The coroner's office in the US state of South Carolina says a 62-year-old former Boeing employee died on Saturday.
A former Boeing employee who blew the whistle on alleged safety problems at the aircraft manufacturing giant has been found dead.
John Barnett, 62, died Saturday from an apparent “self-inflicted” wound, a South Carolina coroner said Monday.
“The City of Charleston Police Department is the investigating agency. No further details are available at this time,” Charleston County Coroner Bobbi Jo O'Neal's office told Al Jazeera in a statement.
Boeing, where Barnett worked for more than three decades until his retirement in 2017, expressed condolences at the news of his death.
“We are saddened by the passing of Mr. Barnett and our thoughts are with his family and friends,” the Seattle-based aircraft maker told Al Jazeera in a statement.
Brian Knowles, a South Carolina attorney who represented Barnett, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The BBC, which first reported the news of Barnett's death, said the former employee had been giving evidence in a whistleblowing lawsuit against the company in recent days.
In 2019, the BBC quoted Barnett as alleging that Boeing had deliberately equipped planes with defective parts and that passengers on its 787 Dreamliner could be left without oxygen in the event of a sudden decompression.
Boeing denied Barnett's claims at the time, insisting it met the highest safety standards.
Boeing, which dominates the commercial aircraft market along with Netherlands-based Airbus, has been under intense scrutiny for its safety record since two fatal crashes involving the Boeing 737 MAX in 2018 and 2019.
On Monday, dozens of people suffered injuries, most of them minor, when their Boeing plane heading to New Zealand from Australia experienced what airline officials described as a “strong shake” caused by a “technical event.”
The incident was the latest in a series of safety-related events since early March, including an engine fire that forced a Boeing 737 to make an emergency landing in Houston, Texas, shortly after takeoff.
On Saturday, US media reported that prosecutors had opened a criminal investigation into the mid-flight explosion of a Boeing 737 MAX operated by Alaska Airlines in January.
A preliminary report by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board into the incident found evidence suggesting four bolts designed to hold the door in place were missing.
The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said last week it had given Boeing 90 days to come up with a plan to correct problems in its production and shortage procedures following an audit that identified “non-compliance issues”.
A separate FAA report released last month found serious problems with Boeing's safety culture, including fears of retaliation among employees with safety concerns.
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