A door plug space of an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 plane awaiting inspection is pictured with paneling eliminated on the airline’s services at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Jan. 10 in SeaTac, Wash.

Lindsey Wasson/AP

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Lindsey Wasson/AP

A door plug space of an Alaska Airlines Boeing 737 Max 9 plane awaiting inspection is pictured with paneling eliminated on the airline’s services at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Jan. 10 in SeaTac, Wash.

Lindsey Wasson/AP

Amid a federal investigation into what brought about a door plug to blow off a Boeing 737 Max 9 jet in January, a Boeing high official mentioned the corporate can not discover paperwork concerning the door plug and it is possible that such data by no means existed.

Ziad Ojakli, the manager vice chairman of presidency operations at Boeing, mentioned workers regarded “extensively” and failed to show up any paperwork concerning the “opening and closing of the door plug,” he mentioned in a letter to Washington Sen. Maria Cantwell on Friday.

According to Ojakli, Boeing’s working speculation is that “the documents required by our processes were not created when the door plug was opened.”

The letter was in response to the Senate Commerce Committee’s listening to on Wednesday, the place National Transportation Safety Board chair Jennifer Homendy accused Boeing of withholding key information concerning the door plug.

Ojakli denied the allegations and mentioned the corporate has been dedicated to cooperating “fully and transparently” ever because the incident.

In a preliminary report launched final month, the NTSB mentioned the door plug in query was lacking 4 key bolts — ones that assist maintain the door plug in place. Investigators consider the bolts weren’t re-installed whereas the aircraft acquired some restore work at Boeing’s manufacturing unit in Washington state final yr.

On Wednesday, Homendy mentioned the NTSB nonetheless doesn’t know who was chargeable for failing to reattach the door plug correctly.

Ojakli responded in his letter that Boeing has since despatched over extra names of workers as requested.

Boeing has been below intense scrutiny ever since Jan 5., when a door plug tore off at 16,000 ft and left an enormous gap throughout an Alaska Airlines flight. No one was significantly injured.

The NTSB and the Federal Aviation Administration have each launched investigations into the corporate. The Department of Justice lately opened a felony probe into the incident, The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday.

Boeing didn’t instantly reply to NPR’s request for remark.