The FAA initially rejected the removal of the foil from the wing on February 22, when its certification office ruled that Boeing had not shown, as regulations required, that the ignition of fuel tank vapor by a lightning strike would be “extremely improbable,” defined in this case as likely to occur no more than three times in a billion flight hours.
By then Boeing had already built about 40 sets of wings without the foil.
This last sentence is also revealing on how some in Boeing view the FAA ...