Boeing & Aerospace

Boeing’s head of quality for commercial planes, Elizabeth Lund, is retiring

Nov. 11, 2024 at 9:41 am | Updated Nov. 11, 2024 at 10:46 am



Elizabeth Lund, senior vice president of quality for Boeing Commercial Airplanes, talks to reporters at the company’s Renton plant in June about the Jan. 5 door plug blowout. Lund will retire in December. (Jennifer Buchanan / The Seattle Times)

By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter

Elizabeth Lund, senior vice president of quality at Boeing Commercial Airplanes and one of the company’s most prominent female executives, will retire next month, the company said Monday. ... Lund, 59, was given the job of restoring Boeing’s quality control after a door-sized fuselage panel blew out in-flight on Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 in January.

With Boeing in crisis ever since, she has been constantly under the spotlight, required to answer questions publicly from regulators and Congress about how the serious lapses happened, and explain the plan to fix the quality management system.

In an internal message to employees, Boeing Commercial Airplanes CEO Stephanie Pope wrote that Lund had planned to retire this year after more than 33 years at Boeing. Pope thanked Lund “for her strong leadership during a challenging year and her remarkable contributions to Boeing.”

In a message to the quality organization she leads, Lund wrote that she did not make the decision lightly. ... “Boeing has been a part of my life for more than 30 years,” she wrote. “A piece of my heart will always be with this company. … I will always root for you.

{snip}