Getting in gear with CHAKU CHAKU

The term "chaku chaku" may sound funny to most employees, but it's serious business in Boeing's Portland, Ore., bevel gear-making organization.

Japanese for "load load," chaku chaku is an efficient style of production in which all the machines needed to make a part are situated in the correct sequence very close together. The operator simply loads a part and moves on to the next operation. Each machine performs a different stage of production, such as turning, drilling, cleaning, testing or sandblasting.

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Airplanes should be SEEN not HEARD

Today there are four and one-half times as many commercial airplanes flying the skies across the globe as the approximately 3,800 that flew in 1970.

Yet according to the Federal Aviation Administration, the number of people worldwide disturbed by the sound of airplanes flying over their neighborhoods has dropped from 19 million in 1970 to less than 800,000 today. That's a remarkable 95 percent reduction.

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