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2003 hasn't been a good year for Boeing

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February: Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates upon re-entering Earth's atmosphere, shining an unflattering spotlight on Boeing and Lockheed Martin, who jointly manage the shuttle as private contractors to NASA.

March: Boeing Satellite Systems acknowledges it made improper technology transfers to China in the wake of two failed satellite launches in 1995 and 1996, when the division was known as Hughes Satellite Systems.

July: The U.S. Air Force shifts $1 billion worth of rocket-launch contracts from Boeing to rival Lockheed Martin to punish Boeing for possessing thousands of pages of Lockheed documents during the 1998 competition for a rocket-launch contract. The Pentagon suspends Boeing from bidding on future launch contracts pending a review of the company's ethics.

August: NASA review criticizes sloppy work by Boeing engineers who studied the possible dangers of impact from foam insulation — viewed as the leading cause of the Columbia disaster.

September: Boeing's long-awaited $22 billion deal to build 100 tankers for the Air Force is suddenly snagged in the U.S. Senate as congressional opponents hammer away at how the deal was negotiated.

November: Boeing fires two executives, Chief Financial Officer Mike Sears and a top satellite official, Darleen Druyun, after concluding Sears improperly discussed employment with Druyun in the fall of 2002 when Druyun was a top acquisitions official for the Air Force. Druyun was involved in negotiating the tanker contract with Boeing. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld orders a review of the negotiating process used in the tanker deal.

December: In 2003 for the first time since the beginning of the Jet Age, Boeing will not be the world's No. 1 commercial airplane maker, surpassed by Airbus of Toulouse, France. Analysts do not predict that Boeing will reclaim the title in the foreseeable future.

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