Shoutout to the old inspector who flagged my torque wrench, he saved my ass in Dallas
5 years ago I was doing a landing gear retract test on a 737 and this old guy from QA walks up, watches me for a minute, and says "your click torque wrench is off by about 7 ft-lbs, check the calibration sticker." I laughed, told him it was fresh out of the shop. He just pointed at the handle. The sticker was faded but I could barely make out the date, 14 months past due. I recalibrated it that afternoon and sure enough, it was reading low. If that wheel had torqued wrong on a main gear, we'd be looking at a much bigger problem than a paperwork write-up. He retired a month later and I never got his name. Anyone else had a QA guy spot something you totally missed? How do you handle it when the new guys ignore the old timers?