ML061790614

From kanterella
Jump to navigation Jump to search
OI Interview Transcript of Witness
ML061790614
Person / Time
Site: Salem, Hope Creek  PSEG icon.png
Issue date: 11/13/2004
From:
NRC/OI
To:
References
1-2003-051F, FOIA/PA-2005-0194, NRC-1217
Download: ML061790614 (66)
v • d • e


Text

Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Title:

o 4 t ... S S. *

  • 1 P Docket Number: 1-2003-051 F 1.

C>) Location: Hancock's Bridge, New Jersey Date: Thursday, November 13, 2003 Work "Order No.: NRC-1217 Pages 1-65 i.

NEAL R. GROSS AND CO., INC.

Court Reporters and Transcribers 1323 Rhode Island Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20005 Information in this record was de!eled (202) 234-4433

  • in accordance with the Freedom of :nformation Act, exemptions "2.'

FOIA-R __,____--__

1 1 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3

4 OFFICE OF THE INVESTIGATOR GENERAL 5 INTERVIEW 6 ---------------------------- x 7 IN THE MATTER OF:

8 INTERVIEW OF

  • Docket No.

9  : 1-2003-051F 10 (CLOSED) 11 -----------------------------x 12 13 14 Thursday, November 13, 2003 15 PSEG 16 NRC Resident's Office 17 Hancock's Bridge, NJ 18 19 The above-entitled interview was conducted 20 at 2:10 p.m.

21 22 BEFORE:

23 Special Agent EILEEN NEFF 24 ALSO PRESENT:

25 Senior Project Engineer SCOTT BARBER NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS V111 04 1 a I1Q-lr t=Afli M.IC K %At M%*

2 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 2:10 p.m.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Today's date is 4 November the 13th. The time is approximately 2:10 5 p.m. Speaking is Special Agent Eileen Neff, U.S. NRC 6 Region I, Office of Investigations. Also present from 7 Region I is Senior Project Engineer Scott Barber, and 8 this interview is going to be wit" And 9 the interview concerns the safety conscious work 10 environment at Salem Hope Creek.

11 I've explained to you that 12 the situation involves no specific potential violation 13 and that you,'re being interviewed for your assessment 14 of the work environment on site. Is that accurate?

-15 I understand, yes.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And that also 17 we would conduct the interview under oath.

18 71 I understand.

19, SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. At this point, 20 if you would raise your right hand. Do you swear that 21 the information you're about to provide is the truth, 22 the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you 23 God?

24 Yes, I do, so help me, God.

25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Thank you.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

... 1121 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

  • 3 1 Would you please state for the record your full name 2 and your date-.of birth and social security number?

3 My full name is- U 4

5 6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And a home 7 contact number for you?

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And a work contact 10 number.

. ; ' 11 SPECIAL AGENT 'NEFF: Okay. And. now can

.12 13 you briefly summarize .your work history?

14

.15

-16 17 18 19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What year was that?

. .... '* Th at was 20 21 It would be, oh,. about or so time frame 22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: .... Fe_

23 24 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: What's -- I mean 25 you said you were How long were you a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

4 1

2 I was I don't 3 know, 4 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

6 7 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

8 1101,1011-010

.9 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

11 12 13

'7 14

/ )

is 16 17 18 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: *So you're a 19 now?

20 21 22 23 24 25 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

  • . -, 1 f^l A&%lm Afc mgSAI

5 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What is your specific 2 job title?

3 ,. I'm in the Union, so the job 4 title is, 5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:

6 Okay. And has been for how long?

7. Sixteen years now?

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Is all your 9 experience on the Salem side or the Hope Creek side?

10 Probably 97 percent Salem 11 side and three percent Hope Creek.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay-. Okay. That's 13 a lot of experlence since 4.

14

  • Been here a long time.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Yes. Yes. And-what 16 I'll do is start with some general information. And 17 as part of this assessment what I'd like to get is 18 what your opinion. is and I won't go back to )

19 we'll talk with recent times. Let's consider the past 20 year to two years or so. What would your opinion be 21 of the work environment here on site or the safety 22 culture, put it that way, the safety culture?

23 Being here a long time, and 24 I'm primarily in contact with field people -- field 25 supervisors, field workers -- many of the people have NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS VVY ~ ID~Is) AM AKIM f I KI %A/I

6 1 been here a long time. From them I get the impression 2 that they really don't care anymore. They're fed up 3 with the five-year management teams coming in shaking 4 the world, changing policies and philosophies, and 5 they feel as though they're not listened to.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And when you say the 7 field supervisors, what kind of positions do you put 8 in that category?

9 First-line supervisors.

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And is that in 11 any one particular department or is that across the 12 board?

13 :1 That's broad, yes.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So name where you see 15 that kind of attitude.

16 . well, in Mechanical area, 17 Electrical, I&C, I mean it's just broad.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

19 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: These people 20 you're dealing with, have they been around a long time 21 also?

22 Salem, yes. I guess the 23 average age of the work force is I think 48 now.

24 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

25 So a lot of guys have been NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

7 1 here a long time, and they've seen the VP levels and 2 the rnanagers come and go and do their shake-up and 3 bring all their buddies in and then their buddies go.

4 The joke out there now is we've got the right people 5 in place for the sixth time. So these people bring up 6 concerns, more efficient ways to do business, better 7 ways, better things and they're just not listened to.

8 And that bothers me because that affects the work 9 force.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, what kind of 12 concerns do they have that they feel aren't getting 13 addressed?

14 . For example, they'll take a 15 diesel generator out of service three times when. they 16 only have *to do it once if they would group the 17 breakers together. Concerns like they go into 18 containment four times to .do a job they would only 19 have to go in once if they would have taken other 20 actions. People -- a couple weeks ago we had a --

21 well, about two months ago we had a CRD vent fan 22 failure, and not one of the people in the POD knew 23 what that fan looked like. They were talking about 24 adjusting the clutch on it. It doesn't even have a 25 clutch. And there were 30 people in this room fr6m NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1.. RHflflF IRI AM.Jf A~lr- M %A/

8 1 the new regime and not one person knew how this 2 machine functions. So they make a management decision 3 on something they know nothing about, and it's 4 commonplace.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I mean did somebody 6 speak up and correct that? Did .they say, "Wait a 7 minute. You're not even talking about the right --

8 Nobody knew.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- parts and pieces 10 here."

11 Nobody knew. Somebody came 12 out of the meeting and said, "Hey, grab a work order, 13 go adjust the clutch.' I said, "Guys, there is no 14 clutch." "Oh, oh. Okay."

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF.: So what happened 16 then?

17 so then I contacted field 18 people and we write the work order to go do the right 19 thing and rebuild the fan and do what we have to do to 20 get it back in service.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I mean it does it 22 happen that way? Does it happen satisfactorily get 23 fixed?

24 Oh, absolutely, absolutely.

25 I mean the guys in the street are very aware of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 4"',n~ ~b*no 1--l .

9 1 configuration issues.

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

3 act 4 as policemen to a degree.

5 -SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

6 .._j Because Ehey know many 7 decisions won't come down correctly, and they know some 8 field guys won't necessarily do the right thing. So 9 we are the police force. You know, a lot of guys feel 10 that way, a lot of planners and schedulers.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, when you say 12 that some are -- the directions aren't going to come 13 down correctly, is it that it's an issue where they 14 don't know the piece of equipment that they're dealing 15 with or is *there more to it than that?

16 .. Most of it's knowledge 17 issues, some experience issues.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

19 .R* Some of the people who make 20 these decisions have never been there. Not that 21 that's a necessity but for anyone to make a logical 22 management decision you need to have the correct 23 information to have a basis to make a decision.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, what happens 25 when you have to act as the police force? What kind NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS AP*WJ* Ip 1 Akil AMIC KI IAI

10 1 of response do you get to that?

2 0.W- 1In the past, I've had my job 3 threatened because of it.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Specifically over 5 what?

6 A specific example would be 7 in five years ago, (phoneticCdne of the 8 best NCOs we have in the control room, experienced 9 guy, I was in a position where I was working in 10 and I would take the place of the 11 A,---at the time. So he would call me with 12 an issue and at the time my supervisor asked me, "What 13 are you working on, " and I said, *"Well, 14 has an immediate concern and I'm running on it." And 15 he made the point, "Well, that's not what I told you 16 to do." I said, "Well, then you need to discuss that 17 with him because he's in command of the station." And 18 that evolved into they offered memg 19 SPECIAL AGENT.NEFF: Who was the person 20 that was going against, 21 L l1 (phonetic).

22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: his direction?

23 24 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: What was his 25 position?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1T71 P*..t'rIn* Iql ahin~ &%/ll I* AI

Ii 1 His position at the time 2 they had j ust made hi 'ýbecause 3 he had pr ior SRO experience, and someone made that a 4 requireme nt for that position.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Is he no longer on 6 the site?

7 He's a guy who goes from job 8 to job to job, because he can't find a home.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Where is he now?

10 -Now he's at Materials 11 Engineering, I think.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So this seems 13 like there must be more to that situation. I mean you 14 must have more detail. *is giving you one 15 direction, somebody is challenging that, and somehow 16 they' re offering you So 17 how did you get there?

18 I've always been self-19 motivated, self-directed kind of person. And I asked

!as a follow-through, "Why did you call me 20 21 directly? Why didn't you call my immediate 22 supervisor?" And his response was, "Because he 23 doesn't respond. You do." And to me that's job 24 satisfaction and I'm happy to serve the guy. Career 25 threatening in the fact tha I guess he was NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

12 1 intimidated by the fact I was self-directed and I 2 didn't need him as a supervisor.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What was the basis 4 for them coming to you and saying -- was it a 5 termination, they were hoping you'd --

6 Oh, yes. They were hoping 7 I'd resign.

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. They were

.. 9 looking for you to resign and they were offering you 10 a package.

11 Yes.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And what was the 13 basis for the termination? Do you recall what they 14 were telling?

15 4. They were telling me I was 16 a 17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Which meant?

18 - And that was -- yes, you're 19 garbage. You don't meet any of the requirements. You 20 have no technical knowledge, no basis, and it boiled 21 down to a personality issue. I mean I've been at 22 " ror to that.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Yes. This is 1998, 24 so it'.after you've been on site?

25 *, Yes. Yes. So that just go NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

13 1 ugly.

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And how did that go 3 then? How did that get resolved?

4 How did it get resolved? I 5 fought it. There was an appeal process later.

6 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Was this through 7 the Union or was-it through the Company?

8 No. We were all company 9 people at the time.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

11 VP This was before we 12 unionized.

13 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

14 And I fought it, pointed out 15 that I was the largest award winner in the history of 16 this company, I saved them tens of millions of dollars 17 in doing things better, and. finally I ended up going 18 outside to a lawyer who's sued this company many, many 19 times, and pulled in the appropriate chain of command 20 into a room and told them, "Either you get off my back 21 or I'm going to sue you for harassment.," And I dialed 22 the lawyer's phone number and finally, low and behold, 23 two weeks later I have successfully passed my 24 performance improvement program. So, hooray, hurrah, 25 that's the end of that story.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

14 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How did things 2 continue from there? Were you working for the same 3 individual, fort 4 Ys 5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: They left you under 6 -

7 They backed off.

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. But they left 9 you under him.

10 .He found another position 11 quickly.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

13 NOW! Whether that was on him or 14 a move by the Company, I don't know.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

16, That's just my personal 17 story.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, what about since 19 then, though? Have you had instances'since then?

20 71 Since then, no. I'm highly 21 regarded and highly respected, as far as I know, by 22 the field guys. Some of the management folks don't 23 like me because I present them with ideas on how they 24 could do their jobs better and make better decisions.

25 I like to think, I like to create, I'm an SAP NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 141)' fl IP*1 AhIrk AI rQ kII IAl

15 1 advocate, which many people aren't. I've learned how 2 to do many, many things that could make Work 3 Management large improvements. And in particular, 4 since we're on that subject, I pushed the issue of 5 becoming a, 6

7 and I interviewed with them 8 all. I got back to .I said, "Well, how did it go, 9 because I know how to fix this process. You people 10 can't stabilize the schedule. All the other plants do 11 it, impose provided guidelines. a has provided 12 guidelines, there's lot of good data out there. We 13 need to do that. I know how to do that."

_--4 So I interviewed and _ tgot back to. me 15 and there's a comment on an email that he wrote to me.

16 I'll read the comment, but i mean he was all for it 17 and all the interviews cameback very positive that 18 this guy can do it, but they chose someone else. So 19 I'll just stay in the Union where I'm relatively safe 20 as long as I do my job every day and just ride out the 21, rest of my career, the remaining9. that I 22 have.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You said a couple 24 things I wanted to question. Go ahead, Scott.

25 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Yes, me too.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

16 1 What was the comment?

2 Well, this was an email that 3 one of the Hope Creed senior supervisors sent to, 4 It reads from 0 copy 5 *nd also copy to me, which was nice of them.

6oIt says, I wanted to 7 drop you a note that I was extremely happy and 8 impressed with performance this past weekend as

9. the t the morning POD.

10 He demonstrated accountability and ownership, 11 something that is lacking throughout this 12 organization. Please thank ersonally for. me by 13 demonstrating these winning behaviors.

14 And *,larites a comment on here 15 and says; "I'm glad to see change. This behavior from 16 seems to match his desire he is expressing to be 17 manager in our organization. What do you guys think?

18 How did he do in the interviews? Have we talked to 19 him and obtained feedback from those he talked with?"

20 I got back to him about two weeks later and he said, 21 "Yes, all the interviews went. great." I said, "Why 22 don't you do this, why don't you fix this place and 23 fix the Work Management?" Never heard another word 24 from him.

25 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Did you think you NEAL R. GROSS rrvi 10T PCf0CP &K~rl TPAM.qrRIF=P~

17 1 had the job?

2 .. I would have liked to think.

3 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Based on the 4 feedback you got?

5 " 2 Not just this feedback but 6 many other aspects.

7 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: But I mean, yes, 8 it sounds like you had good interviews and all. So 9 you thought you had a --

10 10 Yes. Oh, yes.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How many people were 12 in for it?

13 I'don't know that.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And the person that 15 they selected, how do they compare to you in terms of 16 experience?

17 The person they selected was 19 . *He has zero experience in Work 20 Management.-

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And at that point in 22 time, how much experience had you had in Work 23 Management? When was the -- when were you 24 interviewing for the management position?

25 This was February time NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

18 1 frame, February-March.

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Two thousand three.

3 N. es.

4 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: So it was this 5 year.

6 Oh, yes, very recently.

7 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Yes. For the record, 9 we're looking at an email. The title on top is 10 headed; 11 dated Friday, Februa.ry 21, and this is 12 unrelated?

-13 That is unrelated.

-14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. In terms of 15 the selection for that position, the way you just 16 presented it was, well, okay, so I'll go on and I'll

_17 stay with the Union, I'll go till I retire i 18 from now. Seems like there might be more to it than 19 that than what you're saying. Is there more to the 20 reasons for the selection that you believe or is it 21 just something you can't explain or don't understand?

.22 1 don't know why they chose 23 who they did but it fits in.line with most previous 24 decisions at that level, and I'm 99 percent sure that 25 those problem issues regarding Work Management will NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

.- - - 4^1

  • .^- r AI

.1MC M K %A/

19 I continue.

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Where the schedule is 3 just not stabilized?

4 That's correct.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And what kind of 6 decisions are you seeing made in that Department where 7 you say it fits right in with them? Are they just not 8 putting the right people in the right position to get 9 it?

10 ] They don't have the right 11 people in the right jobs. They don't know what the 12 day-to-day interface is. They don't have the SAP 13 knowledge or the prima vera knowledge or know the 14 tools well enough to interact with other departments 15 to make it work. It seems to me that everyone -- all 16 the departments here, Maintenance, Materials, 17 Projects, Planning/Scheduling, they all have their 18 pyramid and budget structures are set. that way, 19 meaning that Maintenance has their budget and they 20 can't touch anyone else's money. And because of that 21 structure, they have, not collaborated with other 22 departments to make the work flow process an efficient 23 -- anywhere near as efficient as it could be.

24 For example, T5 week or T3 week, any week 25 in particular, most other plants I mean they're 90 NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

20 1 percent accurate down from T12. It's not hard to do.

2 There's not any rocket science to it. At TO we have 3 30 percent additions because an operator that wants 4 this piece of equipment fixed now, because -- and he 5 doesn't know that, hey, because he wants that fixed 6 n6w we need to get a plane from wherever, so there's 7 cost there. Materials people don't understand the 8 impact they have when they don't order something in a 9 timely fashion.

10 There's a lot of people here that don't 11 have SAP access in order to prioritize the work of 12 1,800 people. They wait for somebody to come bang on 13 their desk. It's ridiculous to work that way. SAP is 14 structurally designed in a work flow to where someone 15 identifies an issue, 16 wWits all designed to work 17 that way. I've read a couple of books on the side 18 about SAP and talked to some other companies, but 19 PSE&G has designed that process to. keep the pyramid 20 structure in plice. So there is walls on every aspect 21 of it. It's very inefficient; it's very time-22 consuming, it's --

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Not user friendly?

24 SAP is user friendly once 25 you get to know it a little bit. .

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHOfE IS.ANf AVF NW

21 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I think there might 2 be others that would differ with you on that.

3 I agree. I agree. And it 4 is true.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You might have a 6 different level of experience with working with it.

7 Yes, I do. Yes, I was 8 involved with conversion and start-up; so I do have a 9 lot of knowledge on it. And I've read some on my own 10 quite a bit. The where I'm 11 sitting now there are people -- most people, the 12 culture, I mean they don't go out to the plant, they i3 don't know, the don't interface. They just stay in 14 their own little world and shuffle these things 15 around, and the next day get shuffled again.

16 I mean how many years has INPO and the NRC 17 told Us we can't manage this work correctly? I mean 18 it's a reoccurring -- and the same people are still in 19 place. They're still in place. It just seems 20 ludicrous to me. I've talked to Calvert Cliffs and 21 Peach and I know people at TMI and it's like, "Do you 22 guys have this problem?" "No." "Well, how do you do 23 it?" "Oh, we do this." Seems simple .to me. Why is 24 it so hard here? So we bring a new guy in and he 25 brings his regime of guys in and the prior regime goes NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

22 1 out and we just change people at the top and it's sad 2 to see, because, personally, I've been here 3 this is my company. I've watched these people rip 4 this place to shreds. I've watched extremely 5 knowledgeable, good people walk out the door and they 6 don't even know who these people are, what they can 7 offer, what they do. It's sad. It's heartbreaking.

8 There's guys that' stay here till three o'clock in the 9 morning, they can't be with their families on 10 Christmas Eve because some scheduler didn't schedule 11 something right. And that's crazy to me.

12 '.SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Seems like you 13- attribute most of that to the management change or the 14 constant management changeover.

15 Yes.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Because every time 17 they come in they just start from scratch and they 18 don't know -- they don't recognize what they're 19 dealing with here.

20 Exactly. I mean the last 21 layoff they had a couple weeks ago the President of 22 the Union goes up and talks to who's 23 . 1 Pl 1 ecause they were 24 talking about they want to cut Union people and no 25 Union people leave until all the contractors are gone.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

23 1 And then " thinks to himself, "Well, geez, how 2 many management people did we just let go and who were 3 they? We don't know. How many temporary people do we 4 have?" says, "I don't know." That's 5 heresy. I don't want to say that's a fact, that is 6 heresy. So they brought some of these people back 7 after they realized, "Hey, we shouldn't have let these 8 people go because they provided this function." And 9 that's --

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: They made too quick

.11 of a decision in some cases?

12 A Oh, yes. So far, put a 13 letter out saying they brought 23 back out. of the 104 14 or so, I believe.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: In what you're 16 outlining pretty much here, poor management practices,

17. they can't get it together to control the Work 18 Management schedule and it leads to problems right on 19 down the line to why somebody has to work at a certain 20 point in time or why something doesn't get it done.

21 In all of that, I mean that's a very broad .criticism 22 in terms of site management, in all of that, are you 23 aware of any -- do you have any concerns of a nuclear 24 safety nature that's caused by that, what you're 25 looking at as mismanagement of this process?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

24 1 M 1 Yes, because when I read the 2 Davis-Besse reports on the reactor head it was a very 3 similar culture.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

5 . And that frightens me.

6 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: One thing that 7 would be -helpful 'for us is if *you could point to 8 specific instances. You kind of highlighted a few 9 very early on in the interview where you talked about 10 -- I think you said something like making four 11 containment entries when only one would do. That's 12 potentially-an ALARA issue.

13 It's an ALARA issue, sure.

14 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: I think there 15 might have been a couple other things you mentioned 16 too about just different conduct and work activities.

17 What would be helpful for us is if you could provide 18 more specificity around those examples, and if there 19 are other examples that talk in terms of maybe 20 equipment that wasn't properly maintained from a 21 nuclear safety standpoint if you have any examples of 22 that or if there were surveillances that were shortcut 23 or like the thing -- I think you talked about the 24 diesel, in and out of the diesel maintenance window 25 for three separate occasions. I mean if that's an NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

25 1 abuse of the LCR or if it's just poor planning, I'm 2 just trying to better understand what those comments 3 are about.

4 Yes. From an ST point of 5 view, I monitor the STs. We miss very few, if at all.

6 Most of that relates to poor management of the work 7 wherever you take a piece of equipment out more times 8 than it needs to be. What I did provide for you, I do 9 have a list of commitment items that I ran this report 10 yesterday, yesterday being the 12th, showing hundreds 11 of work orders and it shows their due dates and their 12 overdue dates along with their schedule dates, along 13 with how many days we have it scheduled past its due 14 date and also how many days schedules past its overdue 15 date.

16 And after reading this report, I'd like to 17 know a few specifics. Most of this work where it 18 falls close to the overdue date where if we have a 19 window of 90 days to schedule it from its due date to 20 its overdue, this Company tends to put it towards the 21 end of that.90-day window, and that to me is just poor 22 Work Management philosophy.

23 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

24 , So I'll provide you with 25 that list and you're welcome to keep that.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

26 1 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Is there 2 any issues in there that are tech spec related or have 3 other nuclear safety implications that are -- because 4 of the fact that work hasn't been done, there's an 5 impact on system operation or the plant operation?

6 _ These are -- I would say no 7 to that, digitally a no.

8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Okay.

9 . But like I say, these are 10 all commitment-type items.

11 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. You 12 mentioned I think earlier you talked about INPO and 13 LANO and what they've seen and maybe some of the 14 guidelines, some of the guidance they've put out. Has 15 LANO or INPO looked at any of this, any of the -- you 16 know, like for example, this work list that has a 17 listing of work that's overdue? Have they shared any 18 insights on that? Have they given any feedback that 19 you've heard of either to yourself in your role or to 20 managers where you've been present regarding this?

21 Not where I've been present.

22 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Have you 23 heard any feedback at all on this?

24 One particular issue 25 regarding this is I recently got involved with some NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 119. RHN F=IVRIANn A\/F: W

27 1 breaker sampling issues, not tech spec breakers but 2 commitment type breakers.

3 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

4 That PS volunteered to test 5 random breakers percentage of a certain design every 6 so often, and we agreed to do 18 to 23 of a specific 7 type each fuel cycle.

8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

9 So in my job I just started 10 doing this breaker stuff about a year ago. In doing 11 research into that specific issue, I found that in the 12 last-three cycles, four cycles for both Salem 1 and 2 13 we didn't do the work that we committed to do. And I 14 made sure that the work we committed to do at the 15 current cycles that we are doing that.

16 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

17 L: But in the past the 18 engineers who were involved said, ".Hey, we haven't had 19 a specific failure of this design, so no need to go 20 back and do the ones that we committed to do prior to 21 this."

22 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

23 All right? So engineering-24 wise, they probably justified it, but the point is if 25 you commit to do something, you should do it. And I NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

28 1 have a specific Excel report that details that data 2 and that involves hundreds of work orders, hundreds of 3 breakers that we did not check that we said we were 4 going to.

5 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: And who was the 6 commitment made to?

  • NRC.

7 8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: But you said it 9 wasn't a regulatory commitment? I didn't understand 10

.11 71 I was not a technical 12 specification commitment..

13 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

14 0 1 It was a generic letter 15 commitment.

16 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Do you 17 have that available here or is it something you could 18 get for us?

19 It's something I can get for 20 you.

21 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. I think 22 we'd be interested in taking a look at that. Do you 23 happen to know what the generic letter was? It's all 24 right if you don't.

25 Fifty-three, seventy-two.

7r NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

29 1 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: What was it?

2 - Fifty-three, seventy-two, I 3 believe is the letter, and 5311.

4 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Those are docket 5 numbers.

6

  • 0W.-I Docket numbers.

7 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Yes. That's just 8 a Salem Unit 1 and Salem Unit 2 docket numbers.

9 Fifty-"three, seventy-two is Salem Unit 1; 5311 is 10 Salem Unit 2.

11 ~Okay.

12 SENIOR.ENGINEER BARBER:. But the generic 13 letter would be like a year. -It would be like --

14 Eighty-nine, thirteen?

i5 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Yes, 8913, li'ke 16 service water. Eighty-nine is obviously the year and 17 13 is the 13th one in the sequence.

18 19 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: 'But what happens 20 is the more common ones we tend to know. Like as an 21 inspector I know 8913 is service water, 8910 is MOVs.

22 There are others, 9005 has to do with ASME co-class 23 components having leaks from and how do you deal with 24 them. And there's things like that that are more 25 commonplace.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

30 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And this is recent, 2 a recent year you're talking about?

3 0. Oh, yes. What I'll do I'll 4 print out the Excel report that shows what cycle we 5 were supposed to do what breakers with their work 6 order numbers.

7 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Normally, under 8 those circumstances, I mean the licensee can make any 9 kind of changes to their commitment but there's a 10 process for them to follow to do that. And, in 11 general, the generic letter that they're following may 12 have a description of what that takes. Or if not, you 13 would use something similar, like a 5059 process and 14 tax.

15 jokay.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: When you say that 17 Engineering could have justified not having done what 18 was committed to, when you raised the concern saying, 19 but, yes, if you committed to it, then it should be 20 done, who do you have those discussions with?

21 Those discussions take place 22 with. my immediate supervisor. It was 23 phonetic) was involved in 24 that.

25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You work for NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

31 2 - Well, I'm not sure. At the 3 moment I'm working for like six different people.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Oh. What title do 5 you generally report to? Or has all that changed 6 recently?

7 P 1 No, my job title is still 8

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Right.

10 . Bu Uphonetic) 11 asks me to do things, (phonetic) asks 12 me to do things-- asks me to do things, 13 ;asks me to do things.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: For purposes of 15 evaluating you in your work performance, who does 16 that?

17 No one.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You don't get an 19 evaluation annually?

20 .1I got an evaluation recently 21 froMrrM ta00(phonetic) who I haven't worked 22 for ever.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Why is that?

24 That's the way they do 25 business.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

32 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Was your appraisal 2 accurate? I mean was it able to capture what you'd 3 done.

4 I wrote it.

1i They asked me 5 to write it, actually.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

7 (Laughter.)

8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: It must have been 9 good.

10 Absolutely.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Accurate. Okay.

12 When you raised the issue'to these two people, you had

-13 mentioned' is it?

14 15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What kind of response 16 did you get from them?

17 - When I presented the data, 18 and I presented data in full, I was asked to reshuffle 19 so they could understand it-better: Put a list this 20 way, put a list that way, rearrange in Excel this way.

21 My jaw just dropped to the floor when they asked me to 22 do that because it was very simple how it was 23 displayed. I just kind of sideline 24 discussed it with the engineer, and he validated the 25 concern. I took the action to follow through with it.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

33 1 I wanted to see the dates for all the future breakers 2 for the rest of the plant.

3 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER:- Did you write a

-4 notification on that?

5 Yes, sir. Wrote a Level 2 6 notification on it. They --

7 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Did you prescribe 8 this Level 2 or was it somebody else that put the 9 level --

10 ,I got concurrence from 11 '(phonetic)., the that it 12 should be a Level 2 and put it in the box accordingly.

13 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Could it 14 have been considered a Level 1? I mean is this 15 symptomatic and weaknesses in the work scheduling and 16" planning a process such that I mean it has broad 17 implications'. Even though it's just this generic 18 letter and this set of breakers, is there something in 19 the way that the commitment system's being managed 20 that are broader sweeping implications? Could you 21 even think of it like that?

22 W! That's a very good question.

23 I would like to think not, but I would say that that 24 is possible due to all the new people that we have.

25 Because of this specific issue we have two new NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

34 1 engineers addressing it and doing the background on 2 how this particular event occurred, we had an expert 3 panel defer the administrative order to do these 4 things past the date of when the actual work was to be 5 done. So the administrative order was just put off, 6 so, no it drove no one to take the action that needed 7 to be taken to address the breaker work.

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, did you follow 9 the Level 2 -- were you able to track that through?

10 Yes.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Where does that --

12 how.did that get resolved?

13 It's still open, actually.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. It's an open 15 item?

16 1 Yes. And I'm following it 17 because I'm not confident that the people who are 18 supposed to are doing the right thing.

19 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: It seems like 20 something very basic is missing here. I mean there's 21 -- seems like there's responsibility and 22 accountability issues that -- and I don't know where 23 they are but how could something -- it sounded like no 24 one was accountable for getting this done or 25 responsible for getting it done or it just was kind of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

35 1 the ether in the planning system. Was there someone 2 that should have owned the issue or owned the work 3 such that --

4 .Yes. The person who used to 5 own the work whose work center it was assigned to had 6 no clue what it was. So he called me and asked me 7 what it was about a year ago, and I talked to him, and 8 I said, "Yes, you need to kick this off because this' 9 is what drives commitment work orders to be developed 10 for different cycles of the plan. And it ended up 11 next thing I knew was deferred out. past the due dates 12 of the work orders that needed.to be done.

13 SENIOR ENGINEER BRBER:. Is there 14 something wrong -- structurally wrong with this 15 system, though, that -- it seems like you could find 16 out what the story was, and I don't know how much 17 research you did to do that, but it seems like 18 whatever you did you were able to get to the bottom 19 and knew what the issue was. Is it an expectation 20 that people that if they're assigned work of that 21 nature that they do that kind of research on their own 22 and come up with what's needed to do the -- schedule 23 the work and get the work done or is it one of these 24 things that's passed down from word of mouth to word 25 of mouth and -- I'm trying to understand where the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

36 1 breakdown was, I guess, is where I'm at.

2  : Accountability is a serious 3 problem here.

4 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

5 Yes, it is. If it was my 6 company, yes, someone whose work center that is and 7 that's attached to a name would be held accountable to 8 do that.

9 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Was it in the 10 right place or should it have been somewhere else?

11 -It was in the right.place at 12 the time.

13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: The issues of SAP, 14 and I know you say you're comfortable and you're 15 familiar with it, for somebody who doesn't have your 16 level of knowledge of SAP, would that have contributed 17 to something like this falling through?

18 No.

19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It's not part of --

20 you can't attribute this to .that tracking.

21 Most people that I talk to 22 say one of the first things they do is look at what's 23 in their work center and what date it is due to be 24 done. Some abide by that, some do not.

25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So this is coming NEAL R. GROSS

'ni IRT RFPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

37 1 back to an accountability issue.

2 am, Absolutely.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And now that you've 4 written it up as it's gotten Level 2 attention, you 5 say you're not confident that it's going to be handled 6 the way it should be. Who's got it, who's got control 7 of the issue?

8 At the moment,.

9 has a piece of it and *as a piece of it.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Is this something 11 these breakers that need to be tested were they not 12 tested in the current Salem Unit 2 outage? Have they 13 not been tested yet?

14 I looked about 1% two weeks 15 ago. Most of them have already been tested, and the 16 others will be tested before the outage is over.

17 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. So you 18 think that at least for this point in time, for this 19 outage, that the problem will be addressed.

20 For this cycle, yes.

21 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: But it was not 22 addressed previously. I think you alluded to at least 23 two previous cycles where --

24 At least two previous 25 cycles.

NEAL R. GROSS ClI IRT RFPi)RTFRS AND TRANSCRIBERS

38 1 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: -- it should have 2 been done, the work should have been and it wasn't 3 done.

4 V That's correct.

5 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. And that 6 would constitute a miscommitment if it wasn't 7 communicated, if it wasn't communicated as a change to 8 the NRC, potentially.

9 *That is correct.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Okay. Do 11 you have anything else that's like that?

12 Well, one issue that is a 13 different issue than what we discussed, once in a 14 while I look at the notifications when I get time.

15 One that concerned me last week, written byi 16 t ltalks about guidelines 17 for SORC member periodic training.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What's the date on 19 that again?

20 21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It couldn't be.

22 2 That's the end date, I'm 23 sorry, W !is the date, I'm sorry.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: 4 l 25 Yes.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

39 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:

2 W 3 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Is he a 4

5 I know he's at least --

6 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Or an, 7 I know he's at least -- yes, 8 I think he is an 9 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Is he?

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What side is he?

!I2: Salem.

.12. SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Salem side?

13 Salem, yes.

14 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: This is what, did 15 you say training qualifications for SORC members?

e6 17 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: And is there some 18 implication that people are overdue?

19 19i That's how I read this.

20 SENIOR-ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

21 ma And I'll leave this with 22 you.

23 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Does it 24 say how many are there or is it just --

25 It says, "Description of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

40 1 condition, procedure, SHOPDGZZ0004, Guidelines for 2 SORC member of periodic training specifies continued 3 training for SORC members and annual training plan and 4 records of this training. This training has not 5 occurred recently in the last several months nor is 6 there a training plan. Impact on plant personal 7 safety, no immediate safety impact. SORC is made up 8 of knowledgeable and experienced personnel. Specified 9 training is to keep SORC personnel current on lessons 10 learned relevant to their duties, et cetera, et 11 cetera." To me that's a serious issue. The people 12 making the decisions on when we can start, when we 13 can't start, what plant safety issues are and they're 14 not qualified to make those decisions. That's a 15 worry, and I'll leave that with you.

16 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Any other 17 issues that you have?

18 Other issues I have. I just' 19 want to see this place get better and work better and 20 not violate any NRC commitments or tech specs and 21 voice specific issues not at the moment. As I do get 22 them I will volunteer them.... -

23 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Let me'ask 24 you about some things that we've become aware of just 25 through the residents, through interviews, and maybe NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

41 1 you could help shed some light on them. One was I 2 think it was 23SW20 there was a problem with a valve 3 and the way we understand it, at least the way I 4 understand it, was that's a service water valve. It 5 was scheduled to be VOTES tested and there was a fill-6 in vent evolution that was also supposed to go on it.

7 And my understanding was it was supposed to be VOTES 8 tested first -- and I don't know if you're familiar 9 with the testing --

10 . Extremely.

11 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: -- but usually 12 you set the, limit switches, and, torque switches and 13 then they control when the valve stops. And my 14 understanding was the fill-in vent was done before the 15 VOTES testing and because the limit switch and the 16 torque switches weren't set properly, the valve 17 actually drove up through the actuator.. Are you aware 18 of that?

19 That is a correct statement, 20 and I'm intimately involved and knowledgeable on those 21 valves.

22 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. And the 23 thing that I was trying to personally understand is 24 how that could happen, how that could be done out of 25 sequence.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

42 1 . The reason I heard was 2 scheduling pressure to get that header filled.

3 Whoever made that decision, I didn't get a name on who 4 made that decision but someone in the Outage Group 5 made that decision and didn't understand what VOTES 6 was, didn't understand the condition of that valve 7 prior to that decision.

8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. So the 9 made a decision without understanding the implications 10 of the decision.

11

  • Correct.

12 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. And would 13 there be a record of that somewhere? I mean is that 14 something that can be identified who made that 15 decision?

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Or do you know who we 17 should talk to. to get a more clear --

18 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Or do you know 19 who made the decision?

20 I would talk with*

21 22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:

23 24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What's his position?

25He's NEAL R. GROSS f') JOT P=WPT1D* ANn TRAM.R IRPPR

43 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Anybody else 2 involved that you know of?

3 4 Just to present that exact 4 example and that type of decision happens here all the 5 time, and it's not right.

6 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: See, one of the 7 struggles that we have as a regulator is when there.

8 are allegations made that there is inappropriate 9 management or undo scheduling pressure or production 10 over safety, we have . to be able to point to a 11 consequence and it has to have a safety impact, and it 12 has to be a nuclear safety impact for us to get our 13 attention. We don't discount the other things, but it 14 ends up-being more of information that we might share 15 at the conclusion of our review. Whereas if something 16 leads to a violation, say, like for example if you 17 said because of our scheduling practices and because 18 we do things a certain way, we've missed surveillances 19 and especially if you've identified it, let's say. If 20 you said, "I've identified that our practices are such 21 that we miss surveillances on equipment," that's 22 something we can say --

23 (END TAPE 1, SIDE A) 24 (BEGIN TAPE 1, SIDE B) 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We're on Side NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

44 1 B. It's approximately 2:59 p.m.

2 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: We're talking 3 about surveillances and you get 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> to make one, 4 it says right in the spec, like 403 says that. If 5 there was something like that that we could point to 6 and say, "took, this is how ineffective Work 7 Management has led to tech spec violation or this 8 problem has led to something else." I mean what you 9 described with the breakers is good. I don't have 10 enough knowledge to say whether that's a violation or 11 not. It may or may not be, I just don't know. We'll 12 have to look into the details of that. But that's the 13 kind of threshold we're looking for, just somewhat of 14 a high threshold but that's what we're looking for.

15 And those are the kinds of issues that we could do 16 something about.

17 But if we find something like that, then 18 we can point to other things and say, "Look, here are 19 other examples that didn't reach this threshold but 20 they're still there and they're still occurring." I 21 think it's pretty interesting that you mentioned the 22 fact that an individual that came out of Finance that 23 took over, what was it, what was his title?

24 . .. ..

25 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER:N NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

45 1

  • okay. I don't understand that, but there may 2 be a reason for that.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What you just said so 4 we don't get away from it was you're kind of saying 5 that this is typical of decisions that are made, that 6 you're attributing to schedule pressure. Can you 7 think of other ones that go along that line that come 8 to mind?

9 Off the top of my head, no, 10 but over time I could get specific examples and get 11 you more detailed things that you're asking for.

12 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And one of the 14 specific questions that we're interested in probing 15 with you is had you ever seen or felt or heard of a 16 directive or pressure that placed production over 17 safety? And you're smiling a little bit.

18 A few weeks ago, one of the 19 supervisors did tell one of the workers -- he had an 20 issue, I'm trying to remember exactly what it was, but 21 his supervisor said the words, "If you bring that up 22 as a safety issue, I'm going to discipline you." And 23 that went immediately up through the chain of command 24 and finally got to our new guy that we hired, VP 25 level.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

46 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:

2 (phonetic)?

3 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER:

4.

"personally. He said, "Do 6 something now," and then awaited -- you 7 know, word got down, trickled down quickly, "You don't 8 say that."

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: ..,one 10 your lead union people here?

11 Yes.. Yes.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

13 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: And this is a 14 conversation between' Is is ..- supposedly said, "I'll discipline --

  • iNo. *is the one 16 17 who said that --

18 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

.19 -- to a union guy name 20 21 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

'----:i And .. e went to 22 23 ffirst. didn't respond, so he went 24 toand that was within 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> because 25 that's something that deserves an immediate response.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

47 1 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: What did --

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What was the issue?

3 I don' t remember off the top 4 of my head, I apologize.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Just that he was told 6 to do something and said, "If you bring that back as 7 a safety issue, I'm going to discipline you."

8 Oh, yes, I do remember the 9 issue now. It was a work order that had missing 10 operations on the work order. So the question arose 11 are we doing what is necessary to declare this 12 equipment operable despite its missing operations, 13 it's missing activities on the work order?

14 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: What was the 15 piece of'equipment?

16 I don't remember.

1i It was a 17 safety-related tech spec piece of equipment. So from 18 an SAP point of view, I looked into it and how it 19 happened. Come to find out it was not an issue but 20 when the question was raised is it safety or is there 21 going to be a safety consequence, told this 22 guy, "Don't you even say that or I will discipline 23 you." And that was a very wrong comment to make on 24 his part.

25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Who was the employee NEAL R. GROSS Cri IRT RFPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

48 1 involved?

2 3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Can you just spell it 4 for me?

5 6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And his position?

7 8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:

9 W think that issue has been 10 resolved, though.

Ii SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Do you know how 12 it was resolved?

13 When

    • "'N heard of it.

14 he went to, I keep forgetting the guy's name, --

15 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER:

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: After he went to 17 0 nd didn't get a response you said.

18 Right. He went-up the old 19 chain of command, including and didn't get a 20 response, so he went to l 21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And the 22 got back involved and said .-- this is 23 heresy where you weren't present for this, right?

  • ~No._

24 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So this is what NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE 1St ANf AVF NW

49 1 you're hearing is that after*ii. ...-

2 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Well, we don't 3 know if anybody said anything to 4-yet. You 4 haven't said, have you?

5 As far as I know, well,.

6 told me that after he got done talking to 7 was waiting for him on the floor over 8 here and he asked, "How munch trouble am I in," and I 9 guess they conversed after that, and I don't know what

.10 was said.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You know 12 7talked. You don't know if talked to 13 14 I don't know that.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

16 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Is a 17 steward?

18H 18 *Heis a. He's He' 19 on the 20 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. So that 21 would -- you mean he's above a steward, right?

22 Yes.

23 SENIOR - ENGINEER BARBER: I don't 24 understand all the hierarchy.

25 1That's all right. Yes, he's NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

50 1 a real obnoxious go-getter who does what has to be 2 done guy.

3 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER. Okay.

4 Very aggressive.

5 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Was this a Salem 6 or Hope Creek issue?

7 Salem.

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It was just last 9 week?

10 Within the last two weeks.

~.1i SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Two weeks..

12 And I know there were union 13 meetings, union discussions with"and other 14 people regarding that, and as far as I know, it is a

.15 dead issue.

16 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Why do you think 17 he reacted that way, I'mean what do you 18 think -- is it because he just doesn't know how to 19 interact with people or interact with the union or 20 what was behind that? Is there some -- is there a 21 personality conflict? I mean what's at that root of 22 that?

23 In reality, 24 knows much more about the plant thanidoes, 25 because he used to be an operator.

NEAL R. GROSS '

C1 IRTPRFPnPT;:P Awn TRAMtqrPCIR;PQ

51 1 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

2 He used to be a.

3 actually. And is from Hope Creek.

4 is a Salem guy. It was a Salem issue. I 5 thinklinis so overworked and so many fire 6 drills all the time, he didn't really listen to what 7 was being said. I think it's such a hectic, day-to-8 day, fire drill scenario he didn't understand before 9 he opened his mouth.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

11  :: That's the impression I got.

12 And I've seen that time after time after time..

13 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Do you think he 14 generally knew there wasn't a safety issue and he just 15 told him that? I mean maybe he had been at meetings 16 where this discussion had taken place and he just 17 didn't want to repeat it again. Is that possible or 18 do you think he just was overwhelmed and it was just 19 a kneejerk response?

20

  • I'd like to think it was 21 kneejerk but I don't know that.

22 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You started -- I'm 24 sorry, go ahead.

25 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Well, I just --

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REFORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

52 1 what I'm trying to understand in that interaction is 2 where the hard spot is, if it's a lack of knowledge, 3 if it's poor human interaction skills.

4 T11 It's a piece of both.

5 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: I f it' s -- okay.

6 . Yes. He's not a real 7 personable guy.

8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

9 INM Kind of both.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. All right.

11 Thanks.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: This is something 13 that you went to when I asked you about production 14 over safety issues. Does anything else come to mind?

15 Are you aware of any other issues? Some people would 16 term it a megawatt mentality --

17 I understand.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- pushing non-19 conservative decision making. Does anything else that 20 you're aware of come into that area?

21 I would say no at this time 22 based on most of the field guys know what needs to be 23 done. They don't really bend to schedule pressure.

24 They genuinely are safety conscious but that's 25 contrary to the number of accidents we have so far NEAL R. GROSS

,rvr on%, n DTaD A I1I1M TOAh1Qr1M=P

53 1 this year. I think most of the guys really know the 2 day-to-day real necessary stuff. I don't get that 3 impression from many of the management people. I 4 don't think there are serious nuclear safety issues 5 here. I think once in a while something -- someone 6 will make a wrong decision, does get corrected before 7 it gets to this level. It's rare that -- I don't 8 think you'll ever see a Davis-Besse here because 9 enough guys and myself,.-* will scream to a i0 level high enough to where something will get 11 addressed quickly.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you think that 13 across the board you identified two people who would 14 raise a concern. Is that -- do you see that go across 15 the board? Do people raise issues when they see an

16. issue that causes them some concern?

17 I think for minor stuff, no.

18 I think if it was something genuinely threatening to 19 someone's life or the public or destruction of the 20 plant, absolutely, 21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Minor stuff there's 22 a hesitancy?

23 . Yes. Yes. Kind of the 24 mentality of, hey, the guy made a wrong decision, let 25 him burn for it if he's that stupid. They have the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

54 1 wrong people in the wrong jobs, just like they have a 2 Finance guy doing Work Management. They have -- it's 3 just broad throughout this company, this site.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: They're making it 5 hard on themselves in the way --

6 C.i Absolutely.

7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- they're operating.

8 Yes.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So in terms of 10 concerns that I'm looking at that would involve a 11 public health and safety nature, you're saying 12 automatically they're going.to be -- they'll be raised 13 and nobody's going to let that fall through the 14 cracks. But if there's something that is minor or can 15 make somebody's job easier or something where they 16 would make a suggestion, they may not make it because 17 they're just tired of dealing with the wrong people in 18 the wrong positions?

19 I think those are much 20 better words. Thank you. Yes, that's accurate.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I don't know if it's 22 coming out straight, but I'm trying to get what you're 23 saying.

24 That's exactly right.

25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: The serious issues NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 4 nu *r~- 1I11 A&IM AIP %1 1.1

55 1 are going to be raised, they're not going to let them 2 falter on that, but they're going to maybe not help 3 them out in other areas.

4 T. That is correct.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And it seems to me 6 you've given a couple examples where you say, "Look, 7 this isn't right, this shouldn't happen," so you 8 personally feel you can raise issues?

9 Me, yes, because I'm 10 obnoxious, outgoing kind of guy.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And do you --

12 And I' 1 do what I've got to 13 do.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And can you be that

15. way without fear of retaliation on-site?

16 Now, I can now because our group 17 unionized six years ago.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. You had 19 indicated before that-about five years ago you would 20 have had a problem with that.

21 Five years ago I would have, 22 yes. Absolutely.

23 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Was the union 24 here before that six years but just a different -- for 25 different positions?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

56

.

  • A lot of the guys that had 2 my position graduated from the union because they have 3 -- they've been, there and done their job, so who 4 better suited to plan the work orders to do that?

5 When they came out with, "We're not paying you for 6 anything over 40 hours4.62963e-4 days <br />0.0111 hours <br />6.613757e-5 weeks <br />1.522e-5 months <br /> but we expect you to work 60, 7 70, 80 hours9.259259e-4 days <br />0.0222 hours <br />1.322751e-4 weeks <br />3.044e-5 months <br /> a week for nothing," we're not doing 8 that. You've got to be out of your mind. So our 9 group unionized, 65 guys unionized so that when you 10 force us to work overtime we're going to get paid for 11 it, unlike their supervisors and other management 12 people who don't get paid for it and are expected to 13 work all kinds of killer hours for nothing. We 14 weren't going to do that. And I'm sure there are 15 several company employees who have talked to you guys 16 and won't do it on site, that have asked to talk 17 outside of here, so that kind of answers your 18 question.

19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: In terms of fear of 20 21 Yes. Management people are 22 fearful of raising issues for their jobs, because none 23 of the management people, and I've talked to quite a 24 few of them, know who's the next to go because they do 25 it so randomly and so haphazardly they don't know if NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

57 1 they're going to be able to feed their kids tomorrow 2 morning.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Are you aware of --

4 you're saying that doesn't apply to the union in 5 general, this is management where you would see that 6 concern?

7 That is correct.

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: For purposes of what 9 we're trying to accomplish here in looking at where 10 some, concerns could lead to some serious problems, are 11 you aware of anybody that we should be talking to that 12 if we haven't addressed them, we should talk to them, 13 no matter where they want to be interviewed, that may 14 have issues regarding pressures, decision-making 15 issues?

16 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: If they have any 17 knowledge of any violations, any kinds of safety 18 issues, any kinds of problems on backshifts that 19 happen that just don't get publicized. I know those 20 things happen and some things get addressed and some 21 things don't. Some things get addressed at a low 22 level and they should be elevated. Are there people 23 like that that are out there that you're knowledgeable 24 of that you think we should go talk to, provide some 25 insight, either union or management or SROs, ROs, NEAL R. GROSS n(I ;PT PrPr)RTFP.F ANf TRAArJPIRPPR

58 1 maintenance technicians, foremen, superintendents, 2 whomever?

3 For the record, I'll say no.

4 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

6 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: I wanted to ask 7 -- I wanted to just kind of go back and I want to try 8 and pick your brain a little bit about maybe this 9 current outage. There was also another event, I don't 10 think there was any consequence, and I'm trying to 11 remember the system it was, I think it was either 12 Service Order or maybe Aux Feed where there was a big 13 push to get a pump started, and there was all this 14 work activity. And then the operator went to -- I 15.- think it was Aux Feed maybe -- went to start the pump 16 and he realized he didn't have -- the bus was dead 17 that was supposed to power the pump.

18 Oh, yes, yes.

19 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Did you --

20 I heard about that, yes. It 21 was Bravo Bus was out of service at the time.

22 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

23 :4 That was a scheduling issue.

24 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Now, was that a 25 schedule pressure issue or what exactly was that?

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

59 1 That just seemed like a real oddity. Seemed like 2 there was a big push, just the way it was described.

3 Big push, big push, got to get the system back up, got 4 to do this, get it done. It was one of the motor-5 driven aux feed pump.

6 As far as I know, that would 7 be in the bucket of a scheduling issue. They just put 8 it in the wrong place, that's all.

9 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Because I 10 think there was some knowledge of it in shift turnover 11 but there was some thinking that the work was going to 12 be done in-parallel. Is there a lot of things like 13 that? I mean if we were to - if you were to sit down 14 and say do a -- look at some of the condition reports 15 that were, I don't know, that have been written over 16 the last month or so, do you think you'd see a lot of 17 those kinds of things showing up?

18 -. Yes. I try to at least once 19 a week read all the notifications written for the

.20 previous week and there are just a lot of nonsense 21 issues.

22 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Do you think 23 there's any of those that could be left, I mean that 24 there are conditions that are really undesirable that 25 just through maybe the condition reporting system that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

60 1 might get left unattended? I mean is there any things 2 that are written say in the second or third week of 3 October, which is when you were just getting started 4 in the outage, there may be things like this that 5 there was some follow-up that was planned and maybe 6 the follow-up hasn't been done?

7 I'm sure there are things 8 out there that are -- that will remain open.

9 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: I'll tell you 10 what I'm concerned with. I'm concerned with there's 11 a piece of safety-related equipment that there's a 12 problem with and like this 23SW21 I'm fairly certain 13 they probably had to replace the valve in the 14 operator, probably lock, stock and barrel, take the 15 old one out, put a-new one in, but there's something 16 else out there that's like that where there's a piece 17 of equipment that's either is broken or in some way 18 degraded that's in the condition reporting system, 19 that there's some problem with it and somebody's going 20 to work on it and-it's not going to get worked, and 21 it's going to get forgotten. And is there any way 22 that you could look --

23 That usually does not happen 24 here. Is there a way I can learn that, retrieve that 25 data?

NEAL R. GROSS Cll IPRT RFPORTFRS AND TRANSCRIBERS

61 1 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Yes.,

2 " -Yes. Yes, there is, and 3 I'll commit to you that I will look for some of those 4 things.

5 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay.

6 M But usually when we come out 7 of an outage the individual components and systems are 8 tested independently and usually very surprising to 9 see the 23SW20 valve. That was an exception.

10 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Okay. Okay.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Anything else?

12 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: No.

13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Is there anything 14 else you would like to add that either we haven't 15 brought up to you or you think you would like to get 16 on the record?

17 Just one comment of 18 management employees, them being in fear of bringing 19 issues to their leaders in fear of retribution for 20 their jobs. That scares me. You know, I can read 21 Davis-Besse, I can see what happens in my day-to-day 22 world, but I can't be everywhere to see everything at 23 all levels, no one can. There are hundreds of these 24 people out there, management, that are afraid to speak 25 for their jobs. And that worries me because at three NEAL R. GROSS rCl IRT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

62 1 in the morning when something happens I would like to 2 think that it doesn't get swept under the carpet, I 3 don't think it does, but or at least one way or 4 another those issues get identified somehow, but all 5 management people here are in fear for their jobs, and 6 that's not conducive to safety conscious work 7 environment when that fear exists.

8 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Has anybody 9 actually told you that? Do you have like management 10 that's come to you and said, "I'd like to do something 11 about this but they're getting rid of people and I 12 don't want my name to appear on a list somewhere."

1*ý *I've talked to some people 14 that their attitudes are they'll do what they have to 15 do to make sure this place is correct in configuration 16 and runs right, whatever means that may be, but they 17 are afraid to bring issues to their immediate 18 supervision. Most things are resolve covertly but 19 they do get'resolved.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How do you mean 21 covertly?

22 Meaning the Level 2 that I 23 wrote with the breakers I'm going to watch it, I'm 24 going to see who answers what and how they answer it.

25 I'm going to follow through with Engineering to make NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

63 1 sure they address the future issues. Am I confident 2 my boss is going to answer it correctly? No, I'm not.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We're at the 4 end of your time. I just want to take one minute of 5 your time off the record here. I just have a concern 6 I wanted to explore.

7 (Whereupon, the foregoing matter went off 8 the record for a short period of time.)

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We're back on 10 the record after about, oh, a four-minute break there.

11 In summary, what we decided to do is 12 going to. provide some additional information. to us 13 regarding this assessment involving some people to 14 talk to, but there are a few steps he wants to take 15 first, and we'll leave it at that for now. Time frame 16 -for that? We didn't.establish one.

17 *j By Wednesday, next week?

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. All right.

19 That will be great.

20 I'll also provide an Excel 21 report for the previous cycle breaker testing.

22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. I think that 23 was the only documentation?

24 SENIOR ENGINEER BARBER: Well, and if 25 there's any other issues -- you said you think there NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

64 1 probably won't be, but if there's any issues that came 2 up during the outage that related to safety-related 3 equipment that were degradations or problems with --

4 that there's a possibility that they will not get 5 corrected or if there's still work outstanding, we 6 just want to have the opportunity to be able to go 7 back and look.

8 _ I'll look.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And this is our copy?

10 Yes 12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

12 have I or any other NRC employee offered you any.

13 promises of reward or threatened you in any manner in 14 exchange for your information today?

15 No.

.16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Have you appeared 17 here freely and voluntarily?

19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Andat this.

20 point, we have decided nothingfurther to add to the 21 record right now.

22 That's correct.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Well, thank 24 you for your time.

25 Great. Thank you.

NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

65 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: The interview is 2 over. It is about 3:26 p.m.

3 (Whereupon, at 3:26 p.m., the Interview of 4 i K> was concluded.)

5 6

7 8

9 10 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 NEAL R. GROSS M.fI IRT RF:PC)RTFRq ANfl TRAt'J.C.RIRFRR

Retrieved from "https://kanterella.com/w/index.php?title=ML061790614&oldid=2253640"