TL;DR
A former Wisk Aero software manager is suing the Boeing subsidiary, alleging she was fired for pointing out cuts in testing required by the FAA.
Former software director at Wisk Aero, Boeing’s autonomous air taxi subsidiary, has filed a lawsuit alleging was fired after raising internal security concerns about reducing software testing, the Seattle Times first reported. Briahna O’Neill filed the lawsuit in Santa Clara Superior Court, alleging wrongful termination and discrimination. According to the complaint, O’Neill filed two internal safety reports alleging that company executives pressured engineers to reduce software testing required by the FAA to meet a 2025 test flight deadline.
O’Neill says she was fired in March 2025, weeks after filing her second internal complaint. Wisk said he cannot comment on the ongoing litigation and Boeing declined to comment on the matter. The allegations have not been proven in court and the case is in its early stages.
Wisk was founded in 2019 as a joint venture between Boeing and Kitty Hawk, the air taxi company backed by Google co-founder Larry Page, and is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Boeing. The company is developing a fully autonomous electric air taxi designed to fly without a pilot on board, remotely monitored by a single operator who monitors up to three aircraft at a time. This approach differentiates it from competitors such as Joby Aviationwhich uses a pilot model and is the most advanced in the FAA certification process.
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Wisk’s Generation 6 aircraft completed its first flight in December 2025 and a second prototype flew in May 2026, doubling its test fleet. The company is one of eight selected for the FAA’s eVTOL Integration Pilot Program, which launched in March 2026 and allows for supervised commercial testing in 26 states over a three-year period. Wisk is preparing for operations in Texas as part of that program.
The lawsuit comes at a difficult time for Boeing’s broader safety reputation. The company has faced 32 whistleblower complaints filed with OSHA since 2020, according to federal records, and a Senate subcommittee has held hearings on what it described as “Boeing’s strategy.”broken safety culture.” Corporate retaliation against employees who raise concerns has become a recurring issue in the technology and aerospace industries, and legal actions have multiplied in recent years.
It remains to be seen whether O’Neill’s allegations hold up in court, but for Wisk the timing is particularly sensitive. The company is asking the FAA to certify the first fully autonomous airliner in the United States, a process that depends entirely on regulators’ confidence that its software systems meet the highest safety standards. A lawsuit alleging that those same software testing requirements were deliberately weakened to meet an internal deadline raises exactly the kind of question the FAA will need to answer before granting any certification.
