftover tools under the floorboards of Boeing planes, as well as missing seat handles.
Michael O'Leary, the CEO of Ryanair, Europe's biggest airline by passenger numbers, told the news network that the issues were "nothing big, nothing major," but added that it wasn't up to standard.
"In 2022 and 2023, we were finding little things like spanners under the floorboards, in some cases, seat handles missing, things like that," O'Leary told CNN on March 20.
"This shows a a lack of attention to detail, quality issues in Boeing," O'Leary added.
Ryanair spends 48 hours checking new planes in Dublin after taking delivery, said O'Leary. The Ireland-based low-cost carrier only flies Boeing aircraft and is one of the aircraft manufacturers' biggest customers.
This isn't the first time O'Leary has said there's a lack of quality control on Boeing planes.
At a press conference in January, he said he found a wrench under the floor of one plane in such checks."It is not acceptable that aircraft get delivered at less than 100%," O'Leary said at the time.However, the situation had also improved by then, as the 12 planes Ryanair took delivery from October to December were "the best deliveries we've taken from Boeing," said O'Leary.David Calhoun, the CEO of Boeing, announced on Monday that he would resign at the end of this year. His announcement comes as Boeing faces heightened scrutiny after a door plug blew out during an Alaska Airlines flight on January 5.Ryanair has responded positively to the leadership shake-up."We welcome these much-needed management changes in Seattle," said O'Leary in a Monday statement."We are squarely focused on implementing changes to strengthen quality across our production system and taking the necessary time to deliver high-quality airplanes that meet all regulatory requirements," a Boeing spokesperson told Business Insider when asked to respond to O'Leary's comments. "We continue to stay in close contact with our customers about these issues and our actions to address them."