of field PHOTOS: (Portraits, from far left) Field service representatives Irina Turanskaya in Kiev, Ukraine; Mike Snover on a mezzanine in Dublin, Ireland; Eunjeong Bahn outside a hangar in South Korea; Barrie Grubbs. ASSOCIATED PRESS (Products, from far left) A Boeing 737 in flight; a 787 Dreamliner in Japan Airlines livery; an MV-22 Opsrey at night. BOEING Frontiers May 2014 21 representatives based at nearly 115 global locations. Commercial Aviation Services, part of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, has more than 330 field service representatives based at more than 60 locations around the world providing on-site technical support to airline customers who operate Boeing jetliners. Their knowledge must extend to all Boeing airplane models, including the 787 Dreamliner. “The reps are the customers’ advocates back to Boeing,” said Sue Fullington, director of Field Service for Commercial Airplanes and based in the Seattle area. “They’re also Boeing’s advocates when working with customers.” Some Boeing subsidiaries also have their own field service representatives to help customers. Insitu, for example, maker of the unmanned aircraft ScanEagle, has more than 190 full-time field service representatives. They also have access to supplier-provided field representatives to supplement their own workforce. Insitu currently has nearly 200 full-time and supplierprovided field representatives deployed around the world. Field service representatives—both military and commercial—sometimes go to rugged, even dangerous parts of the world. Some even are asked to go to areas where battles are taking place. Grubbs, the Marine Corps veteran, is often deployed with the MV-22 crews to combat zones. In one case, he was part of a team that was sent to Afghanistan to recover an MV-22 that was damaged in the field. A few days after the team arrived and repairs were completed, the tilt-rotor Osprey was flown back to base. “I consider it a privilege to go on
Frontiers May 2014 Issue
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