Boeing’s Autonomous Air Taxi Subsidiary Faces Whistleblower Lawsuit Over Rushed Software Testing
Briahna O’Neill Alleges Wisk Reduced FAA-Required Software Testing to Meet a 2025 Flight Deadline, Then Terminated Her Weeks After Her Second Internal Report
July 2, 2026 – 6:45 pm
Image by: United States Embassy Kuala Lumpur
TL;DR
A former Wisk Aero software manager is suing the Boeing subsidiary, alleging she was fired after raising internal safety concerns about reduced software testing.
A former software manager at Wisk Aero, Boeing’s autonomous air taxi subsidiary, has filed a lawsuit alleging she was terminated after raising internal safety concerns about reduced software testing, required for FAA approval. According to the complaint, Briahna O’Neill submitted two internal safety reports alleging executives pushed engineers to cut tests to meet a 2025 test flight deadline.
O’Neill claims she was fired in March 2025, weeks after filing her second report. Wisk declined to comment on the litigation, and Boeing chose not to respond to the matter. The allegations have not been proven in court, and the case is in its early stages.
Wisk Aero, founded in 2019 as a joint venture between Boeing and Kitty Hawk (backed by Google’s Larry Page), is now a fully owned Boeing subsidiary. The company develops a fully autonomous electric air taxi designed to fly without any pilot on board, supervised remotely by a single operator overseeing multiple aircraft at once.
The Generation 6 aircraft completed its first flight in December 2025, and a second prototype flew in May 2026, expanding the test fleet. Wisk is one of eight chosen for the FAA’s eVTOL Integration Pilot Program, allowing supervised commercial testing across 26 states over three years.
The lawsuit arrives at a challenging time for Boeing’s safety reputation. The company has faced 32 whistleblower complaints to OSHA since 2020, and Senate hearings have raised concerns about its "broken safety culture." Corporate retaliation against employees raising safety concerns has become a recurring issue in tech and aerospace, with legal actions increasing in recent years.
Whether O’Neill’s allegations hold up in court remains to be seen. However, the timing is delicate for Wisk as it seeks FAA certification for the first fully autonomous passenger aircraft in the U.S.