�������t¶��

All around him, workers are cutting the leather into the right shape to hand it to the machinist.

With its manufacturing practices under scrutiny, its machinists on strike and losses piling up, Boeing is said to be considering selling parts of its fabled space business.

“We rallied for each other, and we remembered to step up,” said the 32-year-old machinist.

The new contract may help him address its persistent quality problems, and certainly forestalls a machinists’ strike that was threatened to start Thursday, the deadline for union members to ratify the contract.

The last Boeing machinist strike in 2008 lasted eight weeks, securing wage gains and a promise to outsource less plane manufacturing.