Former Wisk manager sues Boeing air-taxi firm over safety

A former software manager at Wisk Aero, an autonomous air taxi company owned by Boeing, has filed a lawsuit alleging she was fired for raising safety concerns about the company's flight-critical software. Briahna O'Neill filed the suit this week in Santa Clara Superior Court, accusing Wisk and Boeing of retaliation, wrongful termination, and gender discrimination.

O'Neill, who joined Wisk in 2022, claims she was terminated in March 2025, less than two weeks after filing her second internal safety report. Her complaints centered on the company's vehicle management system, the software that controls flight and navigation for Wisk's planned autonomous aircraft. According to the lawsuit, the system was built with what engineers internally called "spaghetti code," a disorganized programming structure that made it difficult to trace failures and complete verification testing mandated by the Federal Aviation Administration.

The lawsuit alleges that in late 2024, when O'Neill requested more time to address these issues, company leadership insisted the schedule for the first flight of its sixth-generation aircraft could not slip. Internal messages cited in the complaint show a vice...