ML061460296
| ML061460296 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Salem, Hope Creek  |
| Issue date: | 11/06/2003 |
| From: | NRC/OI |
| To: | |
| References | |
| 1-2003-051F, FOIA/PA-2005-0194, NRC-1217 | |
| Download: ML061460296 (114) | |
Text
Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION g~.V-a4i E~1
~
Title:
Docket Number:
Location:
Date:-
Interview I C NJ 1-2003-051 F Salem Creek Nuclear Generating Station Thursday, November 6, 2003 7
Work Order No.:
'Pages 1-112 NEAL.R. GROSS. AND CO., INC.
iCurt Reporters q
nd Transcribers
'Was2ton, AC3 20005 (202) 234-4433 A
Information in this record was deleted In cordance Wfif the-freedom of Information,
-A4L exemptions X-
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION OFFICE OF INVESTIGATIONS INTERVIEW
x IN THE MATTER OF:
INTERVIEW OF (CLOSED)
- Docket No. 1-2003-051F x
Thursday, November 6, 2003 The above-entitled interview was conducted at 9:15 a.m.
BEFORE:
Special Agent EILEEN NEFF NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
(202) 234-4433 WASHINGTON, D.C. 20005-3701 www.nealrgross.com
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 ALSO PRESENT:
MR.
SCOTT BARBER, Senior Project Engineer US NRC Region 1 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S (9:15 A.M.)
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
The today's date is November the 6 th, 2003 and the time is approximately 9:15 a.m.
Speaking is Special Agent Eileen
- Neff, US
- NRC, Region 1,
Office of Investigations.
Also present is Region 1 Senior Project Engineer Scott Barber.
This interview is with jSalem.
And it's being conducted as a follow-up interview to that conducted regarding the safety-conscious work environment interview with on October the 2 2nd of this year.
At this point, can you explain why you requested the follow-up interview?
Secause I really wasn't as prepared in the first interview.
And I wanted to make sure you had enough information or I was clear and provided you enough information to follow up on that.
And the reason I asked for it off-site is because, I don't know how anonymous it is when more folks are there.
union reps?
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
More folks meaning NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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Union representation.
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mean, if they're there, it's going to get back to what 3
you said and I don't know how that's going to be 4
perceived.
So, that's basically it.
I felt quite 5
comfortable talking to you the first time last year, 6
so I just wanted to make sure everything was clear in 7
what was going on.
8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Is your concern about 9
how your information is going to be perceived, is that 10 for within the union or is that, does that extend 11 elsewhere?
12 That extends just in a
13 general nature because I'd rather just do it on my 14 own.
15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: All right.
Why don't 16 we start with, what I'll do is because there's been 17 some time, I'll place you under oath.
If you'd raise 18 your right hand please?
19 T
20 called as a witness herein, having been first duly 21 sworn, was examined and testified as follows:
22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
All right.
Thanks.
23 Why don't we go with the information that you wanted 24 to add to what was already discussed since the 2 2nd?
25 I should say on the 2 2nd.
)
7d.
n NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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On the 2 2nd.
We'll bring up 2
one, I had an issue with boron on components.
I guess 3
management came out with an issue where they came out 4
with a, I don't know if you know, night order book, 5
they have a night order book which they have an office 6
which they were not, I think they misuse it.
It's a
7 way to transmit information and nightly activities but 8
it shouldn't be a way to convey expectations or 9
company policies.
- Anyhow, in this night order book 10 they rolled out that any notifications that were 11 written for boron on valves would be rejected if the 12 boron wasn't first cleaned.
And that's how this first 13 rolled out to me.
14 And I said, well, that's kind of crazy, to 15 the AOM, that's just not smart as it rolled out, I
16 said, because you yourself asked us to do a quick tour 17 of the containment parts to an outage and just 18 identify any boron we found on anything to try to get 19 a jump on it and make sure they were covered in the 20 outage.
He just kind of shrugged his shoulders or 21 whatever, you know, yes, we'll look into it.
22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Who was the 23 assistant?
24 Thatwas is the 25 one that rolled it out at the time, I believe.
NEAL R. GROSS 4(1 7c-COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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lis the one that put the night order book entry 2
in.
3 So,
- anyhow, this went by and this is 4
before we had our boron identification program.
We 5
since got that as a result of this, I believe it was 6
a driving force to get it done.
And a fellow named 7
heads that up now and he had told me that 8
,because I had pushed the issue.
But anyhow, the night 9
order book said that you would do that and I
10 subsequently sent notifications, I know of three in 11 particular that got rejected.
12 I went through, I did a walk-down in the 13 containment and identified 20 or 25 valves or so with 14 boron on there and Sand said, hey, 15 these are legitimate things.
I didn't have time, I 16 have no problems going back in to get them but you 17 have to give me time to do it.
And I kind of forced 18 their hand and was out in the limelight now that they 19 had done that.
And what they did, they since 20 rescinded their policy three months later.
21 Bear with me for a second now.
I want to 22 get past these.
23 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
When you 24 talked to
]regarding --
25 It was a shift meeting that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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was rolled out, our mid-shift brief.
3rolled it out to the crew and I said you can't do this, you know.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
At what point in time was this?
L.
~A The date when that was rolled out?
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Yes.
Roughly around December time frame.
The night order entry was December l 0 th.
I'll read it to you, notifications, such and such, there are three of them listed here.
Do you want me to give you the numbers?
We're recently --
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Are we going to be able to get this copy or --
-j\\. All right.
"Notifications
- 2012, 4328, 4229 and 4230 were recently written to identify potential leakage.
Indications of -- or dry boron.
We need to take additional steps to clean off the dry boron and validate active leakage prior to writing notifications.
The wind team SRO will reject all notifications and inform originator that the expectation is the boron is cleaned up and there is an active leak, then the notification is generated."
is who initialed that.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Did you get an 2
explanation as to why management wanted to --
3
- j I believe they were getting 4
upset at the fact that the wind team or whoever -- our 5
shifts were having to go in and do the work.
They 6
felt it was everybody's job to clean boron off.
7 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
8 That's fine.
I have no 9
problems if you have the time.
And you know as well 10 as I do if you go in to do one task and there's 11 something else sitting there and you're not even 12 prepared to do it, you can't do it properly.
13 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Right.
14 MI-AN)
So, I mean, it's crazy to 15 just say you're not going to take any notifications, 16 you're going to reject them all if they're not done 17 right or how you think they should be done.
18 SR. PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
In the valves 19 that you identified, you said you had 25 somewhat 20 valves in the containment walk-down?
21 es.
22 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Was there any 23 of them that you would consider to be leaking in a
24 significant manner?
25 There were a couple of real NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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bad, they were high, I couldn't get close enough off the accumulators in the containment.
They were on containment, the ones I identified.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
C So, I mean, and these were minor in nature somewhere where the valve was encrusted.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
So, those valves would have to be, I'm assuming small valves, right?
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 es SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Small or relatively speaking They were relatively small valves.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Not the main flow path valve?
~No.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
The accumulator isolation valve.
So, they were probably the vent, drain or sample valves, is that correct?
I would say yes.
Or injection lines, accumulator fill valves.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
I'd say three-quarter inch to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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an inch.
2 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
But you 3
had a number of those that you had identified but you 4
couldn't tell they were leaking --
5 j
Yes, I was instructed to do 6
it toward the containment to identify any problems.
7 I had another job to do and you can only stand there 8
so long, so I wrote down each one and then researched 9
them, looked up for previous notifications 10 11 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
To your 12 knowledge, was there any operability problems or any 13 other functionality problems with any of those systems 14 that would have been associated with the accumulators?
15 The only problems I would 16 have saw was if there was a degradation issue and I 17 could not tell that at that point.
And they would 18 have been some of the higher ones that were encrusted 19 with boron.
But you wouldn't know that unless you 20 went and looked.
21 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Do you happen 22 to know if any of them were automatically or were 23 remotely operated?
Or were they all like small valves 24 that would have been pre-positioned and then left in 25 that position?
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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- I have numbers.
I can't tell 2
- you, I have the notification here that 3
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
4
.But it just said not active 5
packing leaks is what I said because I didn't see 6
anything actively dripping on the floor. Once it gets 7
encrusted, you don't know.
A lot of them were from 8
systems that aren't normally in service because you 9
can tell that by your history search on the 10 notification.
If you go back and see it written up 11 all the time and you say clean boron, no elements of 12 active leakage, then you find out it's only under a 13 design pressure when you run your test every outage 14 and you're just doing your injection because your 15 check valves are holding everything out, you're not 16 going to see any active leakage.
But yet it's a
17 repeat occurrence over and over again.
18 And I wasn't even that concerned about 19 them.
I'm more concerned with the ones that get over 20 the packing -- bolts that are carbon steel which is 21 going to eat away more so.
22 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Right.
23 F
ut you don't know until you 24 clean it off and look at it.
So, anyhow, they put a 25 night order entry that said they were going to reject NEAL R. GROSS
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They put another one out that rescinded it about two months later that said, hey, we're not going to do that anymore, so the notification worked to draw the issue to do it the right way.
But it's kind of like a "shoot from the hip" philosophy that we're going to do this and then they change their mind later; If I don't do anything or no one pushes it, it's just okay to reject it.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Who revoked it? When they first put the night order out, you said that was
~right?
ijdid.
And then escinded it.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
He rescinded the order.
ci I believe it was about two months later.
And I do have this in the pile of papers I have in front of me.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It looks like we're going to need to get some copies of some of that stuff.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Let's keep it all together then.
So, go off the record quickly.
Off the record.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And we'll put all 2
this together.
3
- Yes, off the record real 4
quick.
Let me gather this stuff here.
I'll get it 5
for you.
6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It's approximately 7
9:20.
8 (Off the record at 9:25 a.m.)
9 (On the record at 9:28 a.m.)
10 We're back on?
11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Yes.
We're back on.
12 It's approximately, we went off the record before 13 closing 9:25..
It's now about 9:28.
14 Okay.
What happened in this 15 outage which bothered me a little bit was I was doing 16 a containment isolation lineup for Unit 2 which is in 17 the outage unit right now.
18 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Right.
19 I went up and I saw boron on 20 one of the valves.
It was SJ212 which I went back to 21 look, to.....
an 22 I
searched previous history.
And the 212 was 23 previously written up by another fellow which is one 24 of the notifications that had been rejected in the 25 past.
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NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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a SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
function of SJ212?
It's just a double isolation back valve.
It's a containment isolation, within the boundaries of the containment isolation valves and it's up in the outer pens.
SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
- -*:1 It bothered me a little bit It bothered e a little bit 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 LJ that he rescinded the orders and no one went back and looked at the rejected one is what it appeared to me.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
The ones that were rejected previously?
Yes.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Why would they do that?
What motivates them rejecting the orders just out of hand?
ij It's just, I would speculate that it's eliminating the backlog, a lot of backlog.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
On the'notifications?
Notifications.
There's no reason to reject anything, I thought.
I don't think you have to work everything in a certain time frame; you do have to prioritize it.
But if something up, I should have confidence that it works through the process and I really don't.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
And these 2
weren't going to make it through the process?
3 Well, that one didn't 4
obviously, it got rejected.
And I found it again, it 5
was done right this time but it was a heartache to get 6
to that point and it's, I said the problem I have is 7
you beat your head against the wall and they consider 8
you a problem child because you keep raising issues on 9
them.
And that's where I have my problem.
10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
At least in this 11
- instance, it looks like the valve has a pattern.
12 There was 13 I don't think the valve was 14 ever fixed and I don't --
15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It was found to have 16 boron on it before.
That was rejected, then you saw 17 it again.
18 Yes.
19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: But you'renot seeing 20 21
.But I don't think it ever got 22 cleaned from the first time.
I believe it sat there 23 for over a year.
That's my belief where it is, and 24 the problem I had with it is I don't know that for 25 sure.
I can only speculate and it's probably one of NEAL R. GROSS41 c
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the lines, where it's located, it's probably one that 2
would only see pressure during the injection phase 3
when testing.
But I couldn't tell you that for one 4
hundred percent certain but I'm pretty positive.
I 5
would say I'm 90 percent positive that it only sees 6
pressure during an outage or so when you test the 7
line.
8 Okay.
We have another one here.
This is, 9
- letter, an email, I was doing a 10 diesel run.
"two notifications, one was on a 11 thermal well leak and another was on a check valve 12 leak.
And again, I researched it and I have all the 13 details.
You're welcome to have that also.
What I 14 did, I researched it in the past and I found out it 15 was a repeat occurrence.
When I looked back on the 16 retests that were performed, it didn't specify whether 17 they did the retest when the engine was running or the 18 engine wasn't.
19 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
What were the 20 two problems?
The thermal well leak, and what was the 21 other one?
22 I'm going to give you copies 23 of this.
One was on one out the diesel gen, it was 24 1TD644.
You can have this, you don't have to write.
25 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
- Well, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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I just want like a general site I can understand --
2 Okay.
It's a thermal well 3
leak.
4 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Under the 1A 5
diesel?
6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
Let's stop, 7
take a minute and review the information.
It's about 8
9:32.
9 (Off the record at 9:32 a.m.)
10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We're back on the 13 record.
12 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
All 13 right.
So, we were just talking about little well 14 leaks on the diesel, the 1A diesel had a leak in the 15 thermal well and the 1B diesel and valve had a check 16 valve leak. And we're discussing the post-maintenance 17 testing requirements for that.
18 We're discussing the adequacy 19 of the post-maintenance test and what was actually 20 expected to be done, where were we in saying that, 21 what are the retest requirements and what was actually 22 performed.
I don't believe, it doesn't appear that 23 they were adequate retests performed and you have to 24 hear about it from anyone, an email to my, I
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 18 and also talked to who was a valve guy who I explained it to in there.
It's all included in the email.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
What was his -
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Yes, what was his take on it?
What was his --
- Well, he first didn't understand exactly what I was asking and you'll see he actually re-asked the question, gentlemen, this may not be an adequate retest.
And whether he actually did something or not, I have no idea.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
He's a, if I
- remember, he's the in-service testing coordinator?
j Yes, right.
So, I just went, I sit up by the engineers currently right now and them guys help me a lot, try to get things resolved and do the right things.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
This issue came up when?
I don't think we put a date on it.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
It's
- August, the email tha sent Aand others was August 18t at 6:35 p.m.
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12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Of this year, 2003?
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
- Yes, 2003.
And presumably it
- was, it had occurred just prior to that, either that day or within a few days of that?
Yes.
When I wrote that out, it was pretty much after 0 the notification, you'll find out exactly it
- was, the notifications reference there will tell you.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER: Actually, yes, it does have something in the email where it talks about the leak on the check valve, it was on July 2 9 th.
And I don't see the one on the thermal but I'm sure it's-in here. 2 That was probably the first one.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
So, that was within a few days?
- .. Yes.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Wasn't there a plant right in the same time frame?
I think there was.
I think there was, I remember that pretty --
You know what that was?
That was when we lost the bus outage is when I was down there running, we had the electrical bus outage switch failure.
So, I was down running the diesels because NEAL R. GROSS Al COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
So, is that how you identified this? You actually identified it when the diesels were running?
NOj That's when I did identify it, yes.
I was a diesel operator.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
So, they were running for a period of time then?
- 0.
AY es.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
I mean hours.
This was there running on a valid demand signal.
This wasn't a test?
That is correct.
They were running, they were loaded.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
Very good.
Thank you.
Okay.
Do we need any more on that one or no?
You'll
- see, if you see the notification there, Scott, the first page of it, now just go one page up to what you were just reading, that tells you the date that it so it would give you an exact date.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
This says 8/1/2003.
And the time is either 18:13 or 16:13, I
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can't really tell.
2 jJ Okay.
That kind of tells 3
you, and if you'll turn to the next page, it will tell 4
you at the top also, I think, the top of the next 5
page.
6 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
All right.
7 In the long text,. the very 8
top.
9 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
18:16 it has.
10 So, it probably was 18:13.
11 Okay.
12 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Here we go.
13
- Okay, so it would have been 6:00 o'clock in the 14 evening, which is very consistent with
- email, 15 too.
the email, looks like 1the 16 notification initially and the 17 The email was sent next day 18 probably to --
19 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
No, it's, 20 well, no, it's the same day.
21 I
t 22 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Yes, same day.
23 It looks like you probably spent about 15 minutes or 24 so putting together the notification, maybe a little 25 bit or maybe to a half hour.
/
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25 22 4 The notification probably wasn't, was probably the following day.
I don't believe Owould have had the chance to write it up that day.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
They were pretty close.
I tried to keep them as close as I can.
If I do stray off, I try to identify the date that I actually saw the problem.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
Very good, thank you.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We're going to be able to keep this oneL 7
You can keep that one also.
I'll be nice to you.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Thanks.
SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Thank you.
]
Can we go off the record while I --.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
actually make it easier.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
- Sure, It will you want to sort that?
§7 13 Yes, let me sort through it.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It's about 9:36 a.m.
2 (Off the record at 9:36 a.m.)
3
]
Back on the record.
4 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Yes.
5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Yes.
Can you just 6
repeat that though?
7 Repeat that? Where I feel my 8
issues following the safety is every time I try to 9
bring something up, you have to pound it into their 10 head.
11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
They being?
12 j
Management.
You have to 13 almost shame them into doing something and write them 14 up so many times or reinforce that you have to do this 15 or email their boss or email them and cc their boss to 16 force their end to do the right thing.
And if you do 17
- that, it does upset people.
They tend to take it 18 personal and makes my life difficult.
And other 19 people see that, and therefore, it intimidates them 20 from putting themselves in the same position I'm in.
21 That's the point that I feel is the safety aspect, 22 that people don't want to be involved.
It's easier 23 just to stay out of it because there won't be any 24 retaliation.
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What's the NEAL R. GROSSc COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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retaliation that you think they're observing?
What 2
form is this taken against you?
3 I get sloughed, I get put out 4
to pasture.
I pretty much don't work the outage.
I 5
- mean, I get sent out to the switch yard to do the 6
readings or I get sent out to --
to do the duty out 7
there.
They don't want me in the mix because I'll 8
tell you right now, our procedures aren't a hundred 9
percent right now and it takes time to correct them to 10 do the right thing.
If you do it this time or you do 11 it proper, it will be good the next time but no one 12 wants to take that time up front.
It's all about 13 getting the bean or getting the job done.
14 There's no, you don't see any gain in 15 correcting a problem, see gain in getting the work 16 done.
There's no value added there.
I don't know how 17 exactly to say it.
It's not tangible.
I mean, that's 18 a real problem we have is how you capture a lot of 19 things over a post-job.
We always talk pre-post job 20 briefs.
We do pre-job briefs, we could be better at 21 it, but at least we're doing it.
22 Post-job briefs are pretty much non-23 existent.
That's where you capture all your problems 24 or concerns and correct them for the next time.
We 25 just don't want to take the time to do it.
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happen.
And that's evidenced by when we're not on a 2
SAP one or INPO one, I mean, if I'm finding problems, 3
that's backing that up that we're on, I mean --
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Where is the 5
resistance you see taking the time to do something 6
like that?
Where, primarily where?
7 jjC It's in the scheds.
The 8
drive to get the schedule done, to meet the schedule.
9 I don't know how else to put it.
I mean, that's the 10 number one thing.
I mean, you say safety is the 11 number one priority, and I realize it has to be within 12 reason.
You can't, if you did everything totally one 13 hundred percent safe or as safe as you could, you 14 wouldn't be in business.
There is a line there you 15 have to draw.
16 But it doesn't mean you have to overlook 17 it all together and look at everything at one aspect 18 of we're going to get it done.
And it was evidenced 19 by the 23SW20 driving the limit torque that day.
That 20 was moved back in the schedule.
It didn't meet the 21 original schedule.
There was supposed to be a tight 22 swap and somewhere along the line they lost the tight 23 swap implications which was going to go from a reg to 24 a worker to allow them to perform those testing on it 25 to make sure the valve was right.
And then somewhere, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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26 1
in the next day, decided they were going to try to get 2
a film vent down on the turbo generator area and that 3
the valve, the limit torque switch didn't work or the 4
cut-out switch and drove right through the motor and 5
there was a guy standing right there when it happens.
6 So, there's a flaw in the safety tagging 7
process there but, and the lesson learned wasn't 8
shared with anyone.
It wasn't rolled out to ops at 9
all.
It was coded as a significant level 3.
It was 10 not coded safety.
I had to do that.
I have asked 11 them two nights in a row now to code it as a 2 to get 12 a good eval done on it to find out where the breakdown 13 is, but that doesn't, there's no gain there.
They'll 14 think they'll, I guess they'll think they'll capture 15 it after the outage, maybe we'll go over these things 16 again, but in the meantime, what do you do if someone 17 got hurt there?
I think we'd stop and do the right 18 thing and I don't want to wait until that point.
19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Have people told you 20 that they won't raise a concern based on what they see 21 happened to you?
Has anybody said to you I'm not 22 going to push this issue?
23 N
Indirectly, yes.
A lot of 24 people come to me with their issues, hey, you got to 25 look at this one.
This is a real bad thing that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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happened.
I'd say, well, did you do anything?
- Well, 2
no, I'm not going to do anything about it.
You know, 3
I don't want to write it up, I don't want to be the 4
one who did that.
So, I'm the one who does that.
5 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Did they 6
express verbally why, I mean, there's innuendo there 7
but have they come out and said the reason I'm not 8
writing it up is, and they give you the --
9 3 Had they come right out and 10 said that?
No.
But you can tell.
It's just easier 11 to, they don't want to be me.
12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Are you also a f
13 14
- Yes, I am.
15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
Does it come 16 to you in that line?
Is that why they're bringing it 17 to you?
18 3JWell, I'm the 19 I'm the On the 20 I'm on the 21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
So, you're a 22 magnet for this stuff.
23 i*
Oh, yes, a magnet.
24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And then you push it 25 forward.
/)
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~As a matter of fact, they had 2
a safety culture interview.
And in this safety, it 3
said one of the strengths was "Associates in 4
operations expect a high level of satisfaction with 5
management supporting the appointment ot_*_-
6 as a 7
That came out of the interviews they had from out 8
north.
I found that out because --
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What is that 10 interview that's up north you're referring to?
11
...It's in the focus self-12 assessment report where we had a public service, as 13 you know it was statewide, so some of the northern 14 people came down and did interviews of all the people 15 down here for the safety culture.
16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Like an internal 17 audit kind of thing?
18 13 Yes.
No one even told me 19 that.
I just like happened across it.
I said, boy, 20 that's neat.
Why wouldn't they even tell me that?
21 So, that was one of the strengths and opportunities 22 for improvement.
23 Okay.
Off the record so --
24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Is there anything 25 further on that prior issue?
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SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
No.
2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
It's 3
approximately 9:47.
We'll go off.
4 (Off the record at 9:47 a.m.)
5 (On the record at 9:49 a.m.)
6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We're back on the 7
record after about two minutes.
What you've given me 8
is a focus self-assessment report.
This is undated 9
but I'm asking do you recall --
10 I would tell you it was after 11 June 2 nd, 2002 because that's when I was appointed 12 13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
And this is 14 titled industry safety culture at PSEG Nuclear.
15 j
- Well, it was actually, I'm 16
- sorry, June 2 nd, 2003, because I haven't been on this 17 job six months yet.
18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
Industry 19 safety culture at PSEG Nuclear.
In it is that comment 20 that you said there is a high level of satisfaction 21 with management supporting the appointment of yourself 2 2 a s a
4 2"/
23 So, at this point in time, how long had you been on?
24 I don't know when it was.
It 25 would only have been a month or two months.
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2 3
4 5
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
So, it's recent?
f 0:
It's very recent.
It's this I've only got the job since June 2 n" of this year.
year.
SR. PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
So, to clarify, you've actually been on the for about five months now?
June to November?
- Yes, excluding the outage.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Excluding the outage.
And this obviously came out sometime after you-I would say somewhere in the July time frame.
You could get an exact date if you asked the, if you asked for that report, I would tell you to ask a fellow named here from up north or _-..j
_uld be able to get it for you.
SR. PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
And Q
fi s down Mal would be very helpful.
She's there, "'
very good.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
0O particular, this says that the operations, this is going to be your p J That's m e
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
kay.
But in associates in
)eers?
- rs, yes.,
1 2
3 4
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 31 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Had a high level of satisfaction with management supporting your appointment.
What did management have to do to, what went into that, their support?
What went into --
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What did they mean specifically management supporting the appointment of yourself?
They asked for the position to be filled.
I don't know what, I think it's the drive to try to do things safety.
They say, hey, we're going to do this, I don't know exactly where it came from.
I don't know, I really don't know.
But it's an off-shift position, it's a six-month posting and it's day work.
As a matter of fact, when it went through the first
- rounds, no one bid it, so it went all the way through and nobody wanted the job.
Then myself and another fellow, talked about it.
I said, hey, one of us should probably take the job so we don't lose it and it give us the opportunity to have a on day work and make things easier to try to deal with things.
And I said you could have first crack at it, he don't want to drive down there five days himself, so I took it.
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because I had been on in the past and 2
they never really panned out so I
was really 3
reluctant.
4 But so far they have given me the 5
opportunity to do it and they haven't totally squashed 6
me yet.
They've attempted to cut my hours.
I got an 7
email that said you're no longer authorized to work 8
any overtime not specifically approved by me.
That 9
was after a lot of issues were coming up.
10 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Who was that 11 from?
12 That came from ibut 13 I don't think it came from Wbecause I 14 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Who is 16 is who I work for 17 right now.
He's the A
18 sent me the email
- out, I
said I
never worked 19 unauthorized overtime.
I said, you always know 20 what I'm working on, if you want I'll give you a 21 minute by minute log book.
And I actually did that 22 because it upset me that, I will work for them, if I'm 23 there, I work, and it really bothered me personally so 24 I gave him a list of things what I did when I actually 25 said I was resigning.
Here's the list of turnover NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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items, you take them, I don't want to have anything to 2
do with it.
You're not going to get it done in 40 3
hours, I can't get what they want done or be effective 4
in 72 hours8.333333e-4 days <br />0.02 hours <br />1.190476e-4 weeks <br />2.7396e-5 months <br /> a week.
5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
When did he do this?
6 When did they cut your overtime?
7 j
There's an email in here.
8 When we go back on the record, I'll give you that one.
9 But it was, I sent him one back and he said, no, why 10 are you doing that?
Because it was obvious that he, 11 I feel thinks I'm doing a good job and doing what 12 I was supposed to do.
I believe that, it's pure 13 speculation but I believe it came from5 14 because they 15 wanted, they know I like overtime and I will work and 16 that's no secret.
I'mthere to make money, that's why 17 I'm in public service, it's my job and it's how I 18 support my family.
And I do that to the best of my 19 ability.
20 So, whatever I do, it doesn't matter to 21 me, I don't care if they make me mop a floor, I'll do 22 whatever to get the job, to get work.
This happens to 23 be, as you can see, our safety culture needs help and 24 there's a lot of opportunity to improve it.
I believe 25 it's going to take time.
It takes time to research NEAL R. GROSS
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 34 the issues to do it properly.
I could just throw something out there and not research it, to research the diesel when we talked about them and you have to go back and look.
It's no easy task going through SAP which is our program which keeps our notifications.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
That's what we're here CM J It's very hard to do the right thing.
It's definitely not a user friendly program but I'm getting very good at it.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Can I ask you?
I want to back up to your overtime.
He sent you an email.
What did the email say?
CM It said there will be no, if you want to go off the record, I'll pull a copy of the email out and we'll go back on and I'll read it to you.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Let's do that.
(Off the record.)
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
We're back on the record.
It's about 10:05 a.m.
You've given us an email dated September the 2 nd dated this year.
It's from.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
2 there.
3
- Yes, that's correct.
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
At Salem.
And it's 5
to you and this.
Is that an 6
administrative person who processes payments 7
is the 8
yes.
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
So, that was 10 prompted by your email to her about what you needed to 11 be paid for to be updated here?
12
' Yes.
That's correct.
13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
So, his 14 response is from this point forward no overtime is 15 authorized unless approved by him for each case or 16 day.
"In
- addition, some of your time is being 17 dedicated to.
I need to know 18 about them before they take place.
Call me if you 19 have any questions.
You are doing a good job in 20 getting the safety issues on the table and resolved.
21 This is nothing to do with that. "
What would make him 22 say that?
Have you had prior conversations with him?
23 1
No, I had nothing.
I was 24 actually out doing, at the training center when I got 25 this doing data analysis as part of the team as they NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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were getting together the review.
It's over a two or 2
three-year period, I don't even remember off the top 3
of my head, of all safety notifications,
- orders, 4
incident/accident reports to try to find, look at 5
these systemic causes, human behaviors, human error 6
reductions and try to find a
common cause and 7
recommendations on how to prevent that from happening.
8 So,
- anyway, I was out at the training 9
center when I got the email and it kind of stewed me 10 a little bit.
So, I pretty much sent back to him a 11 list of things I'd been working on and told him I 12 resigned from the I
can't 13 possibly do this job effectively in 40 hours4.62963e-4 days <br />0.0111 hours <br />6.613757e-5 weeks <br />1.522e-5 months <br />.
And 14 then he, it sat for a couple of days and sent back to 15 me, hey, we have to talk, you know.
16 So, I talked to him and said, 3J you're 17 not always around.
I said, I know this is not coming 18 from you, I said what do you want me to do?
I just 19 need to know what you're doing.
I said I'll do a log 20 book and you can have this email, this is the one that 21 I wrote up what I did for a day.
If you want me to do 22 it, it's going to take an extra two hours a day to 23 record what I do.
And I did it for two days, and 24 said we don't have to do that anymore.
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
When you said to him NEAL R. GROSS I
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I know this isn't coming from you, what was his 2
response to that?
3 There was no response.
I 4
just know it wasn' ould not do that.
5 and I have had a good working relationship.
He kind 6
of knows that I do my job and I think he put that in 7
the end.
8 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Is it 9
- possible, I mean, you're viewing it as punitive or 10 some sort of --
11 I view it as an attempt to do 12 that because, but I'll tell you right now, as far as 13 I'm concerned, the job I do right now, it's important 14 but it's their job.
They're not doing their job.
And 15 it's important to me because it helps all of us if 16 it's done because they're ineffective at doing it.
17 I'll do it but I'm not going to do it for nothing.
18 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
Let me 19 get to my question.
I had a question I was trying to 20 ask.
Is it possible that it's a budgetary issue?
Is 21 it, I mean, could it be one of these things that you 22 got the email but maybe some others that were working 23 the day shift job, that maybe there was, where the 24 overtime controls weren't, they weren't well 25 established or weren't tight, you know, that others NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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3 4
5 6
7 8
.9.
10 Ii 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 38 got the same email just to say, hey, we need to look at overtime in this area.
I mean, is that --
Could I tell you that's not possible?
I couldn't tell you it's not possible but I would tell you it's not probable.
I don't know anyone else that got a letter.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Do you know of any other Mt hat were restricted in this way?
Guys that were off-shift?
No, I believe I was the There were two other, a couple of other fellows.
There were certain people that liked to work 40 and there were certain people that liked to work, I mean, there were two other guys that were working pre-stage activities and they were working overtime.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Did they get a
restriction in anyway?
No, they got no restriction.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
So, the pre-stage was for the outage?
Pre-stage was for the outage, yes.
Which I've done that in the past, too.
I work.
I mean, it's no secret to anyone.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
- Well, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE, N.W.
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oftentimes, not oftentimes but sometimes there can be 2
situations where it may seem like it's a certain way 3
to you but in fact there's really another reason why 4
this is 5
1j I would tell you that would 6
be the case if it would have stayed that way.
But it 7
didn't stay that way.
It only lasted one day.
8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
After you started 9
documenting what you do?
10 1ii said,U I said can I 11 work over tonight?
And I had to do, they wanted some 12 type of uni-hoist brackets welded on top of the 13 transformers that came from the line of business 14 council.
I said, well, he said what are you going to 15 work on?
I said, well, I have to write all the 16 notifications to get them in the system and it's just 17 not going to happen.
And he said fine.
That was the 18 night he sent me that email.
He said okay, I worked 19 there over four hours, typed them all in, sent him an 20
- email, and as a matter of fact, it might be on the 21 second copy of the list of things I did there.
22 And then, from that point on, he said 23 there's no need to send me this stuff anymore, I'll 24 just tell them you're working on this and --
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
You don't have to --
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case by case, day by day?
2 Not that all.
And I haven't 3
on it now.
I've been working the outage now.
So, do 4
I expect changes when I get back?
There may be some.
5 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Do you expect 6
to the day shift job that you were talking about?
7 j
Yes, I'm supposed to go back 8
at the end of this week as a matter of fact.
9 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
10 But I'll still be working the 11 outage also, I think so.
12 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
All right.
13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
I know this is a
14 September incident but you didn't --
15 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Can we back up 16 just one minute?
One of the things that we discussed 17 when we were off the record was the relative time 18 frames.
And what you said was that you were working 19 five eight-hour days normally.
20 jj My schedule is five eights, 21 Monday through Friday, 7:00 to 3:00.
22 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Right.
And 23 then, typically three out of those five days, you 24 worked for hours overtime for a total of?
25 On the average I've worked NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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for, if you wanted a guess, I would rough it out, it 2
would be 12 to 14 hours1.62037e-4 days <br />0.00389 hours <br />2.314815e-5 weeks <br />5.327e-6 months <br /> overtime in a week is what I 3
worked Monday through Friday unless I had to cover for 4
the shift on a Saturday or something, if they needed 5
coverage.
6 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Right.
All 7
right.
8 But I was last resort.
I 9
didn't bother them, they didn't bother me.
10 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
And the other 11 thing that you mentioned, I think, was that you 12 weren't exceeding the NAP guidelines which is the 13 nuclear administrative procedure which is 72 hours8.333333e-4 days <br />0.02 hours <br />1.190476e-4 weeks <br />2.7396e-5 months <br /> per 14 shift.
15 Thtsright.
16 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
So, there was 17 no other procedural 18 Violation, yes.
I wasn't 19 even close to exceeding any NAP requirements and I 20 know them well enough not to do that.
21 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
All 22 right, thanks.
23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
This would be a 24 September incident where you're believing that this is 25 pressure that's coming on you from above the level of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
42 1
You just don't think that 2
do that.
3 33 And it's just my belief, I 4
believe that came from 5
And I know they do have a budget to look at but all of 6
a sudden out of nowhere it popped out, you know.
7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
And I don't 8
want 9
to--
10 After raising numerous 11 issues.
12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
After raising 13 numerous issues --
14
- Well, I've been in the 15 position since June of that year, June 2nd was when I 16 first started.
17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
Is it since 18 June when you became on the*
- M Awhen you 19 started feeling what you said others would view as, 20 they would see the intimidation?
21 That just added to it.
22 That's not just when it started.
It just gave me one 23 more round of things to go after.
24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
So, prior to 25 that, you'd been outspoken, you pushed issues, you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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raised concerns.
2 I've done that my whole 3
career.
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
And then in 5
June you became the-6 41I'm a thorn.
I don't let it 7
dry up, I won't let you forget.
And they tell me it's 8
a good thing that I'm not.
I don't always believe 9
that that's sincere.
From some of them I believe it 10 is, but a lot of them I don't think it is.
11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
But do you associate 12 a specific issue that you raised with the challenge to 13 your overtime?
14 I would not relate it to any 15 one specific issue.
16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Is it a general --
17 Just a general, cumulative, 18 build-over time.
19 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
You had 20 mentioned that you thought this was possibly coming 21 from Could it be coming 22 from one or the other of those and why do you believe 23 that?
24 1 believe it's more so 25 And I believe, the problem I have with NEAL R. GROSS
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 is is a very nice guy.
He's just, he lets people, he'd be as good as his people under him.
If his people under him aren't good, he's not good.
If they're good, he's good.
He kind of lets them do what they want.
So, if you have a bad seed, I don't know if that's a good term or not, is very egotistical and he puts himself on a high pedestal and I'm the boss and you' re going to do what I say.
You know, you are the boss but I will do what you say within reason as long as it's appropriate.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Now, and what you just described, I mean, you kind of described a certain management style.
Is there anything specifically that you've heard either from or from someone else in this particular instance or other instances that you could relate to that you could say, yes, conclusive, you either heard from him directly or you know that, like say
- said, no, it came right from here?
No.
It's just my belief.
I'll tell you,'
had put an email out one time where, and I have a copy of that somewhere, I don't have it right now.
Basically what it dealt with was procedural compliance.
We are going to treat all category 2 and, you know, there's been category 1, NEAL R. GROSS o
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category 2 procedures.
Cat 1, you will follow step by 2
step, don't annotate as you go along.
Cat 2 is you 3
will have it with you and kind of go along with it and 4
refer to it but you will have it at the job site.
5 That all Cat 2's will be treated as Cat l's.
6 We got an incident which I discussed at 7
the previous meeting with top switches where we were 8
racking in a circ order breaker.
And this breaker was 9
not going in because the switch or whatever, the 10 trunk-operated switch with the top switches, it 11 actually makes a limit up to and allows the breaker to 12 close in, it was riding up because it was slightly 13 bent.
And we had a procedure down there.
It was a 14 category 2 procedure and we racked it in according to 15 the procedure.
And myself, jand a fellow named 16 ere there, he' s another equipment operator 17 who still works down there.
And he said, okay, rack 18 it out.
I said I can't, I don't have the procedure to 19 do it.
You have to do it but you can't use the same 20 one.
4 rule was you will get a new one each time 21 and you will have to take it step by step.
22 He goes, well, there's one in the box and 23 we're not allowed to use field copies.
I said, it's 24 your rule.
I said, now you see how difficult it is to 25 deal with.
I said I'm not doing it until I do what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPOR'ERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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you say.
And I called the supervisor up at the work 2
control center.
It was jat the time, I said 3
can you run down the procedure so that I can rack 4
this breaker out again?
5 And did not fight me but he was not 6
happy about it because it was his expectation that he 7
put out.
And if you want to follow the expectation, 8
that's what it is.
I mean, it's not like turn it on 9
and off like a light switch.
I think I should be able 10 to do a breaker with no procedure.
I think it should 11 be skill and craft personally.
I've racked enough of 12 them in and out and that's what it used to be.
13 But when you proceduralize something and 14 you hold people accountable, if something goes wrong, 15 I'm done.
I sent myself up.
It didn't go in the 16 second time, that's where we got into the other time 17 where actually, we racked it out again and he had 18 been up the switch.
Took a, pried the switch in the 19 cubicle with no fire retardant clothing and he brought 20 it up and we racked it in and it went in.
Was that 21 the right way to do it?
No, it most certainly was 22 not.
23 So, you can't preach that you want people 24 to do this and do as I say not as I do.
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had done that.
He did it one other time.
We had 2
another incident with the top switch.
Brought it up 3
again on two separate occasions.
And I do have dates 4
for them in my file.
One was, gosh, I'm going to say 5
one was December time frame and one was, December of 6
2002 and the other was somewhere around June of 2003.
7 But I do have exact dates if you do need them.
8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
I need to go back on 9
one area regarding the overtime.
10 (7
- 7 We can go back, it's fine.
11 Yes.
12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
When this was written 13 to you on September 2 nd and you responded to that, you 14 said you went about a day where you documented 15 everything you were doing and why you needed the time 16 when this particular restriction was lifted.
17 I do believe you have a copy 18 of one.
Is this the next day or is this the second 19 day?
20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
The 2 1d and the 51, 21 it looks like.
22 This one.
Okay, so the 4 th, 23 that's a -
24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
- Yes, this is a
25 Tuesday and that's a Friday, the 5h, was your NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 17 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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response.
2 S;
So, I have it on just the 3
second day that I wrote it.
So, there was one other 4
one that I had in there prior to that.
And that, I 5
just don't, it only went two days and I do have it in 6
my file.
I don't have a pile of papers on the table 7
and on the floor.
8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What did that result 9
in?
By the time you started explaining to him what 10 you do everyday and he rescinded this you have to 11 check with me everyday, did you lose overtime?
12 Did I lose overtime?
The 13 first day I worked eight hours.
The second day I 14 worked 12 hours1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br />.
I lost it for one day.
15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
So, the first day you 16 got this note?
17 First day I got the note, I 18 worked eight hours.
I wrote him a letter saying 19 here's all the issues that are on the plate that have 20 to be dealt with.
I sent it to I said I resign 21 from and I just stated that, just 22 said you can have them.
Everything I was working on, 23 I just gave him an update on it, where it stood, and 24 I sent it off to him.
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
So, that resulted in NEAL R. GROSS 1
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 a four-hour loss of overtime pay on that one day?
I j-It's a small time frame.
It may have been more than that but I'm not going to tell you I was going to work that day.
Like I said I did -
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
That's my next question.
Were you scheduled to work that day?
I I'm not scheduled to work any day.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Because you said you had three out of five you would do it, right?
- jYes.
Usually I would do it depending on what mor there would be a day I might work four hours.
There was no schedule.
It was here's what's on your plate, get it done.
And I told you, I could work 72 hours8.333333e-4 days <br />0.02 hours <br />1.190476e-4 weeks <br />2.7396e-5 months <br /> a week and not get everything done that's on my plate.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
In terms of what that meant to you, you're saying that they're cutting you off on overtime was retribution for your taking strong stances on some of these other issues.
Retaliation.
That's my belief, the attempt to do that, yes.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What did that loss amount to?
I mean, at most is it four?
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It didn't amount to anything 2
because it did not last because that's when we went 3
back on shift.
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It didn't last.
5 There's building overtime on 6
shift, if I'm not coming out here for 40 hours4.62963e-4 days <br />0.0111 hours <br />6.613757e-5 weeks <br />1.522e-5 months <br />.
But 7
I did not lose any pay in that case.
And I would not, 8
I won't do it.
I'm not, I told him I could work on 9
safety issues on shift.
I don't care.
It does make 10 it easier to deal with than when you're on day work 11 because that's where most of the people are.
It makes 12 it easier to deal with a lot of things.
It's very 13 hard to deal with from the midnight shift.
14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Yes, and follow up on 15 the shifts.
Okay.
You had a question, Scott?
16 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
I'm good.
17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Good.
Do you need to 18 look at the paperwork?
19 Yes, go ahead.
20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Take a quick break?
21 j
Take a quick break.
22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
All right.
It's 23 about 10:22 a.m.
24 (Off the record at 10:22 a.m.)
25 (On the record at 10:32 a.m.)
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Okay.
Back on the record?
2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It's about 10:32, 3
yes.
4 This might have been one 5
that's, this was not safety so much as I had an email 6
or an incidence, actually what happened is it started 7
out very innocent.
The AFI hand wheels were moved and 8
pinned in place, it's the suction from the aux feed 9
water storage tank.
And they kind of lay on the floor 10 in the auxiliary building on 84-foot.
They've been 11 there since I've worked there.
They're chained and 12 all that.
It's just so no one inadvertently shuts the 13 valve.
14 So, one of the fellows had wrote a
15 message, hey, you know --
16 (Off the record.)
17 (On the record at 10:33 a.m.)
18 7'Good?
19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Yes.
20 j7 Okay.
Do we do a time and 21 start again?
I remember you saying that.
22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We could if you like.
23 10:33.
24 There you go.
Good call.
25 Okay.
Anyhow, the guy wrote me an email, he said, NEAL R. GROSS AV.,N.
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- I had a thought.
How about --
for the AF1 hand wheels, get them off the floor, housekeeping, easier, look neater, more professional.
I sent an email, this one is up to you guys.
I sent it to6 iIt's up to them if they want to do it or spend the money to do that.
ohsends me back, this is, the time frame I got that was May 14t I received it, May 17t I shipped it out.
What do you guys want to do?
6/2, I started as' tions to me about a spool piece or something on the pooling system, to get it off the floor.
I said I don-'t know what you're talking about but I think I have an idea what you might be talking about was the hand wheel..
So he said, yes, put that on your list to work on, get
-in a rack for that.
At one of the mid-shift briefs I went up 4.-
~.
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I you know, and I went through the list of things to work on;. After..tat, had sent me an email, and thiis is June 30h nhow so this ;L_.e jst t
.he beginning' of time here,0 why build a rack? Why not just put the-.hand wheel in the. valve with a red blocking -tag rFTP 4PO,,TES
.*§-pr BE*1 Wm3RHD ISLAN Ave;,.W M0n7UA&1 WWWWIATAN DC.- 20005-3701 WWwj~akaros.co
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attached to the hand wheel?
This would be a lot more 2
cost beneficial than building a rack.
3 I replied, "Why build a rack to get the 4
valve off the floor?
Why not put the hand wheel on, 5
and I think the hand wheel should be installed and a 6
red blocking tag attached to the hand wheel, I think 7
the hand wheel should be installed and locked open.
8 And additionally, I don't see any need for a red 9
blocking tag.
I don't know why this particular tag is 10 treated so different than other critical valves.
The 11 IP page itself calls for the hand wheel to be removed 12 and locked.
Perhaps the hand wheel is removed because 13 the valves pinned open were an SR requirement."
14 I wrote, "I don't know that the cost of 15 the rack of some sort would be that much more costly 16 than installing the hand wheel and changing the 17 required position of the valve --.
The bottom line is 18 that, you, operations management let me, 19 know what you guys want and I will try to support your 20 wishes or inform you why I don't think it's a good 21 idea based on past experience, reg requirements, SR 22 requirements, et cetera.
Apparently, I know of no 23 specific reason why the hand wheel couldn't be 24 installed other than the normal position requirements 25 SAP calls for the hand wheel to be removed and locked NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS A14D TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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open.
The SAP normal position is something that we, 2
operations, control."
3 "I will research this issue to see if I
4 can determine why the hand wheel is removed.
Please 5
discuss this issue wi 6
land whoever
- else, and let me know your 7
wishes."
8 He replied back, okay, that was on July 9
1". July I8t later on that day,1 7I would like 10 the hand wheel reinstalled if possible.
I have 11 include licensing, on this email as he 12 may be aware of a commitment that was made in the 13 past."
the AFI valve is the first isolation 14 valve off the storage tank.
The valve is presently 15 pinned open."
Gives him some details.
16 Okay.
I replied back t ame day, he 17 replied to me at 7:44 a.m.,
I replied back at 8:15 18 a.m.
JI just finished checking the FSAR and 19 SAP, and Section 104722 Revision 14 states in order to 20 provide assurance that inadvertent failure or closure 21 of the suction valve in the aux feed water storage 22 tank will not result in the debraded condition of the 23 aux feed system.
The valve was first radiographed to 24 ensure open and the yoke bushing and stem were drilled 25 and pinned in the open position.
The hand wheel was NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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.16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 55 removed with the valve stem left in place to provide visual indication that the valve is open."
"Do you want me to write a notification to have the hand wheel installed?
If so, I would first have to write a notification to have the FSAR changed, and SAP changed.
Do you concur?
Is this the path you wish me to follow or would you like to reconsider?"
please continue with the reinstallation of the hand wheel."
a, JJlcith the FSAR change?
- Thanks, Then I wrote to MYt the time who was.
- same day at 8:58 p.m.
And I also 'Cc' edofm union, union board rep.7
]yesterday after mid-shift brief, ran the brief.
asked me to give an update on some of the items I was assigned to work on.
One of the items assigned to me was the AFI hand wheel
- concern, something very simple.
As you see by the email trail below, this item of concern was first raised on 5/14/03 by a concerned employee.
I then forwarded it to management on 5/17/03 three days later.
A decision was made on the item, it was assigned to me on 6/2/03, the day I started my temporary assignment as a
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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"On 6/30/03, one day after I provided the 2
mid-shift brief, Q 7inquired why we couldn't just 3
install the hand wheel.
I replied immediately, 4
suggesting that he do some research and talk to his 5
peers about the issue before we decided to install the 6
hand wheel.
Obviously without doing any research or 7
talking with his peers, he decided he wanted the hand 8
wheel installed.
My reply is below.
I could have 9
just blindly written the notification to have the hand 10 wheel installed and wasted everybody's time, effort 11 and money, the cost of processing the notification."
12 "Additionally, this could have resulted in 13 a potential LER or fine if we installed the hand wheel 14 without checking the FSAR.
This is the kind of shoot-15 from-the-hip stuff that needs to be stopped.
These 16 are the kind of issues we, as conscientious *am 17 deal with on a routine basis.
As you see below, I 18 have been directed to pursue the path of having a hand 19 wheel installed.
The path I have been directed to 20 pursue appears to be more costly than installing the 21 hand wheel rack.
This appears to contradict& -j 22 original concern of expense.
I will be writing a 23 notification as directed b but I thought you 24 should be made aware of this instance."
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
That's to NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 57 FW I hat's to SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
7 I also sent it off t 17l SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Whý get to that?
001191M**
And you cc'ed it response did you
.2I got a please go on with the hand wheel.
He told me to do that rack after that SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
He switched from the hand wheel to install the --
Install the rack to hold the hand wheel.
And I don't know what type of warning, I will give you an exact quote that he said to me, he stopped me and he said, if you see I'm being an asshole, you have totell me."
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Who said it?
And that was from S* I didn't really want to talk to him.
I said, well SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
So, okay, so you got the response f roor f ro.to just go and install that?
- !]'
I got it from].,
So, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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-vidently got it from somebody else on whatever 2
he said.
3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
You got it out of the 4
response.
5 And then the two guys that 6
went over his head, too, are gone, so that kind of 7
sent me up.
8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
So then, *comes 9
back to you, now he's in agreement with you that this 10 is the way to go, just install the rack after 11 apparently somebody talked to him?
12 Yes.
In a very short time 13
- frame, I mean, it was just like you're going to do 14 what I say type of thing is what I got out of it.
You 15 take it for what it's worth but that's how I
16 interpreted it.
And I'm sure he's not happy that I 17 went over his head but I wasn't going to just do it.
18 I knew something was wrong and I thought I gave him 19 the opportunity to go look and he was just going to 20 tell me to do it and I won't do that.
21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:ý In this instance, 22 you're pointing out, it seems to me you're pointing 23 out where if you do it this way you're going to be 24 outside regulations, potential violations.
25 I thought there was something NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 13'7 RHnDF II AND AVE. N.W.
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I gave it to him, he said do it anyway.
I said geez, you know, and that took me a whole 15 minutes, but I was in the middle of doing other staff, you know, and it's like, well, why should I have to deal with this?
This is at least four hours wasted for something that was something dumb.
You got to be kidding me.
circle origina SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Coming back full to where you started.
J* Full circle to doing the
.1 one and they aren't installed.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Is this part of what you're saying are the kind of issues or part of the issues --
1ell,-that's kind of what I go through with one, but that was just a dumb little one but it's almost like it's the wrong thing to do.
Just because, great, you're my boss in one thing but there is no blind compliance that way.
I'm not going to do, I will do what you say if you choose to make a bad money decision or budgetary decision that's not going to affect anyone, but this one, if I put that on there or write it to put on there, it's going to get installed and who knows what would happen.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Do you have any other 2
issues that would be considered your raising concerns 3
of a regulatory nature, NRC regulations that you had -
4 5
1 honestlydon't have any 6
regulatory that I can think of off the top of my head.
7 The closest thing I would have to any commitment was 8
the boron was to me possibly a safety issue if let go.
9 The inoperability of the diesel potential for not 10 doing a good retest is another issue.
I know of the 11 VF19 instance which I'm sure you talked to, but I 12 wasn't involved first-hand with that.
13 As anL I really don't get involved 14 with that.
I get more involved with the process non-15 compliance.
If they have a leak on, an air leak and 16 they've wrapped it with rubber on the condenser, to me 17 at one point in time, that used to be a T mod.
It 18 wasn't the original design and we've kind of just 19 slowly write our processes away so we don't have to do 20 the right thing and it's so hard to figure out what's 21 going on.
22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Can we have a quick 23 break for a minute?
Okay.
24 Quick break.
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It's about 10:42.
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(On the record at 10:46 a.m.)
And I know I had no recourse 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 because the guys that I went to aren't there anymore.
Okay, we're back on?
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We're back on the record.
I didn't want to miss anything.
It's about 10:46 a.m.
When you say you know he's not happy about that, you're talking about--.j 6-QM I msurelowas not happy at all about me going over his head.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
And that's specifically regarding the hand wheel versus the rack issue?
JThe little hand wheel, that's correct.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
This is fairly early in your career on the isn't it?
- _*i*Itssure is I started, well,*
it's SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
In that position.
And I did join the committee shortly after that, too.
Another incidence we had NEAL R. GROSSf.,
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which required me to go ove Qand 3 head 2
again was it had to do with the red ball breakers.
3 Are you familiar with that incidence where they had 4
some failures in the industry? And it's just the type 5
of rotary breaker that you actually can't see the --
6 so it's almost a leverage device.
And what they did, 7
at Susquehanna, I think they found some failures.
And 8
what they did as a compensatory reading for that is to 9
ensure that the breaker was actually open for safety.
10 When they open the breaker, you actually can't see the 11 so the electrician would accompany you to take 12 voltage readings to verify that the circle was dead 13 prior to someone working on it.
14 So, anyhow, we got into that.
There was 15 an, they were in the night order book entries, there 16 were, let me go through, I know I have that, but there 17 was a night order book entry saying, hey, we're going 18 to do this one night, and the next night it came out 19 and said, hey, we're going to do this unless we have 20 lights or indications.
And the next night, it said 21 something else and there were like four night order 22 book entries.
And then, they rescinded them and went 23 back to the original plan on the fifth time within a 24 seven-day time frame.
Bottom line was they were, we 25 eventually did the right thing.
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check it all, anything that was tagged we were going 2
to check.
3 So, I brought up the concern at the 4
meeting I was at.
I said, what about the operator 5
that goes down and has to open the valve, or open the 6
breaker prior to operating it and going to operate the 7
valve?
I said we do that for safety.
I said 8
shouldn't we be checking that?
And I believeo fi 9
is the one who replied to me, he goes, no, 10 that's not necessary because nothing should happen 11 anyway.
That's just a second check, you know, we're 12 just doing a second thing there, if that would cause 13 two failures or something to happen to the operator.
14 I said, well, if we do it for safety, if we're open on 15 the breaker prior to operating MOV by hand, we should 16 check it then if it's a safety reason.
17 One of the other guys brought, if you guys 18 are doing it for safety, why aren't you tagging it?
19 I said, I don't know, so I went back and I looked in 20 the nuclear administration procedure regarding the 21 operation or MOV's by hand and looked back and it said 22 you will open and safety tag the breaker prior to 23 operating an MOV.
Shame on me for not realizing that.
24 So, I said, boy, I wonder how long that's changed.
25 So, I went back on past records and the farthest I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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could go back was '96, it was in there the whole time 2
since 1996.
So, I raised another issue, you know, 3
hey, we got to tag these breakers.
You know, that 4
says we're going to do this and I gave examples of all 5
the jobs we do where the procedure controls, it tells 6
you to open the breakers.
7 I gave a number of examples and I do have 8
a notification here for it, and that's one that I 9
actually gave you guys last time I interviewed where 10 it talked about7 sending a letter out to his 11 people that NE0 had to beat us over the head with a 12 club to get us to change it.
I went to them and they 13 weren't doing it.
Eventually, they got out in the 14 field, I saw two guys that were going to do a test.
15 One of the times that we do it is prior to our 405P 16 which is surveillance testing where you have to 17 manually open the breaker and throttle the recirc 18 valve to get your flow for the test.
I said, hey, are 19 you guys tagging that?
And they go, no, why?
20 So, I would say that's about a little over 21 a month time frame had passed, and it still wasn't 22 rolled out to the shift. AndL Qwas aware 23 of it and he was at one of our tagging committee 24 meetings and must have --.
I said, okay, I'm going to 25 go upstairs.
And I talked to the SRO on duty and I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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also talked to the work control center and SRO, and 2
both of them were very cooperative and said, look, 3
we'll tag it for now.
I showed them why and said here 4
is what the requirement is and they did it.
I went 5
down to 2and I talked to Ajand I said, you 6
know, what happened here?
I said, how come this thing 7
hasn't been communicated to these guys yet?
He goes, 8
I don't know, I'll look into it.
Well, he's the one 9
that it was brought up to at the tagging meeting.
So, 10 either he told someone they dropped the ball or he 11 dropped the ball.
12 So, later on that night, I'm all done 13 doing my project, I
come up and another issue I 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 j-VuiL.
un.
wom l1*Jw we uon+/-
t eLffeL.4tVe.ly do Lae work control process as far as tagging equipment and walking out tags and signing on.
I find out, I talked tolm"-who's a very good guy.
I said,a2 I
said thanks a lot for doing the right thing earlier today.
He goes, yes, that was good except for the fact that I went out to walk down the tags and make sure everything that was on had signed on and they told me they were done with the test.
So, the tags were never signed on for the safety process.
It was an attempt to do the right thing which was another notification out there that we NEAL R. GROSS 4
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are very weak in operations as being a maintenance 2
organization actually doing work and doing it in 3
accordance to that process.
4 So, it was the end of the shift, I'm done 5
at 19:00.
I go up and I talked t' and 6
1j I go, hey, you know, we just messed up 7
again on this thing.
And they looked at me and they 8
go, well, write a notification.
I said-okay.
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Do you have that one?
10 1 jDo I have it? Yes, not right 11 here.
I'll go on with the story then I'll give it to 12 you.
Then, the next day, I come in, you know, and I'm 13 a little
- bit, I'm walking down on my desk and I see 14
-Jthere.
It's a little bit before 7:00 and 15 is waiting to start a meeting there.
I said, 16 2
do you have a minute?
I said, I said we 17 had an incident last night and I went to your AOM's 18
- there, I talked to_
and they, you know, 19 I had a problem with something and they said, hey, 20 write a notification.
That was their answer, it
- was, 21 no or anything.
He
- goes, well, that is the 22 process.
I says, you got to be kidding me, right?
I 23 said, well, I'm going to, I said I'm getting ready to 24 go to*
nd talk to him.
And then we, he does 25 nothing, he goes, okay, you know.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRiBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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Later on, I make an appointment to see 2
and I talked to the secretary and go in there 3
with tneh for Hope Creek, a-fellow name 4
And I said, you got a minute?
5 I explained the instance to him and just let me hear 6
your take on it and I explained what happened.
And he 7
said, you know what upsets me about that?
He said 8
told me you'd be coming.
He saidwent down 9
to let them know tha as upset and he might be 10 coming to see you.
And wtiat bothers me is he knew you 11 were coming and he didn't do anything about it.
12 So, I went to, that night or whenever, I 13 forget what day it
- was, shortly after that, he and 14 them guys all stayed over and processed the procedure 15 change.
They did some research and found out and they 16 did it the right way.
But it took the 17 to beat them.
18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Goingtoj 19 Yes.
And then again, I went 20 over all their heads again, so I'm sure they're not 21 happy about that.
But *said I did the right 22 thing and he did tell me later on, he said, between 23 you and me, you know, I did embarrass him in the 24 meeting, you know.
I said, well, you know, you had a 25 problem, you knew we had a problem, was it a valid NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS.AD TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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concern?
And he didn't say anything.
2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Who is he?
3 said it to he 4
challenged He a problem, was it 5
valid?
I think "
just looked at him, he said, 6
well, why didn't you take care of it at the time?
7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
You were present for 8
that?
9 No.
jad told me what 10 he said.
11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Where is the 12 notification so I can get a time frame and the issue 13 on that?.
14 jJOkay.
You better go off the 15 record so you don't waste your tape.
16 (Off the record.)
17 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
18 implications that were, you know, you talked a little 19 bit about the diesels, there were some little well 20 leaks there and there's something that maybe needed 21 some follow up
- and, you
- know, maybe a little 22 discussion about service order at various point.
And 23 I don't know if there's, I know we've got until like 24 the circ water breakers were backed, I don't know if 25 the top switches again which, I mean, that's kind of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS
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a procedural issue,
- maybe, you know, personal or 2
industrial safety issue.
3 Is there anything else that, you know, 4
would be a license, potentially a license violation or 5
violation of a license requirement or a tech spec 6
problem, release of radioactive material, things like 7
that where, you know, there's something I can point to 8
and say, yes, this is 9
I have it, the aux, this one 10 basically explains they were scrambling during the 11 outage, this is on August 24 or October 24, to get 12 an aux feed pump back to get some water in the 13 generator.
And they kind of changed their path and 14 they were fighting around.
And what ended up 15 happening, they got the pump back and they filled 16 and they went to push the start button and the pump 17 didn't go because they forgot the bus was dead.
18 That was just kind of like, hey, rush, 19 rush, rush, get the schedule done and you lose sight 20 of the big picture and you don't even realize you're 21 starting to pump on a dead bus.
22 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Did you hear anything 24 about this one before?
25 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
No, not that.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
October 2 4 th?
2 Would you like me to, are we 3
on the record again?
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We are back on --
5
- You just snuck me on the 6
record, did you?
7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Oh, I'm sorry.
8 No, that's all right.
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Scott started talking 10 and I wanted to capture his question because he was 11 kind of doing the summary.
We went back on at 11:00 12 about a minute ago.
13 Okay.
This came, I'll read 14 this to you, then you can have them on there.
Someone 15 sent me this.
"On Thursday, midnight shift, October 16 2 4 th, we attempted to start 22 aux feed pump in order 17 to fill 21 steam generator.
However, Bravo bus was 18 de-energized.
It was immediately apparent when the 19 pump failed to indicate amps that we had to close the 20 breaker with an isolated bus.
Following is an attempt 21 to describe how we lost focus on this evolution."
22 "Early in the shift, we talked about 23 energizing Bravo bus.
This would allow us to operate 24 equipment that had been out of service for several 25 days.
Since we needed to fill 22 steam generator with NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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22 aux feed pump, we focused on releasing tags and 2
aligning the system for the fill.
The control room 3
crew began coordination with chemistry to provide 4
chemical addition during the fill.
The r**3outage 5
evolution team worked to release the breakers on the 6
22 aux feed pump breaker."
7 "When these, tests were completed, the CRS 8
discovered tags remaining on a section of piping 9
needed to fill 23 steam generator.
The outage 10 evolution team Was later able to release the piping 11 tag out and the fill job was ready to begin.
All this 12 point, the control room crew had to contact chemistry 13 department to restart the chemical addition when 14 filling began.
With all players in place and the 15 proper tagging release completed, the RO initiated the 16 start of 22 aux feed pump and the P0 provided the peer 17 check check."
18 "When the start push button was pressed, 19 22 aux feed pump breaker bezel indicated the breaker 20 was closed.
The RO immediately realized zero amp 21 indication and concluded that the Bravo vital bus was 22 still not energized.
The breaker was reopened and the 23 control room crew began to evaluate how it lost focus 24 on the fact that the two Bravo vital bus was not 25 restored."
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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"Several contributing factors came to mind 2
following this list of contributing factors.
3 Discussion about what equipment will be needed for the 4
evolution was held at the beginning of the shift.
A 5
lengthy amount of time expired between the 22 aux feed 6
pump breaker was made right.
The outage team worked 7
independent of the CRS and the control room crew 8
preparing 22 aux feed pump for service."
9 "Due to tagging
- issues, several 10 interruptions were experienced during the evolution.
11 The breaker was released and made ready without the 12 proper flow path for fill.
The flow path piping was 13 released and made ready.
No brief was held for any 14 part of the evolution.
With these actions being 15 handled by the outage office, the control room crew 16 focused solely on filling 22 steam generator.
When 17 they were told the 22 aux feed pump piping had been 18 released and made ready, they attempted to start the 19 pump.
Clearly, they had lost focus on the fact that 20 two Bravo bus was still not energized."
21 "It often becomes obvious during the 22 outage that we lose focus on the big picture.
We 23 hurry to comply with the schedule and we attempt to 24 gain back time by performing work ahead of time (K
25 without sequence.
But seriously, we failed to follow NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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the processes that had been put in place to keep us 2
safe and successful.
In this case, we failed to brief 3
any portion of the job."
And that was on October 4
26th.
5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
In your interview on 6
the 2 2 nd, you were asked about incidents, if you were 7
aware of any --
8 On the 2 2 hd?
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
On the 2 2 nd, of any 10 production over safety issues.
- Now, I understand you 11 also were in an outage at this point, but what you're 12 saying is this 13 This is on the 2 4th and I got 14 this on the 2 6th.
15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And who is the 16 individual?
17 7
- 4.
- Yes, the 18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
This is his opinion 19 of why they lost focus on staying on the schedule?
20
,..He was in the control room.
21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
The pressure of 22 remaining with the schedule?
23
!Well, it was the pressure to 24 get something done.
25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It was contributing NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
74 1
to this loss of focus.
2 I wouldn't even say it was 3
staying on the schedule because it seems like they 4
were going out of the schedule to get something back 5
to, I guess it was more to stay up to date because 6
they went around the schedule.
7 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Is it possible 8
they did this ahead of when it was scheduled?
I mean, 9
I would imagine if I were to look at a P2 schedule for 10 the outage, that it would have had the bus being 11 energized before you'd attempt to start the pump, not 12 necessarily the parallel.
3 You know, I hate to do the 13 Yo nw at od h 14 hearsay thing but that's pretty much, if you're not 15 directly involved, pretty much, we work the schedule.
16 A big problem is planning the schedule for six, nine 17 months and something goes wrong, you start moving 18 things around, you've lost all your planning aspects 19 and you're overlooking things.
I mean, we do it all 20 the time.
When they drove that motor through there, 21 that was scheduled four days prior, prior to the 22 header being filled and even a chance of filling the -
23 24 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
That sounded (1
25 like either an equipment problem or something NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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M 1h7 It started as an equipment problem but if you went through the VOTES testing and followed the schedule and did that
- first, that wouldn't have happened.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
No, you said they didn't do the VOTES test.
- Yes, VOTES testing was never performed.
They did not do VOTES.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
But they were scheduled to I
don't think I
fully understood.
No, they did not do the VOTES.
The VOTES were scheduled.
The reason they, what they had to do was take the red off and put the workers on them to allow them to do VOTES.
SR. PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
I got it.
They were waiting to do the valve.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
All right.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Can we get this one, That document?
3 Sure.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Thank you.
Do you want anything else on that?
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
I don't think NEAL R. GROSS
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SO.
2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Anything else?
3 No, I'll just throw in my 4
hose one if you want.
5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
The hose that you 6
discussed before?
7 1]
I discussed --
just getting 8
feedback on it.
It just shows I tried to do the 9
right.
I gave feedback on --
10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
This is the incident
- 1) that you described on October 2 2nd -
12 That's just the hose control 13 program in general.
It's just, I showed them what C
14 they had to do to fix it and they still don't want to 15 do it the right way.
I mean --
16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
17 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Do you feel 18 that there's anyone at management that advocates kind 19 of the same approach that you have as far as being 20 able to work to resolve some of these issues even if 21 it's over the long term?
22 I told you before, I think 23 there's a lot of good guys.
Are you guys interviewing 24 any of the SRO's?
25 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
We' l probably NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 3
4 5
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 get to that, yes.
We'll probably talk to them.
rBe nice if you did.
I'm going to give you some names of ones that you should interview.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Go ahead.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Go ahead.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Now, can you tell us why for these people?
They're good guys.
They try to do the right thing.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
I like*
the one I told you they beat him into the ground.
I mean, he used to want to do the right thing.
I talk to all the time.
said he's tired of standing up in the meetings alone saying, hey, you guys are messed up.
When you're the lone wolf out there and it's going to affect your raise, I mean, you only go so far.
They're good guys.
They.actually work through the ranks.
It's how it used to always be.
And you know as well as I do now by looking down there that people don't come up through the ranks anymore, very few people.
They were EO's, RO's, now they're NEAL R. GROSS Aij\\
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4 5
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 SRO's.
They know what the real world is.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Anybody else?
j That I think you should interview?
Gosh, I would interview You know, I would interview some of the other ones and get their take on it, too.
The ones I'm having problems with in the past now and I mean, they don't talk to me.
It's just cascading down and it's, and I'm going to blame it on our AOM's.
They don't promote the right thing.
I'm not one of the guys that, hey, good job last night, you know.
But I struggled with*
I mean, he was the one that I had problems before with the SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Specifically how?
>j7 He's the one, well, we had the November incidence when I came to talk to you where he had sent me in the containment.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
In the containment, okay.
43 Yes.
He was the one that was involved there.
And then they promoted him now as a shift manager.
I think you should talk to get his take on the whole thing.
I believe NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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2 3
4 5
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 79 everybody should have the right to state their opinion, you know.
We have a nice ops manager, seems all right, you know, we just got a new ops manager.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
- Yes, that's an assessment I think it's going to be, we're going to go to fairly, anybody who's going to be relevant to the assessment and the culture.
5 7 Yes, but it's not fair to just talk to one side either.
You got to get both and that's why --
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
We will.
We will.
You should talk to us and you should talk to them and your job is wading through the bullshit, that's it.
I mean, I've already had some dealings with SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We won't talk to just one side.
iYes.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We're just looking at, what we're doing is trying to get --
Well, that's my take on the thing.
I mean --
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What are the issues that we're involved with.
And I guess where it leaves NEAL R. GROSS IQ COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
80 1
us with you is, you understand because you went 2
through this process back earlier this year, you 3
corresponded back and forth with the NRC regarding an 4
alleged discrimination allegation.
Is this the point 5
that you're at now?
You're saying that --
6 d-All I'm saying it didn't get 7
any better.
And where I talked to you about in the 8
beginning with the, I talked about it when 9
you guys were coming down and I said, what do 10 we do?
I want to go through the right channels.
And 11 he said,
- why, what's the problem?
No, I thought 12 everything was taken care of.
That issue has never 13 been resolved.
It was never put to a closure.
14 And I told you, I followed the grievance 15 process.
I went to, because I had an email on that.
16 I wrote thean 17 email.
9things aren't getting better around here, 18 we got to do something, you know.
He was supposed to 19 come talk to me, I haven't heard from him.
20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
When did you write 21 him?
Do you have an email for that?
Do you have it 22 here?
23 es.
24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
I'm going to ask you 25 for it, because you look like you're afraid.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
81
- 1No, I'm not.
I just, I'm 2
afraid 3
take me to find it but I do know I have it.
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
If you have it, can 5
I 6
jMIf we can go off the record, 7
I can just give you a couple of things.
8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Yes, at the end.
And 9
that's the point that I'm looking at now.
And it may 10 be that some of the information that you gave us has 11 to be assessed because the NRC's jurisdiction is going 12 to be over concerns regarding anything of a regulatory 13 nature.
In that, I think that you may be there; it 14 may be some additional review.
15 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
- Yes, it's 16 difficult because a lot of these issues that are 17 arisen or brought up, talk to management
- style, 18 management prerogative, industrial --
19 It's the environment.
20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And safety.
21 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Personal 22 safety.
And it's not that we don't care about that.
23 We do but, you know, that's not our jurisdiction.
24 No, I know.
Oh, no, I'm just 25 telling you where--
AC>
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
You know, we 2
have --
3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
But based on the 4
documentation and a review, it may be that you're in 5
that area.
And --
6 I went to you for fear of 7
potentially losing my job if I made a mistake.
That's 8
why I went to you.
I don't want to be a disgruntled 9
employee looking from the outside in.
I want you to 10 know things that are going on.
had just 11 lost his job.
Two other guys they just got rid of or 12 guys that were doing their jobs when they had that 13 hard line you're going to follow the rules to find out 14 that they have guys working.
15 These were good guys at one time because 16 they went and did the job.
And now, and then they're 17 on street all of a sudden.
It's like, wait a minute, 18 what's going on here, you know.
Then they want to go 19 to this hard line procedural compliance one hundred 20 percent, it just changed like drastically.
Not that 21 people weren't doing it but you kind of work around 22 it.
23 You do what it had to say, you knew it 24 didn't work one hundred percent but you didn't change 25 the intent of anything and that was okay.
No longer NEAL R. GROSS
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25 83 was that okay, so therefore, when you follow it, things do get cumbersome.
I get accused of slowing jobs down.
It's hard to do the right thing.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
When you talked to the NRC earlier this year, you had indicated at some point you just wanted to make some of the information a matter of record at that time.
J* That's exactly correct.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
That's what you wanted.
- Now what you're saying is that your situation is ongoing?
D* My situation has not gone better; in fact, it has gotten worse and I'm hoping it gets better here.
Some people are going to have to go for it to get better for me, but that's unfortunate.
I don't know how else to say it.
I mean,- it's
- either, I don't know what to do because I talked to Jeff Teeter because I think he actually asked me if I was considering legal action and I am actually.
I said I'm waiting to see how everything falls out.
If I
have to still work here with these people, yes, I'm willing to consider that.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And your position where you're saying you end up, you're pushed out of working the outage or on the periphery for your NEAL R. GROSS (N
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 84 assignment and this overtime issue, you know, coming up, is that situation, does that happen to other Does it happen to other people with safety issues?
- JIt happened to jnd I are more vocal people.
We haveUM'e in there but we are probably two of the key ones in our department to bring up issues.
I'll tell you right now, we bring up issues, I know we're not the only ones finding issues out there.
So, you tell me what's going on.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
Well, how --
It's not just us.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Being in the position of looking at something like that, just say, you know, what you're saying is accurate, because that would be if an investigation is open on this, how would I show, you know, in your shift, in your position, all these guys are working in these different positions but here is wher alls out all the time?
What do I look at to see?
You have to interview the other people.
You have to interview --
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Is there a
documentation involved in anything like that?
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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I don't think there's any 2
documentation.
They're just observation in shift, 3
people I work with.
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It would be your 5
shift's counterparts?
SRO interviews?
6 It depends.
Depends how 7
honest they are.
And I think you would get it, if you 8
interview the people, I
think you will see that 9
because it's not just my perception.
Yes, I mean, I 10 don't know how else to say it.
11 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
But at this 12 point 13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
We can just see if
(
14 this is the where I'm going to see it, then how do you 15 show that?
16 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
But at this 17 point, most of what you're describing is very subtle.
18 I mean, it may not seem subtle to you because it's 19 directed right at you but as far as for someone else 20 to go in and look at it and review it, it would be, 21 you know, for one of us to go in there and look at 22 something, the fact that you're assigned the job over 23 somebody else, you know, if we were to talk to the 24 shift supervisor, ops superintendent, whatever, they'd 25 say, hey, all the work has to get done.
We assigned NEAL R. GROSS I
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 86 the work based on what needs to get done.
And they're, you know, they could argue that there's no difference.
We just happened to choose to put"0 in the switch order this day.
They can say that.
Yes, they could.
And I can't, that's what happened before.
So, I
can't argue.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
But you understand the dilemma.
You know, it's like --
j* Oh, no, you don't know me.
You don't know what kind of employee I am.
I mean, that's all I would ask you --
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Well, and not only that, we don't even know, some people might like that kind of job.
They might like being outside, you know, literally.
Lil jj
- Well, I know my peers tell me, they say how do I get a gravy job like that?
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
They think you're being treated favorably?
No, when they put me on the switch order, it's not a bad place to be.
It's just out of the line, it's a nice thing.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
It depends on your perspective.
NV.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRJ.NSCF 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.V
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Because they don't want, they 2
3 get 4
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
That's my 5
point.
It depends on your perspective.
They may 6
want, you know, it's nice to be out there, it's
- sunny, 7
whatever.
8 j
But they know why it's 9
happening.
So, that's why you have to interview them 10 to get their perspective.
11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
- See, and again, 12 that's where, I mean, you could use the word subtle, 13 you could use the word difficult, What you need in a 14 situation like that is an adverse act.
And if you 15 can't take a situation and say you're in an, this is 16 an adverse act, this is some sort of condition that is 17 disagreeable, you know, recognizable, it's either they 18 adjusted your, you know, you're talking about the big 19 things, being fired all the way down to changing the 20 conditions of your employment in a negative way.
From 21 your perspective, you're saying they've done that by 22 the basis of your assignment.
They've changed the 23 conditions of your employment.
24 My assignments and my 25 treatment, just in general.
Like when, we were in a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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safety meeting in which I was singled out and I didn't 2
like it.
I went to the ops manager, you know, I said 3
I don't need that.
4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Singled out how?
5
- Well, we had a,
- someone, 6
- well, I'll give you an example.
You called me at 7
work.
All of a sudden, I'm the one that started this.
j 8
That's how it all came out.
You called me and I got 9
in touch with people.
That was the perception.
10 That's how.
Third-hand, heard it from the EO, you 1i guys opened a can of worms, it's not going to stop 12 here, from one of the supervisors.
And I don't know 13 which one it came from.
I didn't open a can of worms.
14 You called me.
I didn't have anything to do with this 15 one.
16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Right.
I guess that 17 comes by when you reached out for some other people --
18
§7 Yes.
And that was the 19 perception.
And I can't stop that.
But I'm not going 20 to not talk to you.
I'll still do what I do but I'm 21 not going to say it's a good feeling to feel like crap 22 all the time, you know.
And it just, I feel that I 23 can't make a mistake.
If I
make a mistake, I'm 24 doomed.
That's how I feel.
I really feel that way.
25 So, and that's not a good way to be in but it's NEAL R. GROSS IC CGURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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challenging.
2 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Do you think 3
that in some way, when you were put on the, gave you 4
an opportunity to bid for the assignment or were 5
selected, how were you going to look at it? That they 6
were actually, that management was actually kind of 7
relying on your tough-mindedness, your determination 8
to see problems through?
9 Lim I would tell you what I 10 think,**would think that way.'*
knOwsmdo 11 the job.
nd I don't always agree either.
We've 12 crashed and he gets upset when the problem falls in 13 his house, it's not taken real well but, it's a
14
- problem, I have a problem with it.
But there's no 15 hard feelings.
It's just that we go through it, and 16 I don't mind that. There's going to be hard feelings.
17 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
In any 18 situation where there's the potential for that kind of 19 conflict, there's going to be someone who's going to 20 be disappointed, you know, in the outcome.
21 Oh, yes.
It's a tough 22 situation.
23 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
And in some 24
- respects, I
can almost see it as a
credit to 25 management that they were willing to put you in this NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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position, selected you for the position because they 2
know that 3
you're 4
But they didn't select me, so 5
you can't go that way.
It was a bid job and no one 6
bid it, so I bid it.
7 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
8 I was not selected for it.
9 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
So, we can't -
10 11 We can't say they selected me 12 for it.
13 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
All right.
14 Like I said, the bid was put 15 out for a day work job for six months with a five 16 percent upgrade to be list of 17 job specs and all that, what we want you to do, and 18 nobody bid it.
That's whe sat and talked 19 and said, hey, one of us should take it, it would 20 actually help us.
We'd be available to go to 21 meetings, go to safety tag meetings.
22 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Did anybody 23 come to you and suggest that or did you just decide 24 that on your own?
25 No, M
and I just did.
We NEAL R. GROSS I
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10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 didn't want to lose the position, you know.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
)* And I'll tell you, I think it's worked real well to help drive it and I've pushed and we're getting one to Hope Creek now.
So, we need another operator, I can't go to Hope Creek.
I don't even know Hope Creek.
But they're actually filling one there.
There are some people that see it as an advantage.
It's just very hard when you're going up against someone that's not conservative or they're just focused on just getting the job done.
It's very difficult for me.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Let me ask
- you, you
- know, we've talked a lot of about the interaction between the union and management and the nuclear equipment operators and the CRS's and RO's and all.
What's the dynamic like between the equipment operators themselves?
Do you have a lot of, I mean, we talked a lot about whether others would be willing to raise safety concerns.
But what's the, you know, what's the feeling like between the operators?
Does everybody look out for each other?
I mean, what if something happens?
Let's say you're an operator on shift and you stumble on a situation where you know that someone NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 (14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 (J*.
-25 92 made an error.
One of your fellowfperatorsmis-aligns the valves and as a result there was some negative consequence.
Maybe not a significant one but maybe something, you
- know, a piece of equipment tripped off line, protected itself but what happens under those circumstances at Salem?
I mean, how is that handled?
You go back upstairs.
It depends where you are.
If you, do. it, usually you're second verification, you say, hey, here is what I found.
It just happened to us.
and myself were doing an audit on a job and it's, found a breaker out of position.
So, what's going on, you know?
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Was this a tag job?
Is that what it was?
j-We were doing a tag release verification.
We were second verification.
We went out, came across the breaker, it was out of position.
We go, wait a minute, what the heck is going on here?
And we went upstairs to go talk to them about it, we come to find out one of the EO's said, oh, no, I
closed that break.
Well, that's open.
And we come to find out they were doing a retest during the course of our second verification.
That was the one line in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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the, it's this one right here.
It's where that came 2
from.
3 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
4 But I mean, you go out and 5
you say, hey, this is what I found, there's a reason 6
for it.
You don't reposition it because you don't 7
know why it was there.
You can't do that.
8 SR. PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
What if 9
it was something different?
You're talking about a 10 situation with a tag up.
11
- Well, I found something that 12 was wrong, you know.
13 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay, that's 14 good.
What if you found something that would 15 incriminate a fellow worker?
Do you deal with that 16 situation differently than, I mean, do you feel any 17 compunction to --
18 Not raise an issue?
No.
19 Honestly how I feel?
I feel I don't know if it's a
20 set up or not and I have to treat, you know, go 21 upstairs and here is what I found.
I mean, what do 22 you want to do?
23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
You report them all?
24 You don't know why it's that 25 way.
You don't know if it's that way for a reason.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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- God, if you reposition it, you could be in worse 2
shape.
I mean, you don't even know what you're 3
correcting, you don't know if it's supposed to be that 4
way.
I mean, you can't do it.
5 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
What about if 6
you're asked to investigate something and you find 7
something that's obviously wrong, you suspect another 8
operator did it, made a mistake, but you know exactly 9
what to do to correct the problem?
How would you 10 treat that?
11 I don't think you ever know 12 exactly what to do because you don't know.
You don't 13 know the situation.
14 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
15
- 1.
I.mean, I
was asked to 16 investigate the, head the tagging event on the PT's, 17 here is what happened.
There are processes.
You're 18 not out to get someone in trouble.
You're there to 19 get to the root cause of what happened.
20 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
All right.
21
,_And correct it so it doesn't 22 happen again.
23 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Have you ever 24 had someone come to you and say, hey,
]you
- know, 25 I wish you wouldn't have brought this up.
I made a NEAL R. GROSS"*
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mistake, you know, whatever.
Now it's going to, you 2
- know, I'm going to get a disciplinary action.
Have 3
you ever had that happen?
4
§ Has anybody ever come, no.
5 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
No.
Okay.
6
.You shouldn't get in trouble.
7 I was involved in the PS3 incident down there.
I 8
think it was a poor brief and everything like that.
9 They disqualified me.
I didn't do anything wrong.
10 Why did you do this?
This is what I was told to do.
11
- But, I mean, and eventually it all shook out but it 12 was like, oh, boy, here we go, you know, there's my 13 mistake.
And that wasn't that long ago.
But if 14 someone does 15 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Were other 16 people disqualified or was that just you?
17 They didn't, I don't know 18 exactly how, what words they used now.
They wouldn't 19 let me do anything.
You're not disqualified, we won't 20 let you do anything.
And there was two CO's involved 21 and there was an SRO involved.
22 SR. PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Were they all 23 24 7 Everybody got the same thing, 25 got the same treatment.
It was just a bad feeling.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 96 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
You weren't singled out so --
Oh, no, no, no.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
I didn't know what was going to happen.
It didn't feel good.
- But, no, was I
singled out myself, no.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
The way you're saying that it works, you know, when you see something, you have to follow it through to find out what went wrong there.
2 Well, you have to go back up and ask someone because you don't know why it's like that.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
When you say go back up, you mean the control --
37j Yes, whoever had the need to job out or control center or the --
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Do you think that it works that way across the board or do other people do things differently?
j I think it works that way across the board.
I don't think we've really had any issues where people have gotten in trouble for what somebody said or turned in or here is what I found.
NEAL R.GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 131 RHnfF IRI ANn AVE.. N.W.
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2 3
4 5
6 7
8 9
10 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21' 22 23 24 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Nobody is making any mistakes out there?
- jJ No, they're making mistakes but just, they might get a coaching or counseling or something like that, but no one gets in a whole lot of trouble.
It's like, yes, I found a tagging mistake, you know.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Was there some sort of a maintenance evolution on the safety valve or some primary safety where there were some people from maintenance that got in trouble?
4
,1-1 j
That was the guys that got fired because they weren't qualified to work on it.
I guess there was a missing piece or something.
That was the one, f*hIU
=hI*
were the two maintenance guys.
And that was the time frame when all this really started hitting ahead, you know, it was like --
(Off the record.)
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
11:33 a.m.,
tape 2.
LI This is jshuf fling through his pages trying to find out his emails.
Do you want to go off the record temporarily while I look for this?
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Sure.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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(Off the record.)
2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
11:41 approximately.
3 We find the email that you sent t This is 4
dated November the 4 th, 2002 indicating "things aren't 5
going real well in our operations right now."
You 6
have recent issues such as the termination of p
7 this is 8
Yes.
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Meetings with the 10 Bravo shift and Kim Hardman and operations management 11 and some recent notifications and you give about four, 12 "have me and others a little concerned with the path 13 we are headed down."
What were you talking about 14 there?
15 That was back when I went to 16 you guys.
17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
After November?
18 That was about the time 19 frame, that was when I sent that out when I went to 20 you.
21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
On the containment 22 issue?
23 W"
It was a containment issue 24 where we're going like not doing the right thing, kind C.-.
25 of what I'm talking about.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE IRLAND AVE.. N.W.
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4 5
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 99 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
What response did you get to that from%
He writes back, "I'll be in touch."
-Yes.
We didn't get anything really back.
I raised that grievance process and dealt wit4, nd all that but --
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Nothing from ECP?
Not really.
He was supposed to get back to me again recently.
I just sought him out verbally.
I talked to him and said, yes, he has a meeting wit and all that, that was within the last month.
He hasn't gotten back, so I don't know really what's going on.
I actually talked to him about closing the issue.
Like he never got back to me, and there was a grievance file that went to a third step grievance in our process through the union.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
So, do you think he's working on the situation or you haven't had enough contact to know whether He said he was but he's, this is, that's the one that I first raised it that I let him know that things were going on, we got to do something about it.
Nothing happened.
Irguess it's best to ask him.
it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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100 1
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
Scott, you had 2
some other questions?
3 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Yes.
I just 4
actually, at one point just recently, we were talking 5
about some, safety valve or --
or something where 6
there's some reason --
7
ýWith the guy that lost their 8
job there.
9 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
What was the i0 nature of that problem as best you can recollect?
11
)IThe best I can recollect is 12 there were, I
guess there was a procedure or a 13 paperwork problem where they either ordered a turnover 14 or something like that, they actually left a piece out 15 of the valve.
16 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
What valve is 17 this again?
Do you 18 Gosh, I don't know if it was 19 a PS3 or the spray valve.
I'm not one hundred percent 20 sure what it was.
2.1 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
22 But whatever, something was 23 left out or didn't operate correctly and they had to 24 pull it apart and lost some time.
And it turns out 25 some of the guys that were working on it weren't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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qualified on that module or something.
And I don't 2
know if the guy that was qualified was on the outside 3
of the step up end.
I don't know all the details, it 4
just turned out that they got rid of the supervisor 5
who still never came back.
His name is 6
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
You said a 7
person was fired.
8 is gone, he's not 9
beeen back.
He was the 11 10 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
And 11 what about the workers?
12 The workers are back on the 13 job now.
14 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Were they 15 fired at the time?
16 V:
They were let go, yes.
They 17 were on the street.
18 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
And 19 what allowed them to come back?
20 Arbitration, I believe.
21 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BýBER:
Okay.
So, 22 they went through an arbitration case and were brought 23 back.
24 Yes.
I don't know all the 25 details.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
So, you 2
don't really know.
But I guess what I'm trying to 3
understand is was there an adverse impact on the work 4
environment for that?
5 3 Well, what came of that was 6
the drive
- for, hey, you guys will follow the 7
procedures.
You can't get in trouble if you follow 8
the procedures.
People, when you get in trouble, you 9
know what, nobody has bad intent to do it.
They 10 test themselves, they start doing a lot of things and 11 then, and I'll be honest with you, in the past, you 12 start doing too much, it just slips your mind like, 13 oh, I left the water running in the bathroom.
It's 14 like you forget.
If you go step by step, I take a 15 break in procedures, category 2 procedure, I take a 16 new procedure down with me every time I go.
And I 17 sign it off step by step.
18 I want you to give me the authority to do 19 it, the skill and the craft, but until you do that, 20 I'm not going to set myself up.
I will take it down.
21 Is there a copy down there?
Yes, there's a copy down 22
- there, but I want a fresh copy and I want to go 23 through it every time.
And if I do that, it's slower.
24 Is it real slow?
No, I could probably say eight 25 minutes, eight to ten minutes, if I went down and just NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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racked it up or racked it
- down, the skill and the 2
craft versus doing the procedure, but I know for a 3
fact I won't miss anything the other way.
4 I mean, there's a fine line, someone has 5
got to make a decision how they want to go.
You won't 6
make a mistake if you're going to --
7 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
- Well, 8
that was the message coming down from management.
Was 9
there any discussion amongst the union as far as, or 10 any others as far as, well, you know, it looks like 11 management is out to get us, we need to protect each 12 other, we need to be 13 It's quite the opposite.
I'm 14 one of
- n.
so I'm the one that's told 15 to promote, hey, guys, follow the procedures.
You 16 guys take the procedure with you.
Don't climb up the 17 18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And it's reinforced 19 them?
20
- Yes, but it's almost like, 21 and I'll get them to tell you, I'm not going to do 22 that, so and so, because, you know, he's a good guy, 23<
I'm not going to let it slide.
It's perceived as a 24 slow down, and it's not a slow down.
Does it slow C
25 things down?
Of course it slows things down.
It NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 137 RH*fF 1.1 ANn AVE. N.W.
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slows it down just for the fact it takes you time to 2
go through something if you're not just doing it.
I 3
don't know how else to, it's just, they can get mad at 4
you but you can't get in trouble if you don't miss 5
something.
I don't know if that comes out right or 6
not.
7 SR.
PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Well, no, no.
8 I understand your perspective on it.
I guess what I 9
was trying to --
10
/§..
That's what --
11 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
I'm trying to 12 get a sense of if others felt the same way or if they 13 felt like, well, we'll consider doing things the same 14 old way but if we make a mistake we'll cover for each 15 other.
You know, it's kind of --
16 j
No, I don't get that at all.
17 I get it where people still are reluctant, and it's 18 getting better now the way you don't fight it.
You 19 can get a lot of old school, people have done things 20 for years like, you know, it's hard to change.
I can 21 tell you I wish I could be an operator again.
I mean, 22 when you went out and you looked at the drawings and 23 said, hey, I'm going to try to do this.
But you 24 can't, in the environment now you can't.
I mean, 25 that's how all the jobs were done.
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1 2
3 4
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 105 Like I said, I went through a lot of changes down there.
When you pulled the drawing out and you looked at it, that's how you did the trouble shooting.
You looked at it and said, okay, here is what we're going to do, and you wrote it on a piece of paper.
- Now, we have things proceduralized.
SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
All right, thanks.
I'm done with that line of question.
Your turn.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
I'm just going to ask you again, anything you'd like to add?
j No, Iappreciate the time and I feel comfortable that I've got everything out.
I just want to see some change and I hope you guys can help.
That's what I said before, I mean, I just want to go there and not have to worry about anything, you know.
I don't know how best to do that.
And like I
- said, I hope, we have a new N)who seems pretty good.
And then came back, he was real good before.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Who' s the ne*00 again?
His name is don't even know where he's from.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
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106 2
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
3 M
Yes, everybody struggles with 4
that.
Well, he actually helped, I'll tell you what, 5
I wrote a notification the other day, and we're still 6
on the tape, right?
7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Yes.
8 That's good.
But it
- was, I
9 went out and I had a --
board duty and I went out and 10 there were scaffolds built out there and they asked me 11 to check out 26 service board pumps for a start.
And 12 I said everything looks good on the pump but I said 13 there's scaffold clamped to it.
I said, that doesn't 14 seem right to me, you know.
I said, as a matter of 15 fact, there's clamp to 24, too.
And I know over the 16 years, and you've been around a while, it used to be 17 12
- inches, six inches, touch it, now I
see it's 18 hooked.
It's like, wait a minute, I don't know if you 19 hook this to things, to operable bay.
20 So, I called in there and they scrambled 21 around a little bit.
I wrote notifications on it 22 later on.
They called a scaffold group, they said, 23 oh, yes, an engineer evaluated it, it's
- okay, you 24 know.
- Well, I still wrote it up.
And as a matter of 25 fact, the called me in the office, he wanted to NEAL R. GROSS
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107 1
talk to me.
You know, it's okay to do that, it's 2
going to end your interview, did you look at the 3
scaffold tag?
I said, yes, I looked at the scaffold 4
tag.
I said it had an engineer on there.
5 He said, well, you shouldn't have made us 6
really jump through hoops like that.
We were 7
considering holding the fuel movement up.
I said, you 8
know what, I haven't seen that before.
And I went 9
through the whole scenario, I said have you ever seen 10 it before?
He goes, oh, yes.
I said, okay, well, I
11 met with the ops manager today and he actually brought 12 the issue up of that scaffold.
He said it was very 13 good what you did there, he said, because I don't like 14 that and we're going to change that because it's not 15 a good practice.
I don't care if it's sizeably good 16 or not, it's not a good practice, which gave me a good 17 feeling.
I said, well, you ought to talk to your 18 people there because they thought 19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Who is th you had 20 the problem with?
1 O=was the one 22 that, well, it's he questioned, it was almost like, 23 and he's one of the ones don't make us jump through 24 hoops.
I wasn't trying to make anybody jump through 25 hoops.
I reported that I had an issue.
And I didn't NEAL R. GROSS M1 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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-15 16 17 18 19 20 21.,
22 23 24 25 108 think it was right and I actually went through the scaffold program, I went through the FSAR, I tried to look and it talked about harmonics on the pumps and all that stuff, that's really not a clear document and I don't want, anything with a high school education, but it didn't come right out and say, hey, don't hook with this.
But I don't know, I still don't have a good feeling about it but I did what I was supposed to do.
I documented it and how they do it now is up to them.
It just was something way different.
And to me, that's what I'm supposed to-do.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Right.
Right.
But was it a real obvious concern?
I don't know wh**alled me in his offihe to ask me about it, you know.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Well, if I was an inspector looking at it and if it was a safety related pump and I made a comment to a shift about it, I would expect that they would do something about it and there wouldn't be a hook to that after some period of time.
So, the only difference is it's non-safety related.
So, I'm not --
Lj No, it's safety related.
SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
You said circ NEAL R.
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board, didn't you?
2 Yes, circ board operator, it 3
was service work pump.
Oh, no, no, no, it was a 4
safety related pump.
5 SR. PROJ. ENGINEER BARBER:
Oh, all right.
6 I'm sorry, I misunderstood.
7 Oh, no, service work pump in 8
the operable bay.
9 SR.
PROJ.
ENGINEER BARBER:
Okay.
Okay.
10 That, to me, that's what I 11
- mean, it's still there, it's still hooked.
12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
And is 13 concerned with you almost made him hold up fuel 14 movement?
15 Well, he made a comment like, 16 hey, if you saw an engineer's signature,.let us know 17 that because we were getting ready to maybe consider
-18 holding up fuel movement for that.
So, I don't know, 19 I told you the scaffold number, I told you where it 20 was, where it was hooked to, and I didn't know why he 21 really even wanted to talk about that, you know.
.22 He's one of the ones that, we're kind of 23 not on the same page right now, I don't think.
I 24 don't think I'm on good list.
But like I said, 25 was it a real drastic thing?
No, it's just I didn't NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 110 think, I didn't know really where he was coming from when he asked me to come in there for a minute.
I thought it would be something else, he had something else to discuss.
So, it just was kind of weird to me.
SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Plus the guy above him flipped it and said you did a good thing.
7 (U7
- .Yes, but he didn't talk to him.
I thought that was nice though, that's why, so far I've had all good dealings with him.
He's only been there a little over a month, I think.
But he's told us things unrelated to the, just more union company issues, you know, like one was they want to stop, it's not contractual to get rest period when we work 12 hours1.388889e-4 days <br />0.00333 hours <br />1.984127e-5 weeks <br />4.566e-6 months <br />.
Typically what we've done over the past was if we worked on our shifts, we get 12 off.
If you work over, if you're held over on a job 13, you get to come in an hour late so you don't exceed the 24 and 48.
When I said it's not contractual, we'll sign a waiver but we're not going to pay you anymore for it.
And typically what we've got paid for in the past, three guys lost pay for it.
And I said, that's great but I can understand where it's not contractual, I said.
But I said, will you consider making good the guys that lost their pay when they thought they were NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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going to get it, we'll just do it from here on out the 2
way you want to do it? And he told me, he said, well, 3
told me we don't typically do it that way 4
and we've only done it a couple of times in the past.
5 6
And I said, great, I said, I'll tell you 7
what.
I sa
.101...M04 a liar.
He said, well, 8
I really wouldn't use them words and I said, well, 9
I'll tell you what.
I said is a liar and 10 I'll prove it to you.
So, I brought pay stubs in and 11 I have six years of pay stubs I brought in and they 12 all had said rest period on there so I just brought in 13 three years in.
I had over $3,000 of rest period with 14 pay for all the circumstances.
And he said, give me 15 the names and I'll make good.
16 But it was like, I'm not going to bullshit 17 you.
I mean, I will tell you my side and I will back 18 it up.
So, I mean, like I said, that's unrelated to 19 safety but that doesn't help my cause either.
It does 20 with him, hopefully he'll see that, I said your job is
- 21.
to hear both sides and you're going to have to figure 22 out who's telling the truth. Well, I told him because 23 I know you're going to get different, and that's the 24 same thing you ought to do.
And I don't think that's 25 different anywhere.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
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SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Anything else, Scott?
2 3
I don't have anything else.
4 SPECIALAGENT NEFF: Anything else, T
5 Have I or any other NRC representative offered'you any 6
promises or reward or threaten you in any manner in 7
exchange for your information today?
8
- TOWNo, you have not.
9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Are you here freely 10 and voluntarily?
11
- Yes, I am.
12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:
Okay.
It's 13 approximately 11:56 a.m. and we'll go off the record.
14 Thank you for your time.
15 Thank you.
16 Whereupon, the interview was concluded at 17 11:56 a.m.)
18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.
CERTIFICATE This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the matter of:
Name of Proceeding: Interview of Docket Number:
1-2003-051F Location:
Salem Creek Nuclear Generating Station were held as herein appears, and that this is the original transcript thereof for the file of the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission taken by me and, thereafter reduced to typewriting by me or under the direction of the court reporting company, and that the transcript is a true. and accurate record of the foregoing proceedings as recorded on tape(s) provided
- by the NRC.
Ronald e4n Official Transcriber Neal R. Gross & Co.,
Inc.
NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS ti9A RwfrF1 I.I Atin AVF N W