Just Plane Dangerous?

In his office a mile from a runway at London's Heathrow Airport, Philip Bowles grips an official-looking piece of paper. A pilot since he was 18 and now CEO of Airfreight Express (AFX), he is holding a copy of the most important document in aviation safety: a work card. These government-approved forms are used to document repair or maintenance of all aircraft. "Trust still exists in the aviation industry," explains Bowles, "because when these forms are completed, an airline can be 100% certain that the aircraft is airworthy."

Or can it? Bowles is charging in a lawsuit filed last Thursday that a Boeing 747 cargo plane owned by AFX was temporarily turned into a ticking time bomb by faulty and deceptive maintenance practices. The target of the suit is Evergreen Air Center, a midsize maintenance and storage facility in Marana, Ariz.

The company is a subsidiary of the privately held Evergreen International Aviation, based in McMinnville, Ore., whose interests include airplane sales, ground logistics and freight forwarding. The Air Center has done work for America West and cargo carriers such as Atlas Air, which has the largest fleet of 747 freighters in the world. Evergreen also maintains NASA's two 747s, used to haul the space shuttles. And it is one of only a handful of prep centers for Boeing. That means new planes from Boeing's factories are sometimes stored temporarily at Evergreen, then later prepared by Evergreen workers for final delivery to an airline.

The suit alleges that Evergreen, whose motto is "Quality Without Compromise," made multiple repair errors, failed to perform required work, charged for work never done and extorted money from Bowles' air-freight company, which is based in London and will start service to Chicago later this month. (AFX has since hired another firm to make the plane airworthy.) "Evergreen actions with regard to our airplane were a clear threat to air safety. If Evergreen is doing the same to other airlines, they may well hurt someone," Bowles told TIME. "They have to be stopped." Last week the FAA confirmed that it was conducting its own special inspection of Evergreen. Contacted by TIME, the Air Center's president, Trevor Van Horn, said, "I am not going to comment." Other calls to officials at the company were not returned or yielded no comment.

Bowles' public whistle blowing, particularly over safety issues, is uncommon in the industry. Airlines and maintenance companies are so interdependent that disputes are often disposed of quietly, and aviation remains remarkably safe. Major airlines such as United and American do most of their own work, but 50% of all maintenance done on U.S. airliners is outsourced, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.