Text

OI Interview Transcript of Witness
	ML061790624
Person / Time
Site:	Salem, Hope Creek
Issue date:	03/02/2004
From:	; NRC/OI
To:	;
References
	1-2003-051F, FOIA/PA-2005-0194, NRC-1364
	Download: ML061790624 (132)
	v • d • e

Official Transcript of Proceedings NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION ff..itJ

Title:

Interview of Docket Number:- 1-2003-051 F. &

Location: Hope Creek NPS Date: Tuesday, March 2, 2004 Work Order No.: NRC-1 364. Pages 1-130 NEALA R.-GROSS AND CO., INC.

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

Washington, D.C. 20005 (202) 234-4433

- L,,, .J.%,% in tins record was deleled inaccordance with the.Freedom of Information Act, exemptions**--/¢ EOIA-

1 UNITED STATED OF AMERICA 2 NUCLEAR'REGULATORY COMMISSION 3

4 OFFICE OF INVESTIGATIONS 5 INTERVIEW 6 ---------------------

7 IN THE MATTER OF:

8 INTERVIEW OF : Docket No.

9

-1tll : 1-2003-051F 10 *(CLOSED)

11. ----------------------

Tuesday, March 2, 2004 13 14 AOM's *Office 15 Hope .Creek Nuclear Power Station 16 17 The above-entitled interview was conducted 18 at 2:39 p.m.

19 BEFORE:

20 Special Agent Eileen Neff, NRC/RI/OI 21 22 Also Present:

23 SCOTT BARBER, Senior Project Engineer::-

24 25 NEAL R. ýGROSS,,

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2 1 P-R-O-C-E-E-D-I-N-G-S 2 (2:39 p.m.)

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Today's date 4 is March 2nd, 2004, and the time is approximately 2:39 5 p.m. Speaking is Special Agent Eileen Neff, U.S. NRC 6 Region I, Office of Investigations.

7 Also present from Region I and from the 8 Division of Reactor Projects is Senior Project 9 Engineer Scott Barber. What follows is an interview 10 of spelled- '

employed by PSEG Nuclear a'stheO 12" t Hope Creek.

13 Correct.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: As agreed this 15 interview is being tape recorded, and the location of 16 .the interview is th. office at the Hope Creek 17 Station. The subject matter of this interview 18 concerns a safetyl conscious work environment.

19 It has been explained t that he 20 is not the subject of aniy investigation, and that you 21 are being approached as a witness for your assessment 22 of the *work environment"' at the station, and you 23 understand that, right?

SYes, I do.

24 25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And you were NEAL R. GROSS 4(1 lc- j-.

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3 1 also further advised that there is no particular 2 subject of investigation, in that there is no 3 potential violations associated with the safety 4 conscious work environment.

5 And as I explained to you before going on 6 the record, we would conduct the interview under oath, 7 okay? Would you please raise your right hand to be 8 sworn in.

9 (whereupon,'was sworn.)

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Briefly, could you 11 give me -- well, I'm sorry, actually what I need is 12 .some complete identification information for you.

,1,3 Your date of birth and social security number?

14 16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And a home address,

17. please?>

18 .

19 20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Thank you. And a 21-, brief summary of your education?

22 23 24 25

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4 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And then work 2 history.

3 JI have been in the nuclear 4 industry since"

/5I went 6 through the' 7

8 And in' I came to Hope Creek as a

"., e o " if"t

.... and I as *m* , .

10 andnow am the 11 i 12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So when were you 1-3 *jat. Hope Creek then?

14. 1 was at Hope Creek

15. in August o as an 16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And then when were

.17 youI

-:18 . "Approximately--I don'.t know.

19 Well, later.

20 SPECIAL AGENTNEFF: So in. theo time" 21 frame?

22 In th and time 23 frame.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: As a 25 Arid promoted too in what year? Do you recall?

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55 1

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. When you were 3 in that *IM time frame, who had you 4 been reporting to, your ]at that time, and your*,.

5 7 My first 6

7 8 ..... .....

9. SPECIAL.AGENT NEFF: And then were you 10 11 Yes, I succeeded

12. SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And what about senior 13 management then? Who were you working with at that 14 point in time?

15 Senior managers would have 16- been a 'chain that well, I remember 17 "' / "in those senior 18 positions while I was alMw 19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: With regard to 20 S"..they flipped in the 21 . position at-some point'in time?

.... . "*** - .and 22 23 then *-and through both of those tenures, I 24 believe "that g was the 25 nAll NEAL R. GROSS /~(( ~7&-~-

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6 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. What I would 2 first like to doJ.s to talk about an incident that we 3 have heard a lot about, and it is an incident that 4 goes back to March if 2003, the bypass valve.

5 Sure.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: There was a 7 reactivity management event associated with it, and 8 there were some other issues surrounding that in the 9 handling of the bypass valve incident, and we talked 10 to a lot of people, and we have looked at a lot of 11 whatever available documentation we have, and we have 12 examined the issue pretty closely.

13 And the sense that we get is that at that 14 point in time you were, placed in a pretty 15 uncomfortable position by your senior management, and 1-6 what I would like to know is how do you respond to 17 that?

18 Are we wrong in that assessment? How do 19 you feel about that. situation?

20 About the question as to 21 whether or not to go in, and repair the bypass valve 22 and start up or not start up; or for the handling of 23 the reactivity event?'

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I realize that there 25 is two issues there, and the question is about the

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7 1 start up, and let's talk about that.

2 Well, what I would or how I 3 would couch that is that when the reactor SCRAM was 4 actually carried out by the crew, the bypass valve 5 reflection wouldn't close, and there were some 6 questions by people in the organization as to, well, 7 the valve is closed, and it is not stuck open anymore.

8 So it is not a problem and can we start 9 back up, and that wasn't going to happen. We were not 10 going to start up the plant until we understood what

.11 the problem was with the bypass valve. But I had to 12 explain that to the organization.

13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And when you say 14 organization and some people in the organization, I 15 would like you to'be a little more specific. Can you 16 tell.me where the questions were coming from?

17 I know that were some 18 questions. I thinkicame over to a meeting 19 that we had that morning and specifically asking

20. questions of the plant status and where we were 21 headed.

22 And basically I ended up going to a 23 meeting ii . ffice to discuss that. And 24 I was asked a lot of very specific questions with 25 regards to why we could not start the plant up.

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8 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And who was present 2 at that meeting?

3 ý Z7 a n S I thinkay have been there, and I think 5 *was there, and I think that the 6 maintenance director was there. I don't remember his 7 name right now. And I think that there were 3 or 4 8 other people in the room, but I don't recall their 9 names.

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Were they outage 11 people?

12 MR. BARBER: QA people?

13 I don't remember who was there 14 from QA, but now .that you mention the outage group, 15 there was an outage group guy there who is no longer 16 here working, and I don't recall his name either. I 17 would have to think about that.. I am not good with 18 names and so I don't remember who he was. But he is 19 no longer an employee here. He is gone.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now these are all 21 individuals that are all gathered at one point in 22 time, or at different points in time?

23 I remember a protected meeting 24 in#-office with this group there for a 25 coup le o f hou r s . NRO NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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9 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: For a couple of 2 hours? We areigetting 3 or 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months . Does that sound 3 accurate?

4 Well, I think the total time 5 involved in the decision making process for making the 6 presentation to senior management and getting the buy-7 in to go ahead with what I felt we should do probably 8 lasted 3 to 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months as a total time.

9 I don't know that it was always spent in 10 that office, *but it caused a 3 or 4 hour4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months delay in the 11 cool down of the plant.

12. SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Can you go

.13 .into that in terms of if you are on this side of the 14 fence with your position, were others with you, or 15 were you convincing others that were not with you? I 16 mean, can you divide it up among the people that were 17 there and where they stood on the issue?

18 I would tell you that I don't 19 remember a'lot of conversation from the other people 20 in the room. I don't remember people having a strong 21 position until I was making a case and answering 22 questions, and basically I said, that I would not 23 authorize a start up of the unit until we had done 24 that, and it was not going to happen until we actually 25 went in and determined the extent and condition of the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS A

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10 1 valve.

2 And at that time I remember 3and I thinkad affirmed my position, and 4 said that is what we need to do.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So did you have to 6 state your case for that 3 to 4 hour4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months time frame? I 7 mean, how long did it take for you to explain your 8 position?

9 -.. don't know. I don't recall.

10 I know that it was a 3 or 4 hour4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months delay in the cool 11 down of the plant. I don't know that I was there for 12 3 hours3.472222e-5 days 8.333333e-4 hours 4.960317e-6 weeks 1.1415e-6 months or 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months in that meeting. I just don't 13 remember.

14 But there were a lot of very direct 15 questions on understanding why the bypass valve was 16 still considered inoperable when it was closed, and 17 what was my justification, and I think I left the room 18 and went and got some technical specifications.

19 I think that I got a copy of the 20 surveillance procedure, and I brought back some 21 written documentation to the meeting to discuss it.

22 So there was time spent out of the room while I was 23 collecting some data and coming back.

24 so it was not all conversational. I did 25 some drawing on the board, and some explanation of the NEAL R. GROSS7 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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1i 1 way that the system operates, and the way that it 2 performs, and then a rather detailed explanation of 3 system operation and technical specification 4 requirements, and why I thought the valve was 5 inoperable and required an extended condition on 6 resolving the issue.

7 MR. BARBER: And who was the discussion 8 with primarily?

9 1 think that most of the 10 questions that I answered were directed at me by*.*

11 MR. BARBER: Okay. So kind of help us

'12 understand the picture. Was it one of these 13 situations where suddenly a fairly large group, maybe 14 .10 people or so, 8 to 10, to 12 people --

15 Yeah, 8 to 10 people would be 16 a good number.

17 MR. BARBER: And there is a dialogue it 18 appears between you and and they are listening 19 and forming an opinion one way or the other. Did 20 anybody else play a significant role in the discussion 21 at any point along the way that caused the discussion 22 to tip one way or the other?

23 It sounds like you said that and 24 WJendorsed your.position somewhere along the 25 way.. I*

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12 1 Correct.

2 MR. BARBER: But was there any individuals 3 that spoke up one way or the other?

4 4- Not remembering all the 5 players in the room at the time, and since you 6 refreshed my memory that there was a guy there from 7 the outage organization, I remember that he spoke, and 8 I believe his conversation was supportive of my 9 position.

10 But I don't remember the rest of the 1i players in the room at that time.

12 MR. BARBER: Okay. But what was your 13 sense though in the discussion? Did you have to 14 convince him that this was the right thing to-do, or 15 was it just that you were just explaining the 16 situation?

17 Well, I don't think the 18 opinion of the rest of the people in the room was the 19 same as mine. I don't, in their vision of what that 20 meeting was all about.

21 As an operator making significant 22 decisions for the station, I have had to provide that 23 justification to on a number of occasions in the 24 past. His engagement in understanding what we are 25 doing was relatively high.

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13 1 I don't know this as a fact, but I am 2 pretty sure that I would have spent a sufficient 3 amount of time in that room explaining to him why I 4 wanted to start up the plant without fixing the bypass 5 valve, just as much as I would have spent time in that 6 room explaining to him why I wanted to keep it shut 7 down until we fixed it.

8 MR. BARBER: Well, what you described in 9 trying to start up the plant seems less defensible 10 than wanting to shut the unit down. I mean, to 11 continue the cool down of the unit and identify .the 12 *root cause of the problem, seems more--

13 A Well, yes, from an ij 14 perspective I think it is much easier to defend to 15 shut down and do an extended condition, than it is to 16 start up without knowing.

17 MR. BARBER: Right. And one thing that we 18 are not clear on is why the protracted.period of time.

19 Why not -- you know, we talked to a number of 20 different people and polled a number of individuals 21 and they all felt that. the right decision was to cool 22 the unit down .and get into the bypass valve, and look 23 in and find out what the problem was. Why didj7 24 need that kind of convincing?

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14 1 the information and the justification to be able to 2 talk to corporate and be able to say this is why we 3 are going to keep our unit down, even though corporate 4 would like to understand why we are not coming back up 5 on line when the bypass valve is not doing its job.

6 And I think that he needed the data to 7 support that to talk to corporate and say this is why 8 we are not bringing our unit back up.

9 MR. BARBER: How would they even know that 10 level of detail? I mean, how would they even know the

-bypass valve had not shut when the unit SCRAMed?

12 Oh, I couldn't tell you that.

13 .I would imagine the communications that take place 14 between senior management and corporate on the status

15. of a unit being on-line or off-line are probably 16 relative significant and frequent, but that would be 17 out of my purview.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Did-you participate 19 4.

in any discussions that involved corporate in that?

20 <'7ý No, I did not.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Were they present on 22 the phone or in any way engaged in what you were 23 explaining?

24 I don't believe they were, no.

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15 1 that meeting time.

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And do you think that 3 may have been' driving ý where he needed 4 justification for it?

5 I think he specifically said 6 one time during the meeting that he needs to explain 7 to corporate what we are doing with our asset down 8 here, and he wants to have a good solid story when he 9 tells them what we are doing.

10 That is not a quote, but I think he alluded to needing to explain what we are doing with 12 the facility down there.

1.3 MR. BARBER: Did have an 14 operations-background?

15 D Ibelieve he has a relatively 16 strong operations background.

.17 MR. BARBER: Did it seem reasonable to you 18 that the questions that he was asking over this period 19 of time, and not that he doesn't have the right and 20 even the responsibility to ask probing questions, but 21 just the extent to which --

22 To take it at face value 23 because he-knows the store already?.

24 MR. BARBER: No, not even that, but why 25 didn't the discussion take a half-an-hour or an hour NEAL R.GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS

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16 1 instead of 2 hours2.314815e-5 days 5.555556e-4 hours 3.306878e-6 weeks 7.61e-7 months , or 2-1/2, or 3, or 4, or whatever?

2 I mean, there is obviously some amount of time that is 3 going to be an optimum amount of time.

4 But 3 or 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months just doesn't seem to fit 5 the need or the desire to take conservative action.

6 I mean, I can see it going the other way, and I can 7.. see if you want to turn around and say let's take the 8 unit back up. I can see where you might want to take 9 that amount of time, but just to say, no, we want to 10 continue the cool down and get in and look.

2 Iwould saythat with me being 12 relatively new to the position, whether I was the 13 designated-senior license holder or not, due to the 14 absence of my direct supervisor, who was away, 15 and me being in a position of making significant 16 decisions for the station from a viewpoint of a lower

.17 tier management employee, I think he wanted to 18 understand that I knew what I was talking about, and 19 that I was making the right decision for the company 20 from the perspective of what is the safe thing to do 21 from an operations orientation..

22 I am going to tell you that

23. is a tough guy to be in a conversation with. He can 24 be very blunt, and he can be very asserting, but that 25 was his management style.

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17 1 I was never afraid ofC and 2 him and I had had multiple convdrsations of that sort, 3 and for me to say that I was in a difficult position, 4 well, I was having to answer more questions than I 5 thought that I needed to.-

6 And I had to go do some research on them 7 because I came to the table without enough answers, 8 but I don't think that any of the questions that he 9 asked me were inappropriate.

10 And I think that his methodology and the 11 way that he conducted himself during that briefing may

.12' have caused the rest of the people in the room to be 13 at a higher discomfort level than I-was.

14 I was uncomfortable because I came without 15 sufficient answers, but when I gave him my answers, he 16 says okay, and if that is what I want, then let's go 17 do it.

18 MR.' BARBER: 'What was-that point? I mean, 19 was there something that he was looking for that once 20 you said something in a certain way, or at a certain 21 point, what was he looking for?

22 I can't say that there was 23 something crystal in my mind that I knew that I had 24 done, or I was done when I said those words. I can't 25 say that I can recall that.

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18 1 It was not enough for me to say that the 2 bypass valve is inoperable, whether it is shut or not, 3 because it currently won't pass its surveillance, and 4 so it is inoperable.

5 And so I can't start up the plant and go 6 above 25 percent power, and I am certainly not going 7 to start it up until I understand why it didn't work.

8 That wasn't -- you know, it would be nice to say that 9 that is all you need to -say, but then I needed to 10 provide and understand the justification of what the 11 bypass valves do for me, and why it takes more than

.12 surveillance criteria to determine operability.

13 Why there is more things engaged than what 14 operability is all about. It is not enough to say 15, that passing a surveillance means that something is 16 operable. So don't use that as your only reason to 17 say that it:is inoperable. What goes along with that.

18 And I didn't come prepared to the table to 19 discuss that. So I had to do some'little research, 20 and some backtracking, and thinking on my feet to talk 21 about those issues.

22 S*PECIAL AGENT NEFF: It seems that the way 23 that it has been reported to us is that it was black 24 and white. It was crystal clear. You could not start 25 up and you needed to figure out why it had failed in NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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19 1 the first place.

2 7j It was to me.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And it was to you as 4 reported, and you and others in operations management 5 believed it to be a rather simple issue. So to see a 6 3 to 4 hour discussion of questioning, probing, 7 pushing, on understanding. why you can't start up in 8 that position stand out as an incident.

9 Yes, and.I would say that we -

10 - and I want to be careful about the 3 to 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months . It 11 did cause me 3 to 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months in delay and doing the cool 12 down.

13 As a matter of fact, you know, I stopped' 14 the cool down one time because I got some guidance 15 from the director to stop the cool down, and where are 16 youat, until we resolve this issue.

17 And I did, but stopping the cool down was 18 not a significant impact: on us. It didn't jeopardize 19 any of the paths of where we were headed. It was 20 always my intention to ensure that that is where we 21 ended up.

22. And halting the cool down for the time 23 period that we did, it did not have an impact on 24 anything other than scheduling business meetings, and -

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20 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Right.

2 SBut I don't think that I spent 3 I don't think that I was on the defense and 4 explaining my position for 3 to 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months .

5 I was out of the room gathering data and 6 I came back, and I don't know if all the people were 7 there when I came back. There was still a crowd 8 there, but I don't know that everyone was still there.

9 But I clearly understand your questioning 10 attitude and something that appears to be black and 11 white, why did it take 3 to 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months to come to that 12 determination.

13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:, Well, you credited 14 tas being an experienced operator.

15 " Q - Yes, I believe he was.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And would you have 17 the understanding that you would both be on the same 18 page more or less?

19 Right. I think that he wanted 20 to understand what we were doing with the asset, and 21 he wanted to understand that I knew what I was talking 22 about with respect to making a significant decision 23 for this facility.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Did you feel at any 25 point in time that it was direction to you and in NEAL R. GROSS --

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21 1 which way you would go?

2 No, I would say that the only 3 direction that I received that I wasn't happy about 4 was to suspend the cool down, which I got from the 5 director. And I told him later on -- I said later on 6 that I am going to continue the cool down, and we are 7 going to take the unit cold.

8 I think I might have said that I am not 9 jerking the crew around anymore. We are going to a 10 systematic recooling of the unit down and go to full 11 shutdown. And that is the only direction that I got.

12 I didn't.get any direction fro 13 As a matter of fact, if I had to suppose

.14 what direction I ever received froLit would 15 be that I operate the 'unit in accordance with 16 standards with reactivity, and management concern.

17 And, you know, it's not -- I never got any 18 direction that was specificto operating the unit. It 19 was how to operate the unit.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: His expectations?

21 His expectations, yes, of how 22 things worked.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Going back just a 24 little bit on your -- well, it is more or less an 25 assumption when you are saying that he was looking for NEAL R. GROSS /4[(( 7ci COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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22 1 a justification.

2 That is my assumption.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And in that time 4 frame, at any point in time, did you get the 5 impression that he was pressuring for the start up 6 because of -- or for any reason at all? That he 7 wasn't questioning, but that he was pressuring for the 8 start-up in this length of time discussion?

9 No, I don't. As a matter of 10 fact, what surprised me was that in the term of that 11 conversation, meeting, discussion, that it utilized 4

.12. hours of what would typically be considered critical 13 path time and putting the unit in a condition to do 14 work, or starting up a unit, was not a concern.

15 And it could have been a 5 hour5.787037e-5 days 0.00139 hours 8.267196e-6 weeks 1.9025e-6 months or a 6 16 hour meeting, and we would have held right now, and 17 when we made our decision,.we would have implemented 18 the plan. -So I was surprised that from a senior 19 management viewpoint that we weren't -- that I wasn't

20. being pressured to move forward in any direction.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You were holding?

22 I was holding and that it was 23 okay to hold for 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months of critical path time without 24 regard to whether that is going to cost us either in 25 a start up or in the time that it takes us to get shut NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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23 1 *down.

2 And.I have the sense, and I don't remember 3 if it is because of conversation or not, that that 4 time wasn't important. It was important for us to 5 understand that we were doing the right thing.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What about in terms 7 of where at in this particular point in 8 the decision making? . From'what we are seeing, you 9 were portrayed as somebody more or less in the middle, 10 and possibly being seen as having to defend a 11 position.

.12 .And Ops Management. is saying this is what 13- we need to do, and you are explaining that. You are 14 explaining that.. But consider it from this point of 15 view; did you se as also in the middle, 16 and having to defend where he is- going to move the 17 plant, or -where the plant will be going from his 18 chain-of-command?

19 Did you get the sense that he was

.20 pressured in that way?

jjj I didn't have the sense that 21 22 he was pressured, but it was clear to me that he had 23 to provide an explanation of what we were doing with 24 the unit to corporate PSEG.

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24 1 position, who would that be?

2 I.don't know. I don't know 3 who he would have conversations with.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What has been 5 reported to us is that comments that you made 6 indicated, and this is at that time frame, but 7 indicated that there was pressure from the highest 8 levels of PSEG Power on this process decision that you 9 were going through, and that is what has been reported 10 to us.

11i So I just need to turn that out to you, 12 and whether that jogs anything?

13 1 would say that in my

.14 position with the organization and in my participation 15 in that meeting, that I would not have been privy to 16 that.

17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: It was not something 18 that you were privy to?:

19 No.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you know why 21 something like that would be attributed to you?

22 To.me?

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Through conversations 24 that you had that has been reported to us in sworn 25 testimony that there was pressure from PSEG Power, NEAL R. GROSS q(I(ý COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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25 1 from the highest levels of PSEG Power, regarding that 2 process, that 3 to 4 hour4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months discussion while you were in 3 there?

417 Well, do you think the words 5 that I have already provided you, and thatLi" 6 needed to provide justification and an explanation of 7 what we were doing with the asset could be construed 8 as pressure from senior management?

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I can see it being 10 construed that way, but I see a difference in there, 11 and what I am trying to hash out is what is the 12 difference. He may have felt that he needed to 13 justify something, but this is a little stronger.

14 It.is. It is significantly 15 stronger.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Yes.

17 . And it is also inappropriate.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So you are 19 saying that is not what occurred?

20 2i am saying that I did not --

21 if I ever used the words that m - I.was being 22 pressured by senior management to start the union back 23 up, I would say that I did not say those words.

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26 1 to what we were doing with the asset down there, and 2 whether or not he was pressured is not something that 3 I know.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Okay.

5 So I don't knowthat I -- I 6 would not have said that. I would not have said that 7 was being pressured to start up the unit, 8 because I didn't know that, and I can't --

9 MR. BARBER: Well, would you have inferred 10 that just from the line of questioning that he was

11. asking you?.

12 Well, I don't think so.

13 Certainly I could have inferred that, but I don't 14 think that I did.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: But you think that 16 the closest that you are coming to that particular 17 statement would be that he needed justification in 18 terms of when the asset would be moved?

19 2 Correct.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And that is the 21 closest that you would cometo astatementlike that?

22 I think so..

23 MR. BARBER: Is it possible that when you 24 were completing your explanation with him that what he 25 was really looking for is some absolutely irrefutable NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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27 1 explanation that pointed at a tech spec, and saying 2 that this is part of our license, and we are not 3 meeting it :in this particular element of the 4 discussion, and there is no equivocation that we have 5 to shut the unit down because we are not reading our 6 license?

7 Do you think that is what he was looking 8 for, that he was looking for the absolute last bit of

9. irrefutable evidence that said that we made the 10 argument?

11 ".if it was as simple as a tech 12 spec compliance issue,' it would have been a done deal 13 from when'we started the conversation. I think it was 14 more along the lines of -- I am going to tell you that 15 every time that I was in a conversation with 16

ill h was trying to make me think outside the 17 box and-explain, and provide justification for the 18 things that we needed to do at a nuclear power 19 station.

20 He was never satisfied with a quick go 21 with the dancer. That was never satisfactory. You 22 always had to have a thought process behind it, and 23 you had to have 2 or 3 questions in depth for each 24 question that was asked to be able to explain why you 25 do things here at a nuclear power station.

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28 1 He was in the education mode with me every 2 time that we had a conversation, and I never had an 3 easy conversation with him. It was never easy to walk 4 into his office and talk about something, and have it 5 take 5 minutes.

6 I got educated every time that I went 7 there, and I don't think that his standards for 8 nuclear power on what we should do and how we should 9 operate a nuclear facility are in question.

10 I think that his presentation skill and ii the way that he talks to people, if you are not in 12 tune with what he is trying to accomplish can send an 13 entirely different message, and one that I did not 14 recognize at the time, but I see it now as potentially i15 challenging and stifling, and being overbearing.

16 And because I had a good first meet up 17 with him, and he explained to me what he was all 18 about, I was not challenged by him that way. I didn't 19 look at him as being threatening and -domineering, and 20 forcing me to do something that I don't want to do.

21 And I. know that I could never walk in that 22 office with a lame answer. I had to provide 23 sufficient justification and explanation of all the 24 things that I decided to do with the issue at hand.

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29 1 that the conversation went the way it did and the 2 interplay between you an did you feel that you 3 were swinging on the limb a little bit because you had 4 -- well, Wasn't here?

5 That's correct.

6 MR. BARBER: And he was off and away from 7 the station, and was here, and he could 8 have supported you. jwas here, even 9 though he maybe wasn't in Ops at the time, and he had 10 a *ton of operational experience, and he could have 11 provided some insight one way or the. other.

Do you feel like you weren't getting any 12 13 support from the leaders that maybe should have 14 provided it?

.1" I would tell you that I never 16 thought that.V was a strong leader. I 17 don't know what his background -- I couldn't tell you 18 what his background is. I didn't think-that he was a 19 dynamic leader.

20 That I didn't get that -kind of support 21 from him was disappointing, but I would tell you that 22 I probably also didn't expect it either, because I

23. don't know how strong his technical background was.

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30 1 experience would rally and help me answer questions.

2 I didn't think about that.

3 c certainly has sufficient background 4 and technical knowledge to clearly understand the 5 issue, and could have easily said, yeah, that's right, 6 we're done. Let's go and fix it.

7 . But I am going to tell you that I don't 8 remember if spoke or not. I don't know if he 9 did. He may have added support. I don't remember.

10 I think he was there, but I don't remember any 11 participation. You could easily refresh me and jog my 12 memory, but I don't know that he did.

13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What about wit I 14 I know that he was off-site at the time, but 15 did you have discussions with him regarding this 16 event?

17 Yes, I did; of the event, you 18 mean about the meeting or the reactivity?

19 SPECIALAGENT NEFF: More about the after, 20 after the bypass valve wouldn't close, did you have 21 discussions with him about that as you can recall?

22 Probably in passing, but not 23 in any great detail. I would say that the working 24 relationship tha and I had was not as strong as 25 it should have been.

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31 1 I would say that immediately after that 2 event his whole life became engrossed in the 3 reactivity event and the root cause analysis, and him 4 and I -: he worked in that sphere, and he was also 5 functioning as the quasi-plant manager.

6 So he was working as 7 and he worked in that sphere and I 8 worked with operating the unit. So the strength of 9 our relationship was not the strength that I currently 10 have with this plant manager, or with my current Ops 11 manager.

12 We separated and we divided and conquered 13 the accountabilities that needed to be done. I am 14 sure that I had a conversation With after the 15 fact that we had this big meeting, and talking about 16 the start it'up or shut it down question.

17 But I don't remember ever sitting down in 18 his office, and having a discussion with him where I 19 complained about it took me four hours to convince the 20 organization to shut the plant down. I don't remember 21 ever having had that conversation 22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you recall what 23 you relayed to him in general about what went on with 24 that?

25 .No, I'm sorry, I don't.

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32 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: In coming out of that 2 experience, and that particular event, your meetings 3 and whatever it took you to convince senior management 4 and others of the direction that you were going to go 5 with it, what was your feeling after having gone 6 through something like that?

7 V-Well that was pretty obvious 8 to me. I mean, I can recall that. That was a 4 hour4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months 9 delay in what I wanted to accomplish, and I don't 10 think it should have taken 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months .

11 I am not going to and regardless of 12 what I jus said about my relationship with*

13 being in the-and 14 having to explain or justify what you are doing is not 15 a walk in the park.

16 It had some stress, and what am I doing, 17 and am I doing the right thing, and why did the 18 explanation have to be so detailed. So, yes, it was 19 not a pleasant experience for me. But I thought about 20 it numerous times afterwards, and not in the detail of 21 the words and conversation, but I really am satisfied

22. that I would have spent 4. hours there, whether I 23 wanted to start it up or shut it down, and providing 24 a justification to senior management on what I wanted 25 to do with the plant.

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33 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, why do you say 2 that? Had you ended up in a conversation of that 3 length from your other perspective at a point in time?

4 M601Oh, no.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Had you been 6 challenged from, let's say, call it the safety aspect?

7 I would say that all of my 17 8 conversations with" were challenging. -It 9 was never, hey, we are going to do this. It was, 10 well, tell me why you are going to do that. Tell me 11 why you are not going to do this.

12 *Give me the justification for doing what 13 you are doing. It had to be -- you had to show the 14 management team that.you had your thought process made 15 well, and it wasn't just a carte blanche rubber stamp 16 on.you walking in there-and saying I am going to do 17 something.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:- Okay.; And in this 19 particular incident, you are looking at your actions 20 were going to be ultimately conservative, in terms of 21 shutting the plant down and figuring out what was 22 wrong with that valve.

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34 1 why we cannot go and start up.

2 j Correct.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Can you think of any 4 incident where you took a tactic, and you would have 5 been more aggressive or less conservative, and you 6 were confronted byjo* ý " or anybody else in 7 your management chain saying --

8 Take me the other way?

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: -- take me the other 10 way. Consider that, and take a more conservative 11 approach.

12 Nothing comes to mind. I

--13 won't tell. you know, -but as I said something comes to 14 my mind right now.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So. you are just saying that; any discussions that you ever 16 had with 17 u would expect to be engaged in a back and 18 forth, no simple answer, and we are going to delve 19 into that, and we are going to challenge that, and we 20 are going to look at that closely?

21 Absolutely, which was 22 surprising to me for a senior manager to be engaged in 23 that kind of detail, and'I have never experienced that 24 before.

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35 1 detail.in operational decisions?

2 Yes.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So can you think of 4 other instances where it was that you were going to 5 take this conservative approach and you engaged in 6 that kind of discussion with jto-that 7 degree?

8 You are kind of portraying it as though it 9 was a fairlycommon event?

10 Yes, I think I had a 11 significant number of conversations with him with 12 respect to the Bravo diesel generator exhaust leak 13 issue, and I think'I spent some time in his office 14 about that as well.

15 -SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And that is fairly 16 well documented, too, the diesel being the whole 17 internal investigation.

18 Well, .-I keep that on my shelf, 19 and so I Jiobk at that problem every, day of my life.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. So from that 21 perspective what were you taking as a position on what 22 was being challenged?

23 What was being challenged was 24 do I have a clear understanding of what I am trying to 25 do. My position back then was that the diesel NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS :I-1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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36 1 generator was operable, and I had to provide some 2 justifigation as to why I thought it was operable.

3 And I think I engaged him at the point 4 where I had received sufficient push back from the 5 employees that I needed help, and again*Jas_ not 6 here during that time frame. j!was not here during 7 that time frame either.

8 And what I needed to do was to- solve a 9 significantly emotional problem with the bargaining 10 unit employees on what is safe and what is not safe 11 for them to do their job. And you need what? When I 12 look back on this thing for the Bravo diesel 13 generator, the mind-set that I had then and the mind-14 set that I look at today is different.

15 And that I was looking for a way to make 16 it safe for the operators to run the machines so that 17 they weren't'have any exposure to carbon monoxide, and 18 I said what would it take for you guys to feel 19 comfortable about this, because the levels in the room 20 are not exceeding any regulatory guidelines in part 21 per millions exposure.

22 And their feedback was, *yeah, but we are 23 getting sick and we don't feel good. I said I 24 understand that, and I also understand that when I 25 drive down the highway behind a bus that I can smell NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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3.'

1 the diesel fumes, but it makes my wife sick.

2 You know, she gets noxious from smelling 3 diesel fumes just walking by, and I said we all have 4 different tolerance levels for that odor. Are you 5 getting ill because of the smell.

6 It is not supposedly -- I mean, the 7 feedback that we had from our safety department was 8 that it was not reaching any threshold levels that 9 would challenge anybody's health.

10 And I said what is it that I need to do 11 foryou to feel comfortable and safe? Do you need to 12 wear a face mask respirator, and the guys said that we 13 wouldn't do anything but operate in an SCBA, and I had 14 the mental image of that I am saying that the machine 15 is oPerable, but I have got to have operators to 16 operate the equipment in SCBAs, and I said what a 17 horrible picture that is. What a contradiction.

18 .But i was comfortable that the machine was 19 operable and would perform its intended function for 20 the duration of the mission time, and I didn't think 21 that the issue that had risen to be such a emotional 22 one required that I exceed the LCO time and shut the 23 facility down to correct this issue.

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38 1 now, that is not a good decision, and and my 2 conversation with respect to that was understanding 3 why I thought the diesel was operable and that it 4 would perform its function.

5 And I will discuss what I just explained, 6 and his support of what it would require to make the 7 bargaining unit individuals, the technicians who would 8 have to actually operate the machine, be comfortable 9 in their personal safety viewpoint to perform the 10 task.

11 And those were the types of conversations 12 that we entered into, and I think that-I probably had 13 an office visit and.'a follow-up phone conversation 14 with respect to that.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: With 16 SWitl yes.

17 MR. BARBER: You are saying that he was 18 looking for away ta make them feel comfortable?

19. No, I was. The safety 20 department says you have not reached any threshold 21 that jeopardizes anybody's health and safety. And the 22 bargaining unit said we don't care. It is making us 23 feel'ill.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You were just 25 explaining that it didn't make everybody feel ill, but NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS If 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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39 1 certain individuals felt ill?

2 That's right. So the concept 3 of trying to -- I needed assistance in working with 4 the bargaining unit and understanding their position, 5 and what it' was going to take for us to probably 6 resolve the issue and- make the employees safety 7 comfortable to go perform the manipulation.

8 And that *was before we utilized and 9 exercised the safety issues resolution process, which 10 is a very effective way resolve those issues. That 11 was not in place at the time and it was a painful back 12 and forth between the bargaining unit and management 13 on doing the evolution.:

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

15 And he weighed in to have 16 conversations with the bargaining unit leadership to 17 help make that happen.

18 MR. BARBER: There was -- I think we have 19 some information that attributes to wanting to *find 20 out what it would take to direct someone to actually 21 go onthrough'the area and take action if they would 22 not be willing to do so. Do you recall anything along 23 that line?

I heard that, too, and I heard 24 25 that from the bargaining unit people and not from him.

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40 1 Let me think. What was the word that I heard.

2 Insubordination. That was the word. I heard 3 bargaining unit people toss that around, that is the 4 company provided the data and the assurance that it 5 was a safe job to do, and that employees would not 6 perform that task, that would be insubordination.

7 And I did not hear him say that to the 8 bargaining unit guy, but I know that he had a meeting 9 with bargaining unit leaders here on site, and I don't 10 know if he said that or not.

11 MR. BARBER: Did you ever hear him say 12 that, and maybe -not to the bargaining unit, but to 13 others, other management employees?

14 l No. No, I did not.

15 MR. BARBER: Never in any context?

'*3 No.

16 17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Let's just take a 18 quick-break,.okay? -It is 3:28 p.m.

19 (Recess.)

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:. Okay. We are back on 21 the record, and what I have in front of me is actually 22 the report.of interview with you from that emergency 23 diesel generator investigation and the leakage and how 24 it was handled.

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41 1 raised there, and there is an interview with you where 2 they actually interview you once, and you are talking 3 about the use of the term insubordinate, and you are 4 saying, no, not you, no, not me, not in my 5 conversation. But they find it necessary to 6 come back to you based on another interview, and upon 7 further review of all information gathered -- and I am 8 going to read from page 4 of 5 from your own interview 9 in that investigation.

10. "Upon further review of all information 11 gathered the investigators considered it necessary to 12 reinterview to 'confirm some of your earlier 13 statements regarding comments made regarding 14 insubordination."

15 Now, they put you down as saying that 16 -- and I am quoting -- I didn't have any conversations 17 with any representative of the employees where I used 18 the- word insubordinate. We used the word 19 insubordinate in meetings with but not 20 with employees.

21 Now, I don't know if this is in any way 22 refreshing you recollection. It further talks about'-

23 .

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42 1 that interview, was held closer to the time in 2 question, and if I had said that closer to that time, 3 then it was probably accurate.

4 What :I recall how is that I heard those 5 words from bargaining unit employees, and I don't remember our conversation wit ihee h 6

7' used the word insubordinate..

8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Well, they go a 9 little further with and you clarified it a little 10 fufther it looks -like. Now, you did have a 11 conversation wit on the topic, and you

12. noted thati hought it might be insubordinate if we 13- deem the work safe and the bargaining unit employees 14 refused to do safe work.

15 recalls telling words to the

.16 effect that we really didn't want to be in that space

.17 to get the work done. It would not be a winning 18 situation.

19 jn I would say that if I said 20 that, it is an accurate reflection. I will tell you 21 now that I don't recall that conversation. I think if 22 I said that at that time,.then I think that is a good 23 statement, but I don't recall it now.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. I guess what 25 we are looking at overall is the position taken here NEAL R. GROSS ( 7 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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43 1 either by you and by you are in a 2 position where you are saying your priority was that 3 you were looking to make the situation safe for the 4 operators, and some of the information here indicates 5 that you might have been up against it there a little 6 bit there, too, witI_ in terms of how you 7 were going to handle that.

8 Well, in my experience as a 9 first-line supervisor, trying to accomplish something 10 with a hammer is never the right way to do it. It is

.11 not the right' way to do business.

12 Forcing people to do something is not ever 13 the right way to do business. It is' not a win-win 14 situation at all. And I think that is what I conveyed 15 there.

16 Telling somebody to do something 17 because they will be insubordinate if they don't do it 18 would have been not a winning situation. That is a 19 fact.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And in this situation 21 that I was asking you about, 'you said that you had 22 engaged in a lot of operational decisions with*

23 and--

24 A number of them.

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1 you would take the position that he would force, and 2 challenge, and probe, and not accept an easy answer 3 from youl or a simple answer from you?

4 Correct.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And you said this was 6 another example akin to the bypass valve issue. Are 7 there other issues, like any other number of issues 8 that you talked about, where you found yourself in the 9 same position with him?

10 - I will tell you that the two 11-- times that I remember being in challenging situations 12 would. have been the bypass valve and the diesel.

13 Those Stick out in my mind painfully in the past.2 14 years, very painful.

15 I mean, there are other things that took 16 place at the facility that were questions, and are we

,17 doing the right thing, but in March of 2004, I don't 18 remember the conversation specifically with 19 I They were not significant enough to stick 20 with him.

21 But there are other things that -have taken 22 place in the past 2 years where I have questioned 23 whether or not we were doing the right thing.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: :What is interesting 25 is that if it came from it is a one way.

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4b 1 It is challenging your conservative position. You 2 don't have any examples where he challenged you to be 3 more conservative.

4 And what I am saying that is of interest 5 is because this is a safety conscious work environment 6 probe, and so we are trying to figure out what was the 7 kind of direction that you were typically faced with.

8 Was it a pbsh to be in that one direction, 9 and when you say that you could see yourself easily in 10 the position and flip in the 3 to 4 hour4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months discussion of 11 having to defend, let's say, a more aggressive 12 position,' what do you base that on.

.13 Because based on what we have been 14 gathering we are not seeing that.

15 Well, that is a perception on 16 my part, and that is not -- I don't have anything to 17 toss on the table to justify that. That is my 18 perception based on each of my conversations with him 19 were always challenging and depth to understand why I 20 was taking the position that I was taking.

21 And that regardless of what position I 22 show up with, I will be provided .that kind of in-depth 23 justification.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And that is your 25 expectation based on your contacts with him, but you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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46 1 don't have anything that goes in the other direction?

2 That would be correct.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And that would be an 4 example of that?

5 37 That would be correct.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you have anything 7 further on that?

8 MR. BARBER: No.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I might have to speak 10 up being over here. There is another point that you 11 made just a little while back, and it was a comment --

12 jJ Well, let me pause here a 13 minute. I am bothered by my detail for information 14 recall in 2004 Versus getting presented with something 15 that I said in a dated interview later on.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Well, you know what, 17 and it is probably -- the explanation is that we have 18 been looking at this more recently than you have, but 19 what I have to do is --

20 Q Right, and I. don't have a 21 problem with you providing me that information. I 22 just would say that the closer that information was to 23 the time period, the higher accuracy it is going to 24 have, versus what I am remembering now.

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47 1 but when we were going through that, our job is to 2 find out what is going on on-site, and having reviewed 3 this more recently than you have, what you said -- and 4 I knew that I had seen it somewhere before, and --

5 Well, that clearly indicates 6 that in some meeting that I had wit over 7 in his office that we had a conversation about -- of 8 insubordination with employees.

9 I am glad to hear that I said what I said, 10 but I don't recall that particular conversation.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Let me put it 12 out for, what I think it is worth just so that you 13 understand my position on it. When we have that kind 14 of information and you make a statement during an 15 interview'in response to a question, Scott's question 16 about the word "insubordinate," I have to probe 17 discrepancies.

18 You know, I have to question it further, 19 and you resolved that to my satisfaction. My question

.20 would be that in this situation and given your 21 responses here, what I want to make sure of is that 22 you are being forthcoming.

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48 1 and there is the expectation that you will be complete 2 and accurate.

3 I can understand time frames 4 discrepancies, *but that is why I have to probe a 5 little further, and we had this information more 6 recently than you did. But my concern would be that 7 you are being frank with us in terms of your 8 recollection of events.

9 *Good.

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And you understand 11 that is what we'are looking for.

12 I do. I am not trying to--

13 I will tell I. you that I am not trying to protect*

I mean, I have no reason to.

15 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And-that is where my 16 next question was going to..

17 ] Well, I have no reason to 18 protect If I thought that he was a 19 detriment to nuclear power, then he needs to not be in

..20 nuclear power.

21 And I would tell you that at the time of 22 my interface with him, I did not' view him as a 23 detriment to nuclear power. But I have been asked 24 some particular questions that never came into my mind 25 before on the type of senior manager and their NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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49 1 demeanor, and the way that they deal with employees, 2 and what impact they have on a safety conscious work 3 environment.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: This is where you 5 went before where you said in hindsight more or less 6 you were looking at situations that were handled?

.7 That's right. So his 8 predecessor by 2 or 3 people, who was a senior VP when 9 I got hired, and not that I lived under his reign for 10 very long -- a couple of weeks, a couple of months --

11 he was a very overbearing and challenging senior VP.

12 And he was hard on people, and the stories 13 that I hear say it is totally inappropriate. 4SIU 14 jwas not *to that degree,. but his loud 15 challenging voice, and the words. that he used when he 16 -talked to people could yery easily train you to keep 17 our mouth shut.

18 JI don't think that I recognized that 19 during his tenure and in my relationship with him, but 20 in hindsight, and when I look back, and I hear that 21 people have a worse impression of that 3-to-4 hour 22 meeting than I do -- and I didn't think it was a good 23 meeting.

24 You know, I can't tell you that I wasn't 25 sweating and challenged during that meeting. I was.

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50 1 but I think the people who witnessed it had a more 2 sour take away from it than I did.

3 And that is the impression that that 4 senior leader had on the organization, and it did not 5 register with me at the time. When I look back on 6 that, that is the kind of thing that can be stifling 7 on an organization for people to speak up and identify 8 issues if you are not solid on your convictions and 9 what you want to do.

10 And I see that now and I did not see that

.11 then. So I think he would. be a challenge for our 12 organization today, and where we want to go with 13 advancing our organization.

14 I think that his management style would be 15 counter to what we want to achieve here with our 16 safety conscious work environment and moving our 17 organization in a positive forward fashion.

18 And I don't see that in the management 19 team -that we have today.- It is significantly 20 different in the tone and gender of the way that we 21 speak about things. It is really different.

22 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And there were others 23 in that management team that'you were dealing with at 24 that time, and from your perspective what was .-

25 effect in that time frame?

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1 It seems primarily that you had to deal 2 withwhat you are 3 talking about. But did you have any engagement with

.4-5 a -longstanding 6 came here. My 7

8 9

10 So I don't know how he influenced the

11. senior VPs other than the stories, and I. don't know of 12 any direct things to report back.

.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:' And in terms for 14 you kind of give an impression of him being 15 I guess not very effective.

16 j Well, I don't think that he 17 was a strong. leader, and I don't know about his 18 technical background being strong., I think he would 19 be -- my impression would be that he would be 20 negatively susceptible to that type of leadership.

21 .- SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: So you are savinc 22 that he .was negatively susceptible, meaning he would 23 fall in line with it?

Y Yes, I think so.

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52 1 "

was pushing for would becomell 2 Yes, and I would say -- and I 3 was not privy to any private meetings that they had.

4 I don't now if he stood up and had those types of 5 conversations that I had wit 1Rr not. I 6 don't know that.

7 I know that he was supportive of where I 8 was during that meeting, and the wrapping of it up and 9 this is what we are going to do, and we are going to 10 shut the plant down.

11 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: After a certain point 12 in time, he was on your side with the issue?

13 Yes, correct.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: When you got to a 15 turning point there, what was it?

16 Scott did ask me that, and I 17 don't know that I remember what the turning point was.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You said what 19 actually clinched it and wrapped it up, and ended that 20 discussion. You don't know what it took to sway*

21 22 No.

23 MR. BARBER: The only-thing that puzzles 24 me about this is that it seems so Very different than 25 how I would expect things to work, because often times NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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53 1 when you get these difficult challenging situations, 2 you (inaudible), 'what the right answer is.

3 You may have an idea what the right answer 4 is, but you could pick up the phone and callii and 5 say, hey, we have this problem in the plant, and 6 this is what I am thinking, and this is what

is 7 thinking, and what are you thinking?

8 And he could you his feedback and talk 9 about it, and then you could get on the phone and talk 10 to lwand the three of you could talk. And 11 then'you could get on the phone, the three of you 12 could get on the phone and talk t0 M 13 And sit down and have an informal 14 .conversation, and hey, this is what we are thinking is of.

16 2*: Instead of having a --

17 MR. BARBER: Exactly.

i's That was a management style 19 that I *was not familiar-with. I have been in the 20 industry since *and granted, I was always at a 21 level in the organization below the Assistant Ops 22 Managers at that time,, but my conversations with 23 .senior managers was for not.

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1 with the organization. That was always with and it 2 never had to go above the operations manager's 2evel 3 from my perspective.

4 To be engaged in that type of explanation 5 to the ulevel was abnormal. It was kind of 6 a surprise for me and I wondered if that had taken 7 place before, and if that is the way that business was 8 done, because I didn't expect it to be the way to do 9 business.

10 MR. BARBER: Did you stop and talk to 11 anyone in Ops that you -- well, sort of like 12 13 I don't believe that

14 was here for thatI 15 MR. BARBER: I mean, did you have any 16 thoughts like when you knew that you had to go over 17 and talk to on what is this about, and did you 18 .share any thoughts with anybody?

19 You'know, I think I did have 20 a conversation with

because I was still 21 reaching out to talk to periodically to help me 22 and coach me through the -- you know, I was like 5 23 months on the job, or 6 months on the job, and so I 24 still kept in touch with*". to coach me on things.

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55 1 with him. I a pretty sure that I had a conversation 2 with him, but I don't remember the details of the 3 conversation.

4 MR. BARBER: Do you remember having an 5 impression one way or the other about something that 6 you either should do or not do? You're saying that 7 you don't remember the details, but did you have an 8 impression that I am going to do this or I am going to

9. do that?

10 ou mean after talking with 12 MR. BARBER: Yes.

13. . ]Idon't think thata~ told 14 me anything that changed my impression of what I was 15 going to do at the facility. The facility was not 16 starting up as long as I was the 17 It just wasn't.

18 Did you tell that to anybody 19 else that you can recall?.

20 3 Yes. Yes, I told people in, 21 the -- we had a meeting here in this room that 22 jcame to, and I told that meeting group, some of 23 which went over to ff ice, that we weren't 24 starting the unit up with me as the 25 2" and I said we are going to go cold.

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56 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And who comprised 2 this meeting group? Was it the shift people, or --

3 -1 -0No. I think they might have 4 been more along the lines of people who might be 5 structured in the FORT and TORT job titles. The first 6 outage response team, and the transient outage 7 response team.

8 And they were the leaders of that 9 organization, as well as there might have been some 10 engineers in there who were there to help us figure il out what the problem with the bypass valve might have 12 been.

13. And I don' t. even remember where the notion 14 of starting the plant back up even came from. I don't 15 know who vocalized that, but somebody did, and it 16 really caught me off-guard as to what are you 17 thinking.

18 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You' just hit my 19 question on that. If it was clearly something that

20. was not even in your thought processes, then where was 21 it coming from? Was. it operations or was it outside

22. in senior management?

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1 that I had to talk to in my organization that worked 2 for me that had to counter that it was okay to start 3 up.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What about the outage 5 group? I mean, they have a deep involvement in the 6 schedule and what happens here.

7 M They do. Boy, I wish I could 8 remember that outage guy's name.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Hold on a minute. We 10 will just go off the record briefly. It is 3:49.

11 (Whereupon, at .3:49 p.m., a recess was 12 taken, and resumed at 3:50 p.m.)

.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: We are back on and it 14 is approximately 3:50. -And the individual that you

- 15 recognized the name-.for was 16 That's correct. I remember 17 that he was -- I remember that over in th 18 office that he ended up being supporting of the 19 position, and I know that he had some conversation 20 when we were next door in the OSC meeting prior to 21 going over t office.

22 And I don't know if he suggested that we 23 have the capability to start up or not, or whether he 24 was asking the question just as a formality that had 25 to be addressed. NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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58 1 So I still don't remember where that 2 thought process came from, and is it okay for us to 3 start up because the bypass valve is not closed. I 4 don't know who originated that thought process or 5 question.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: How did it come that 7 you got involved in that meeting at that point? How 8 did you get contacted and what were you told to come 9 to the meeting to discuss?

10 § Well, I was just getting ready 11 to roll up my list and I heard that somebody wanted to 12 start the plant up, and so then I would ask myself who 13 did I hear that from and I don't know. I don't even

14. know if that is a factor not..

15 But I have the sense that I went to that 16 meeting to put the train back on the track,- and that 17 that meeting was talking about doing something that I 18 was not going to support, and that's why I think I 19 went to the meeting next store.

20. SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:. Wereyou invited, or 21 did you have to go and put your two cents in?

22 I don't know. I don't 23 remember.

24 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: But it is something 25 that you think that you might have heard about and you NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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1 just needed to weigh in on?

2 . Well, someone may have come 3 and gotten me. I am not sure.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You just are not sure 5 how that came about?

6 Right. As a matter of fact,.

7 I would tell you that that entire process of having to 8 have a discussion about starting the plant up or 9 shutting it down interfered with my response to the 10 reactivity event.

11 And that is where my focus was when I 12 realized that somebody has a different idea and I need 13 to stop that.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You had one incident 15 on top of the next, huh?

16 Yes, I did. And I think that 17 whole issue with ensuring that we did the right thing 18 with the facility interfered with me making sure that

19. I did the right thing in our response to the 20 reactivity event.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: There was a delay 22 there?

23 Yes, there was.

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bU 1 reactivity management event that occurred on a Sunday 2 night. I 3 01 Right.

4 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And there is 5 discussion on Monday morning,- and it takes you in a 6 totally different direction.

7 That's correct. It was a huge 8 distraction for me and I did not-manage that well at 9 all.

10 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Why do you mention 11 that? Was there some sort of an impact from there 12 being a delay in handling it, the reactivity 13 management event?

14 Absolutely. When I went to 15 SORC (phonetic), and I presented the details of the 16 shutdown in my post-transient response presentation to 17 SORC, when I discussed the issue of having had the 18 reactivity excursion, and looking at 19 face was the first time that he had realized that.

20 And, you know, *.I think was back by then, too.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: A couple of days 22 later?

23 Yes. And I realized that my 24 director doesn"t understand the magnitude of this 25 event. So I realized then that my actions in having NEAL R. GROSS C-COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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bi.

1 properly communicated that to the organization, and 2 implementing the types of. things that you should do 3 with that type of challenge to reactivity management 4 were woefully short.

5 And I attribute some of that to me being 6 here by myself, and having,'that challenge the next 7 day, and that distracted me from taking closure to the 8 initial event.

9 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. It took you 10 off-track a little bit?

11 It took me off-track a lot.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: A lot?

13 MR. BARBER: Do you recall talking to 14 The discussion on the bypass Valve and what to 15 do about that was on Monday morning, and I think that 16 reactivity event was on Wednesday. Did you talk to 17 t all on either Monday afternoon or at all on 18 Tuesday, or with at all, about that?

19 I mean, was this a situation where maybe 20 you mentioned it to them, and it just-didn't register, 21 or you just didn't have a chance because you really 22 were focused on --

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bZ 1 over the phone.

2 MR. BARBER: And what was his take on 3 that?

4 I don't remember. I know that 5 it was a big deal forpkwhen he got back, and we 6 were engaged in what is the right thing to do, and he 7 was asking me what my course of action was with the 8 cooling and where I was headed with that.

9 But I don't know that -- I am sure that 10 some kind of red flag went up for him, but I don't 11 know that he provided me any direction on things to 12 do. I think he was asking me what are you doing, and 13 what is your course of action.

14 MR. BARBER: -How did the plant get into 15 that? I mean, we have heard some information about 16 that there was an ITT that was planned, and procedures 17.

18 19 that.

.2 Sure, I will talk to you about 20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Before we go there, 21 I just had another question on the other end of that 22 event. From what you said before, you said -- when I 23 asked you if there was direction coming at you, were 24 you being directed to move the unit in a particular --

25 in other words, to not shut down, but to start up?

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1 You said there was no direction, but the 2 only direction, that you objected to was to*

3 4 To halting the cool down.

5 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: To halting .the cool 6 down?

~Right.

7 8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And at what point in

.9 time di'd that -- when was that communicated to you?

10 I think in the transition from 11 this meeting to the meeting. Just hold 12 this thing stable until we go get all the stuff 13 resolved, and I think that is what that was.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. But you did 15 that, right?

16 I did. I told the shift 17 manager to slow and stabilize the cool down until I do 18 and solve this issue, and then I will come back and we 19 will finish our cool down..

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay.

21 MR. BARBER: Actually,. another question 22 -that I wanted to ask you was on that. Your statement.

23 to the group in here about -- what was it again?

24 Could you refresh my'recollection on that?

25

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64 1 I will tell you is that I told the organization that 2 we weren't starting the plant back up, and I think 3 that I got some -- I think that1 4 were sensing -- well, it doesn't have to go that far, 5 and we will go and have a conversation about this, and 6 explain it to --

7 MR. BARBER: Some people have attributed 8 that to you trying to, quote, draw a line in the sand.

9 Absolutely.

10 MR. BARBER: I am not going to be in this 11 organization if we are going to start the unit back 12 up.

13 T correct. Well, I think 14 that may have been part of the conversation that I had 15 with you know, and being forceful about my 16! position.

17 As long as I have been in the industry -- I am a good 18 soldier. I am. I am a good soldier.

19 And you can ask me to do a lot of things 20 from a business perspective, but I don't.have to agree 21 with it, but I will execute it. And you can ask me to 22 do an awful lot of things, but you can't ask me to do 23 that is a challenge to nuclear safety or personal 24 safety.

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65 1 go out doing something that challenges our mission, 2 and I was prepared not to start the facility up 3 because it was not the right thing to do. Somebody 4 else could be the Kif that command was going to be 5 given, because it was going to be me.

6 MR. BARBER: Did you tell(' _aw 7 that during the meeting?

8 N j Sometime during the meeting, 9 I think I did say that. I don't think that I said 10 that in the' early stages when I was getting asked 11 questions for understanding.

12 But I think later on during the meeting 13 that there was actually a question around the 'table of 14 the people who were there and what their position was

.15 on what we are going to do with the unit.

16 And I think that I may have said that then 17 as-well. I think that I said that a couple of times 18 that day here, and also over there.

19 MR. BARBER: Do you think that had an 20 impact on the decision that was made?

21' Idon't know. I don't know 22 that I was that important to --

23 MR. BARBER: Well, let's just back up a 24 minute here. One of the things that you said earlier, 25 and maybe it was an insightful point that you made, NEAL R. GROSS -7 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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66 1 was that you were talking about forcing operators to 2 go into the diesel room and force them to do work that 3 they did not want to do.

4 And you said that is a really bad position 5 to be in, and I think you used that as an example, but 6 generically you were saying that was a bad situation 7 to be in.

8 So if thought the same way 9 that you did on that kind of issue, here you have'got 10 ianq Ithat is saying I am not going to start the unit 11 up from where I am.

12 So he may be thinking in his mind, okay, 13 so if I want to turn the unit around from where I am, 14 I have to acknowledge that that may result, and 15 may say, okay, fine. You can relieve me, and have.

16 someone else start the unit up. And considering that, 17 do you think that had an impact?

18 Well, I would tell you that if 19 it came to the point where I felt that I needed to say 20 that, and I needed to play that card -- and that is 21 pretty strong stuff. It is.

22 And I did, I did say that, and I.don't say 23 that to toot my.own horn, but if it got to the point 24 where I needed to say that, then there was sufficient 25 challenge to the other position, to my position of NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS f2\ &

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67 1 what I wanted to do with the unit that I had to draw 2 that line in the sand.

3 And I will tell you that if I was on the 4 receiving end of that from one of my employees that 5 that would certainly make me think twice about what I 6 was asking them to do.

7 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Well, you were there, 8 _ We weren't. You had the benefit of seeing 9 expressions, and participating in this. Was this some 10 sort of a turning point? Did a light go on that said 11 that you really felt strongly about moving the unit in 12 that way?

13 14

-J Well, what makes you think that when you are throwing your job on the table like 15 that that you have the foresight to look at people's 16 faces and judge their emotion on it?

17 I mean, when you say something like that, 18 you could very well get the answer of that's fine, and 19 you are replaced, you know.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Right, but you must 21 have been tuned in to:a response to that, right? Once 22 you say something like that, you are looking to see 23 how he is going to react.

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1 I think when he was done polling the group, he said 2 okay, that's what we are going to do.

3 MR. BARBER: So that was a turning point?

4 jWell, I think that was the end 5 of our conversation, because he was asking everybody 6 their position, and so we were done with the 7 justification viewpoint, and I think that I took some 8 written material back to him after the meeting to 9 substantiate some other things that I told him to 10 follow up.

11 But when.he is asking people around the 12 room in a polling and voting fashion 13 MR. BARBER: I don't understand --

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: When they weighed in 15 on that were they of the same mind that you were?

16 9 I don't remember anybody 17 saying that we should start up. I think everybody was 18 aligned with that viewpoint at that time, and I don't 19 know if that was based on the strength of my 20 justification, or whether they were on board with that 21 from the get go.

22 They could have very well have been in my 23 camp all along, but I don't know that for sure.

24 MR. BARBER: To me, him asking everybody 25 in the room what they wanted to do -- I mean, that is NEAL R. GROSS AI 7/C-COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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69 1 an :interesting approach, but you were the 2 right?

3 You were holding, quote, the 4 and it was your 5 decision toiid.ke unless hetook it away from you.

6 That's correct.

7 MR. BARBER: I mean, those were the 8 choices. You make the decision, or [ can't make the 9 decision through you if you don't agree to that.

10 - That's correct.

11 MR. ,:BARBER: But what he can do is that he

.12 can replace you.- He could have brought back, or 13 promoted one of the shift managers, but that is a 14 pretty significant action, and he would have had to

15. have done it on the~spot. --

16 .That's right..

17 MR. BARBER: So to poll other people --

18 1 was not the first one that 19 he asked. I mean, it was a sequential around the table 20 kind of thing,- and I wasn't the first one to get up 21 and talk.

22 MR. BARBER: But to poll other people --

23 1 was not the first one that 24 he asked, and I was not the first one to say that this 25 is what I think we ought to do.

F I 1*'.

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70 1 MR. BARBER: Well, it just seems that it 2 was a very odd management style to do this, and to 3 challenge you significantly on the course of action, 4 and to have people in there that may or may not have, 5 quote, a dog in the fight.

6 I mean, it sounds like there were people 7 there that weren't even sure what organization they 8 were from, and to ask them an opinion about something, 9 they may not have had the right to vote on that.

10 Didn't that seem odd to you that he would 11 be doing that?.

12 No, it didn't. I mean, even 13 as you mention it down, it is the way that we do 14 business in the industry, that when we have a 15 maintenance or SORC work that way, and SORC work is 16 where you poll and vote on it, and make 17 recommendations to the Chair to make recommendations 18 to the plant manager.

19 And it is the way that we do business and 20 who is the decision maker. Well, I think that when 21 i~as here, people woul.dhave said thatfif 22 is the decision maker.

23 I think in this organization that the 24 decision maker is over there in the control room. It 25 is the shift manager. That is who the decision maker NEAL R. GROSS Al 1C' COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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71 1 is. But I think that pushing the decision making down 2 to the people who have the wherewithal to do that 3 activity is a vision difference in the management 4 organization that we have here today.

5 I mean, Mnever tells me what to 6 do. He asks me what I am going to do, and when I say 7 this is what I am going to do, he asks did you think 8 about think, and did you think about this. No, I 9 didn't think about that. Let me roll that into my 10 decision and I will get back to you.

11 And I will get back to him and say, yeah, 12 I am still doing.that. So I am going to add this part 13 of it into my plan. Okay, good, fine. But he doesn't 14 -

doesn't say do. He says what are you doing.

15 And I would expect our organization to 16 think that]was the decision maker, and 17 that is not the place for'that decision making to take 18 place.

19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And in that instance 20 were you getting do from Is that why 21 you got to the point where you put your job on the 22 line?

23 MYou are asking me that 24 question a lot, Eileen. I don't think he directed me 25 to do anything. I don't think he did. A,(( c" NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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72 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: But it got to a point 2 where you thought you had to take a pretty strong 3 stand?

4 Maybe I was tired of having to 5 justify the answer, and I am done, and I want to get 6 out of here and go do what I am supposed to go do. I 7 don't know if I was inappropriately playing a trump 8 card, but it is a big emotional step to throw that 9 card on the table, but I was done with that game, and 10 it was time to go and take the plant to cold, and go 11 fix the Problem.

12 MR. BARBER: It sounds. like you were 13 pretty frustrated?

14 . 1dift I think I was. I don't back

.15 up from -- you know, I am going to guess that I have 16 couched this entire conversation differently than you 17 have heard it from other people.

18 But I am not going to tell you that it was 19 okay. I am just going to tell you that I don't think 20 that was going to make me start up, and

.21 I think the' position that I took was solidly 22 justified, and I think that I threw my job behind it 23 to support my conviction on what I was doing.

24 And that I was not going to start the unit 25 up as the Jý individual at Hope Creek.

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73 1 MR. BARBER: Okay.

2 And I will tell you that I am 3 glad that I don't do that anymore. I am glad that I 4 don't have to do that kind of challenging 5 justification for the things that I am doing.

6 is a challenging individual, 7 but it is at a much different tone of understanding 8 what you are going to do.

9 MR. BARBER: When you discussed your stand 10 wit what was his reaction to that? I mean, you ii must have discussed the fact that you said that to 12 13 Wt 14 MR. BARBER: Yes..

is I don't know that I did.

16 MR. BARBER: You didn't?

17 I don't know that I did.

18 MR. BARBER: Wouldn't you have wanted to 19 do that? I mean, just to. kind of share that with your 20 boss and say, no, it got to a point where I had to say 21 this just to make my point.

22 I will tell you that and 23 I did not have that kind of working relationship. We 24 just didn't. We dealt with what is the issue now 25 today, because there were plenty of issues now and NEAL R. GROSS C COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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74 1 today that we didn't sit around :shooting the breeze 2 about, and that type of thing.

3 MR. BARBER: Well, not shooting the 4 breeze, but did you tell him? I mean, that is talking 5 about things that happened --

6 3 Well, I will tell you that 7 when I got engaged with when he returned, it was 8 the reactivity event is what we were engaged in. And 9 I know that I had to have some kind of conversation 10 with in discussing the thought process behind the 11 bypass valve, but I would tell you that i don't.

12 remember that.

13 I know that our lives were totally engaged 14 in the reactivity event, and the impact that it had on 15 our station and the industry, and that was all 16 consuming. As a matter of fact, it consumed his life.

17 more than mine after we finished our short outage and 18 started the plant back up, because he had the longer 19 term.resolution engagement.

20 And I took over staying focused on the 21 operation of the facility.

22 . SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: There were a couple 23 of points that you made about the differences between 24 the way that things are working now, as opposed to 25 whe -U. mrpmJ NEALR.;GROSSj\\ >

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75 1 And you said more or less that you didn't 2 see it then, but you could see now where his style 3 would have a stifling effect. What is it that is 4 being done differently now that you can say you think 5 that has turned around?

6 I know that you made one point just a 7 minute ago about where decisions are being made in the 8 control room, as opposed to the input from the VP 9 level.

101. Yes. And I would tell you 11 that those decisions aren't accepted carte blanche.

12 They are always questioned, but the.-- I think that 13 our organization understands more clearly now the

'14 execution of the conservative decision making process 15 is your first choice.

i6 You know, always fail on the side of 17 conservatism. And I would have told you that 2 years 18 ago. I would have told you the same thing 2 years 19 ago. I would have told-you that I did not think that 20 we had a challenge to our safety conscious work 21 environment.

22 But as we mature and progress, and go 23 through different phases, and especially to be 24 followed by a kindly, gentler, but accountable 25 organization, that gives you the wherewithal and the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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76 1 accountability to make a decision, you get an 2 opportunity to weigh and make comparisons between what 3 you had before that you thought was okay, to what yo 4 have now and make a judgment that would have you feel 5 that it is not okay.

6 1 think that', brings an entirely 7 different vision, or a mission statement and vision of 8 the department and of the company has not changed a 9 bit. The promulgation and the communication of it to 10 the troops on down is different than it was before.

11 It is stronger.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: As'a concrete'example 13 of where it is stronger, what do you see them doing 14 differently? I Understand that you are saying that 15 you based that on a comparison, and you would not have 16 had'that had you not shifted your management.

17 But what are the examples of where you see 18 it strongerl in terms of communication and mission 19 statements?

20 Well, I think if I was going 21 to make a decision, would ask me, well, why 22 -wouldn't you. do this instead, and why would you 23 provide the justification and rationalization on your 24 own as an operating organization without engaging the 25 rest of your support organization to help you make NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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77 1 that decision and do the right thing.

2 And the case in point on that, and an 3 example would be the Bravo reactor feed pump issue 4 that we had a couple of months ago. We had a 5 vibration point that came into alarm on the reactor 6 feed pump, and the initial feedback was that it was 7 bad information, and bad instrumentation. So we said 8 okay.

9 I thought that I was conveying a 10 difference in the concerns of the decision making 11 process, and would be the reason with the Bravo 12 reactor feed pump and the vibration challenge that we

.13 had on it.

14 And then we had an alarm on vibration that

15 initially was sent back to us through the 16 investigation from INC in engineering that it was not 17 accurate information, and that was a good thing we 18 said.

19 We said, good, we have got bad 20 instrumentation, and so we need to fix that, but the 21 pump is okay, and so we shouldn't have to shut the

.22 unit down. But the alarm was in, and the procedure 23 wasn't changed to say an acceptable vibration of a 24 higher level would have been okay. So we didn't 25 change the procedure.

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78 1 And we didn't follow our process to 2 document that the instrumentation was okay, which 3 would have been the expectation for the operating 4 crew. First you have to say that the instrumentation 5 is no good, and then document it as such so that you 6 don't have to follow it.

7 Or if the instrumentation is okay, then 8 you would have to change your procedure on the spot to 9 say that operating at that vibration level was

10. acceptable with appropriate justification from the 11 subject matter expert.

12 We didn't do either one of those things.

13 That was a bad call. That was rational relation and 14 justification that was Bravo diesel that was operating 15 the unit with 75 FTFM with an off-gas leak, and that 16 was the rationalization justification for everything 17 is okay and I don't have to do anything.

18 And we were taken to task on that strongly 19 and appropriately,.and a follow-up incident with the 20 Bravo reactor feed pump was that while the vibratibn

.21 was trending up, and not known to be a valve or not --

22 and as-a matter of fact, we thought it was invalid, We 23 did not get sufficient feedback from the engineering 24 organization or the maintenance department in a timely 25 enough fashion.

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79 1 And we said you know what, it is okay. It 2 is okay to come down 5 percent and take the Bravo feed 3 pump out, and then figure out whether or not you have 4 got an issue with it or not.

5 And that was a different sense of about 6 what is the right thing to do. If you go ask any 7 reactor operator are you comfortable taking the unit 8 off-line if you have to take the unit off-line, and 9 they will all tell you yes.

10 If I think that the unit is not the way it 11 is supposed to be, I Will either take it off or I will 12 direct it to come off, and place into motion a 13 shutdown.

14 The one that is harder to deal with is the 15 unknown, where you think that everything is okay, and 16' you might have to reduce power, and those questions 17 can be tougher to answer.

18 The black and white is easy on either end 19 of the spectrum. It is the ones in the middle that 20 cause you the most consternation, and I think that we 21 are comfortable with the management at zero vibration 22 that it is easy for us to make the gray decisions now.

23 It is easier to make the gray decisions 24 because providing your justification is not a problem, 25 because you almost don't have to do it. I am not NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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80 1 comfortable with it, and this is what I am going to 2 do. Okay. You know, that is probably the only 3 feedback that I got today that I told the control room 4 supervisor.

5 I went over and I talked to him, and I 6 said so what are we doing with this feed pump, and he 7 said I am not comfortable with it. And I said then 8 why are you standing around being uncomfortable with 9 it.

10 I said bring the unit down power and take 11 the pump out. Well, you know -- and I said that's it.

12 And when I conveyed that information to the plant 13 manager, and this is what I am going to do, fine. Go 14 ahead.

15 And it is easy. I don't know that it was 16 that easy before.. I think we have been provided 17 comfort in being able to make those decisions that 18 didn't exist before. Maybe we always had it, but I am 19 comfortable about things now.

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: At what point did you 21 get that sense of comfort? Can you tag a time frame 22 to that?

23 11 Well, I would tell you not 24 long after showed up at the gate, and came 25 and talked to us, and had conversations, and we NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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81 1 understood 'where he was coming from, and his 2 conversations are gentle, but probing, and making you 3 understand what we are all about. And he made a 4 significant impact on our organization within weeks of 5 arriving.

6 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And what time frame 7 was that exactly? I am not exactly sure where you 8 are.

9 Well, August. I think he

10. hired'on in August, because that's whe 11 left the.company, and I became the, "

12 , -oldme that I would be the 13- W So it had to be in:August.

14 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. And what you

15 are describing then is .a change in your management 16 structure that took you from having to justify what 17 you were doing with the assets in the prior time 18 period, to where now conservatism seemed to be more

-19 endorsed, and they are easier to come by?

20 I think that is a valid 21 statement, and I see-that now, and I would not have 22 seen that before.

23 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: You don't think you 24 saw it while you were living it?

25 M No, I don't think so.

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82 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Now, I took you off-2 track before, and we were going into --

3 MR. BARBER: I was going to actually back 4 up a little bit around the bypass event, and you 5 talked about the reactivity management event. And I 6 started with talking about the IPPE, and what I was 7 trying to get to was, first of all, with the valve 8 stuck the way it was, who made the decision to treat 9 it as a (inaudible)?

10 Was that a decision that you made, or 11 someone else? I would kind of what to just understand 12 how you got to that process and who was involved?

13 ] I-think I did.

14 MR. BARBER: Okay.

15 1 think I did.

16 MR.. BARBER: Okay. So what was the plan

17. when that decision was made?

18 Well, I think that when we 19 placed the main turbine on-line and the bypass valve 20 did not go close, I think we said are we okay, and I 21 said, yeah, we are okay.

22 The plant is stable, and-the generator is 23 operating okay, and I have got a bypass valve that did 24 not go full-close, and do we have time to assess this 25 situation and come up with a plan on what we are going NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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83 1 to do. Yes, we do.

2 And I went to -- I don't know who I went 3 to. I went to a plant management organization, and it 4 may have been SORC, and I want to take some time and 5 put together a procedure to decide what we are going 6 to do with the unit, and how we are going to shut the 7 unit back down to make repairs to this valve.

8 And I am sure that we had executed 9 something to try and make some repairs on-line and 10 that was not successful, validating the concern, and 11 validating the issue, and making sure that the bypass 12 valve is really stuck open, and we can stroke it open, 13 but it doesn't go closed any further than 45 percent 14 or something like that.

15 So that would require the unit off-line to 16 make repairs, and not only that, but it will require 17 the reactor to be shut down as well. Because I had 18 never been a fan of doing that kind of work with the 19 reactor critical, which advocates (inaudible) to make 20 the reactor critical on-line, and I don't like that 21 (inaudible).

22 I think that it can be done safely, but I 23 think it provides --. it has never been challenged by 24 the operating crew that it is not required. So we are 25 going to come up with a plan to shut the unit down, NEAL R. GROSS ¶ COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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84 1 and the concern was that with where the power level is 2 at, we can just SCRAM the reactor and cool down the 3 vessel.

4 And the concern was based on a previous 5 shutdown that our decayed heat rate was not sufficient 6 matched up against the hole created by the bypass 7 valve that we would have been challenged in exceeding 8 the cool down rate on the RPV.

9 So we said, okay, so we don't want to 10 SCRAM it, and I was questioning whether to SCRAM the 11 unit and close the MSAV, and I said that I can do 12 that, too. And we train for that and do that in the 13 simulator:all the time.

14 But why Would I challenge my primary 15 containment as my isolated heat source, heat rejection 16 source, when I can develop a method to shut down the 17 plant and use the condenser as the heat rejection 18 source. Am I afraid of putting the heat in the 19 reactor?

20 No, it is designed for that, and in the 21 primary containment? No, I'm not. It is design to do 22 that. And when challenged by abnormal transients that 23 is what we are trained to do.

24 And I said why do I want to initiate an 25 abnormal transient on myself and put the decayed heat NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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o

85 1 removal process through primary containment when the 2 condenser can be available. So let's devise a plan to 3 shut the unit down and maintain the condenser as a 4 heat containment, and use the primary containment as 5 a fallback method to do that.

6 And that' s why we developed a procedure to 7 shut the reactor down with the bypass stuck open, and 8 provide guidance to the operating crew on how to 9 effect that.

10 -

MR. BARBER: Do you remember what day that 11 was? Was that on that Thursday or Friday before that 12 Sunday when the event happened?

13 No, what I would tell you that 14 it was probably 24 to 48 hours5.555556e-4 days 0.0133 hours 7.936508e-5 weeks 1.8264e-5 months after we decided that 15 we were going to shut the unit down. I think we had 16 2 or 2-1/2 days to develop a procedure on what we were 17 going to do.

18 MR. BARBER: Okay. Do you recall just in 19 general who was involved with the development, and who 20 was the test engineer, and kind of how things flowed 21 from there on out, or were you not involved with that?

22 I had some engagement in that.

23 I know that I had working on the 24 procedure, and there was some other:SRO working on the 25 procedure on the shift tha wasn't here.

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86 1 I think that was engaged, 2 because he had developed a section of the procedure 3 for the previous shutdown when we did some pressure 4 testing of an SRV, and so I think he was engaged in 5 that procedure development.

6 I remember jwas the individual 7 that I assigned to be the test manager on the night 8 that the reactivity event took place, and I know that 9 M 7ffq% io, who had gone 10 through the trainingprocess to be prepared to execute 11 the evolution.

12 I don't remember who the guy was on the 13 off-hours when it didn't get executed, and that would 14 have been the manager on the day shift, and I don't 15 remember who that was.

16. MR. BARBER': As far as the (inaudible) 17 methodology was -- well, cover all of this: One is 18 that you do like a V&V type of procedure, where you do 19 a verification and validation, and you are doing the 20 research to kind of find out if this had ever been 21 done; and then the validation piece is kind of more 22 singularly oriented, and where you go out and try to 23 run this on the simulator and see what happens and see 24 if this will work, and if the sequence makes sense.

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87 1 process that you go through that, and you refine the 2 procedure, and you make it as pristine as you can with 3 the amount of time that you have available. Then you 4 do the training.

5 And we have gone through a number of 6 discussions on how things happened, and how these two 7 things were combined, where the V&V and the training 8 evolution ended up being combined.

9 I would say that there was no 1/-

10 intention. I don't think that we sat down and said, 11 okay, let's do a V&V. I think basically we initiated 12 a procedure to provide guidance to people to shut the 13 plant down the same way and reverse it the way you 14 started out.

15 And we sent that out to train the 16 operators on, and their training, because of issues 17 and questions with the procedure, turned out to be a 18 V&V, and a finished product that they would be trained 19 upon never took place.

20 The training on a finished product never 21 happened, and that was unbeknownst to me until after 22 the fact. So that was a huge breakdown-in the process 23 of what we were trying to accomplish.

24 MR. BARBER: I am sure that you probably 25 feel that a lot of it was not warranted, but we have NEAL R. GROSS .

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88 1 not delved into a lot of what you found out in the 2 days and weeks that followed, and what were some of 3 the things that went on.

4 When you look at the way that the 5 organization suffered through that event, what kind of 6 insights would you share as far as things that relate 7 to our review, and what we are looking at?

8 You know, a 'safety conscious work 9 environment, and. the ability to raise safety concerns, 10 and whether it was a concern with the procedure, and 11 a concern with.an evolution or what have you.

12 3 Well, let me answer that last portion of your question. I think the.

13 14 during his -- I know that the 15 during the training -portion that turned 16 into a V&V,. and I knew that he was very concerned that 17 it wasn't a solidified done deal plan.

18 And that caused him a lot of consternation 19 when he was going through the training process. And 20 his--

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Do you recall who 22 that was?

23 3 Who that was?

24 And I don' t think that his concerns were appropriately 25 addressed at the time of the training evolution. The

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89 1 issues that he had should have been sufficient for us 2 to stop and question, and back up, and fix this issue, 3 because he was going to be the guy who directed the 4 (inaudible), but that didn't happen. That didn't 5 happen.

6 I don't know -- I mean, I have talked to 7 the shift manager and I have talked to the simulator 8 trainer as to why we didn't do that stuff then. You 9 know, it was never really clear why that wasn't a stop 10 and back up reac.tion for all. So we did not train the 11 procedure.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: What were the answers 13 that you -were getting about why that didn't happen, 14 and why were the concerns not addressed?

15 Wel l, what I got out of it was 16 that we had a procedure that directed how we were 17 going to do it, and for'some reason the operators 18 thought that they- were out -there to develop and 19 provide comment on, and that was not the intent.

20 And so there was a lot of conversation 21 about people thinking that this was the best way to do 22 it, and we ought to do this and we ought to do that, 23 and if became confusing and a jumble of what they were 24 actually trying to accomplish.

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90 1 supervisor wanted to hear. He wanted to hear that 2 this is our plan, and let's practice the plan, and it 3 became a challenge enough for him that we need to back 4 out of this and we need to get rezeroed on what we are 5 going to do.

6 And the shift manager noted, yeah, go 7 ahead. Take five, and back off, and we will take a 8 look at this while you are taking off and taking a 9 breather. But that should have been -- that was like, 10 okay, go ahead, and keep calm about this, but he may 11 have thought.that he was doing the right thing for the 12 individual, but that should have been applied to that

.13 my SRO is going to conduct this evolution that I am 14 not comfortable with, and we need to reevaluate and 15 see, and that we need more time to do this.

16 MR. BARBER: Who should they have come to 17 if they needed more time? Should they have come to 18 you? Should they have gone toW 19 The training took place before 20 and in all fairness to I was going to be 21 th "on the day watch. I was going to be 22 the and . turned'that over to and 23 I sat down and I went through the procedures with him 24 to tell him what his accountabilities were in 25 accordance with the SNP 84 (phonetic). 1/

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91 1 'And at the time, he was very comfortable 2 with what I told him, and what he needed to make sure 3 happened, but the accountability to ensure that the 4 crew was properly trained, I don't think that was in 5 that and I don't think that complied with the INPO 6 recommendations on what your IPTD procedures that your 7 test manager is supposed to be accountable for.

8 It is now because we have revised it as 9 part of our lessons learned, but I don't think it was 10 an. accountability of the test manager to ensure that 11 the crew was -- he was there to provide the oversight 12 communication link to management, and to make sure 13 that the crew;understood the basic -- all of the 14 standards, questioning attitude, and stuff like that.

15 And although it appeared to me that 16 was comfortable with the turnover of duties, he must 17 not have been, because he did not execute them. He 18 continued to perform more in the role of a shift 19 manager than the big picture overview of management's 20 representative.and doing the ITTE properly.

21 That was where he did not do his job and 22 ensure that he understood what I expected to happen, 23 and management-control of that evolution.

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92 1 related to how to control the bypass valves?

2 Right.

3 MR. BARBER: What was that specifically?

4 Yes my expectation in the 5 development of the ITTE was that we would use 6 automatic pressure control as we brought the unit 7 down, and after we SCRAMed the unit the operators 8 would do the bypass jack to effect the cool down.

9 And during the training process and where 10 they were actually going to V&V, the crew decided that 11 they were going to use the bypass jack to control 12 pressure, in concert with the pressure regulator, 13 which got by me before edification.

14 And so using a manual pressure control 15 system when you have an automatic pressure control 16 system in place, why would you do that? Why would you 17 do that at that operating range of the reactor when 18 you are more susceptible to transients.

19 And so shortly after doing an evaluation 20 of what the crew did, and the procedure non-21 compliance, there was use of the bypass jack at low 22 power level. And not that I remember everything that 23 went into the thought process of providing a guidance 24 anymore, but I don't want you to use the turbine 25 bypass jack with a reactor critical.

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93 1 And in hindsight that is a problem for me 2 that I have been mulling over for a certain amount of 3 time because I think you should be able to use the 4 bypass jack at low power levels to control pressure on 5 a start up.

6 But not when you are shutting it down, and 7 formulating the guidance to provide the operating crew 8 additional details and how'the bypass jack will be 9 used, that direction as a contributor to the i0 subcriticality that we had this year, and that the 11 crew became disconnected in their teamwork with the 12 start up process, and pulling rods and establishing a 13 heat up break, and the rest of the coordination of the 14 crew in preparing and manipulating the balance of the 15 plan.

16 Primarily, placing RCIC in :start up 17- alignment, which had to be done before you get to 150 18 pounds. And the automatic pressure regulator doesn't 19 open up until you get to 150 pounds. Actually, in our 20 facility it works around 148 or 149 pounds.

21 So they realized that they were heating up 22 faster than they were getting RCIC available, and so 23 they stopped pulling rods to speed up and concentrated 24 on getting RCIC available.

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94 1 going to pull any rods because they were concerned 2 that any rod pulled would increase the heat and take 3 them above the 150 pound set without RCIC operable, 4 they allowed the core to drift down.

5 And they monitored the core drifting down, 6 and they declared the core so critical, and the core 7 was so critical. Had they had the capability to open 8 the bypass jack and crack .a bypass valve open to 9 control their pressure of less than 150 pounds, a 10 potential which has been a non-event issue, and that 11 they could have continued or stabilized their heating 12 right to the point where pressure was being controlled 13 on the surface bypass jack.

14 And with the influx off o 15 another, facility, and from another 16 facility, and looking at and evaluating the corrective 17 action taken out of the reactivity event, they said 18 that was shortsighted, and was not, a good 19 recommendation, and that we need to make that go away, 20 and to provide!the right guidance for the operators.

21 MR. BARBER: And so has that been 22 addressed?

23 **Yes, indeed.

24 MR. BARBER: All right. Anything more on 25 -- are you fully covered in your pressure rates when NEAL R. GROSS - I(.

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95 1 you take the reactor to critical? Can you take 2 reactor critical based on those valves?

3 Well, yes.

4 MR. BARBER: But you use a pressure 5 control that is between zero and a hundred pounds?

6 You don't need to control 7 pressure between zero and a hundred pounds.

8 MR. BARBER: When you run it through the 9 same situation, and if you cause a heat up for any 10 reason between zero and a hundred pounds, and it falls 11 between i00 and 150 pounds, could you not end up with 12 the same situation?

13' You should have the confidence

14. that you can maintain the reactor critical in the heat 15 up range by rod withdrawal without heating up the 16 reactor.

17 And withdrawing rods to establish and maintain a heat 18 up rate, versus launching a rod periodically to 19 maintain criticality and to stabilize pressure, it may

/ 20 seem that drains are another option for pressure 21 control.

22 Placing the steam through an evaporator in 23 service, and of course with the ILB, warming up the 24 RCIC lines are all steamloads that you can use in 25 concert with the direction of the ILP to maintain NEAL R.GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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96 1 pressure.

2 MR. BARBER: Is that all done by 3 procedure? If I were to put in a procedure, I would 4 say that in this pressure that you can do these 5 things?

6 ! They are not listed as reactor 7 pressure control modes. They are steps to performing 8 the procedure without recognition that these are 9 pressure control valves for you.

10 And one of my.

11 that day took corrective action to develop pressure 12 control :versus crystallized pressure controls 13 methodology for ILPs when you are less than the bypass 14 operator-function.

15 MR. BARBER: I don't. have any more on 16 that.

17 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: I would suggest that

ý18 we take a break right now.' It is 4:42 approximately, 19 and if we could take a quick break.

20 l Sure.

21 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: We will go off the 22 record.

23 (Whereupon, at 4':42 p.m., the interview 24 was recessed, and resumed at 4:56 p.m.)

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97 1 record, and it is approximately 4:56 p.m. after a 2 brief break. All right.

3 MR. BARBER: All right. I had a couple of 4 things that I wanted to ask you about. One was where 5 I mentioned to you while we were off the record on off 6 gas. You actually brought it up that there was this 7 situation where off gas went from 120 to 40 FTFM, 8 depending on what the circumstances were.

9 And then over some period of time 10 progressed up and exceeded a procedural limit of 75.

11 FTFM.. What our understanding was that the procedure 12 was kind of weak or even silent on what to do if you 13 exceeded.

14 Correct.

15 MR. BARBER: You could -read it as you 16 can't operate the (inaudible) system and so you take 17 it off-line, and then you are playing with two fouls.

18. You could read it that way, or you could read it as 19 finding out the dates for this one, and find out the 20 dates, and I guess I would like to hear what your 21 thoughts were on that issue, and how that was handled, 22 and whether there were problems.

23 Well, you are correct in 24 everything that you said, and the procedure also 25 provides some guidance during start up of the steam COURT REPORTERS AD TRANSCRIBERS -( c' -

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98 1 jet air detector, and you will concede 75 FTFM, and it 2 recognizes that, indicating that the system will 3 handle more than 75 FTFM, and in fact up to 150 FTFM.

4 So when we had that slowly degrading 5 condenser back in issue that provided that increased 6 flow in off-gas, what we did organizationally was 7 rationalize as we gave engineering time to tell us --

8 well, if it says don't operate above 75 FTFM, and we 9 know that everything works okay above that 75 FTFM, 10 and so what is the real number because this is not it.

11. And we gave them -- I think it took us two 12 days to change the procedure to provide us guidance 13 that we wanted to operate at above 75 FTFM. Well, 14 that is not the way to do business.

15 The rationalization was what is the 16 condenser vacuum. The condenser vacuum is good. How

17. is the steam jet air ejector performing. It is 18 operating very well. All the parameters on the steam 19 jet air ejector are within nominal.

20 How is the recombiner working. Well, the 21 recombiner is-working very well, too, and how is the 22 off-gas train look. There is no challenge to the off-23 gas train, and all the temperatures are good on the 24 off-gas train.

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99 1 going out to the staff? *Nothing. So from start to 2 finish the elevated off-gas flow has no impact on any 3 of the equipment that said you are having an adverse 4 impact at operating at 75 FTFM.

5 And combined with knowing that you start 6 the system up and you can operate for hours above 75 7 FTFM due to the steam jets catching up to what the 8 mechanical vacuum limit is and the hogging down the 9 condenser vacuum, was-a rationalization that 75 FTFM 10 is not the right number, and reducing reactor power, 11 and taking or doing a reduction in reactor power is 12' not, going to change it., because it is an in-leakage 13 issue,. and it is not a power generated issue.

14. And so engineering wants the right number 15 and so engineering came back and said that is not your 16' max limit. Your max limit is this based on the design 17 limiting component in the off-gas system.

18 So'they changed our procedure and they 19 said do this and do this when you. are above those 20 elevated temperatures. That is not procedural as to 21 what, and that was an issue that was brought up and 22 challenged, and we rationalized a response to it.

23 Well, that is a recognition point in all 24 of these events that we talked about today, and we had 25 -- I don't think that we recognized it at the time, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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100 1 but we would rationalize our decisions to provide 2 justification that we were comfortable with, and that 3 we did not think challenged the safety of anything to 4 go do things that when I am at 70 FTFM, I had better 5 tell engineering that I don't think that 75 is the 6 right number, and you need to get me the right number.

7 And if you don't get it to me by the time 8 that I had 75 FTFM, the you are going to get it while 9 I am at a lower power, because I am going to take 10 action to comply and maintain 75 FTFM.

11 The vibration is-trending up on this Bravo 12 reactor feed pump, and we don't think that it is 13 valid. You need to help me validate this condition.

14 If you don't validate it by the time that I hit this 15 set point, this feed pump is coming out of service.

16 And instead we did the rationalization 17 alone, and it is not accurate information, and it is 18 a bad instrument, and it is okay, and that is not 19 procedural. That is not the kind of procedural use 20 that you use in compliance tests, and it commits to a 21 message that we send the operators that work for us 22 and that we are permitted to operate a facility by 23 procedure.

24 Putting all those things together and 25 seeing them, you don't see that at the time. You see NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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101 1 that when you put them all together. And putting them 2 all together caused me to take the time to go back to 3 the technical specification and look at the 4 requirements for programmatic controls of the 5 facilities.

6 And if you go back and look at the reg 7 guides that stipulate that these are the systems that 8 you will have procedures, and if you go back to the 9 upper tier administrative procedures that put in place 10 the program for how you.operate the facility, and the 11 lower tier is the department's administrative 12 procedures that tell you how you operate the facility.

13 And provide that education to the 14 operating force on what our expectations are for 15 procedures. And I also had the opportunity to share 16 with the operators that Bravo diesel management, 75 17 FTFM management, not closing the hydrogen make-up 18 valve outside when you are doing with the make up 19 employee, or bargaining unit employee, or technician, 20 not closing the nitrogen make up valve after nitrogen 21 make up that is required by the procedure, and a 22 decision made by the employee and not by --

23 MR. BARBER: You mean closing one instead 24 of three?

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102 1 that when you are done with make-up, go outside and 2 close this out. They closed out this side and they 3 left the outside valve open. But this is not a union 4 problem, and this is not a management problem.

5 This is an issue here in our operating 6 organization on rationalizing outside the bounds of 7 the procedure guides that you have. It is not an 8 acceptable way to operate the facility, and we are not 9 doing that.

10 And I think that the amount of time that 11 I have invested in communicating that message, I think 12 it is clear, and that the rationalization -- and that 13 the procedure is.not correct, and that even if it is, 14 you need to fix the procedure to provide you with the 15 guidance, and that procedures are a decision making 16 tool that we had time to develop in the -- not at the 17 point of contact.

18 And I had time to sit down and figure it 19 out some other time, with days or weeks of evaluation, 20 as opposed to me making the decision in a 5 minute 21 time span on what is the right thing to do.

22 And I think that my organization is clear 23 on that expectation now, but the 75 FTFM was the 24 rationalization that I gave you from a vacuum, and 25 what is going up the stack, and everything in between, NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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103 1 and that number is not right.

2 And my procedure says that I can exceed 75 3 FTFM and so it is not a training component issue, and 4 what is that number. And engineering came back and 5 told us that it is not the number. So the 6 rationalization was correct, but the execution of it 7 was not.

8 MR. BARBER: Do you have any thoughts on -

9 - and I heard what you said about you are at 70 and 10 you are going to increase to 75, but do you have any 11 thoughts on how long it took to recognize the trend?

12 That you were at some nominal value, and 13 at some point you started departing from that novel 14 value, and obviously it trended up over a period of 15 time.. I am not talking so much about the 75, but just 16 the recognition of the trend, and that we need to do 17 something in the power plant to identify what this 18 leakage is. Was that part of it?

19 Let me just make sure that we 20 are at 70, and if you don't tell me by 75, and that 21 was an example of what we should do today, and not 22 what we did back then.

23 MR. BARBER: I understand.

24 What I would say was that, 25 yes, we were on top of that vacuum, and that off-gas NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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104 1 flow was degrading, and it was not a surprise to us 2 that we were at 75 FTFM, and we had been executing 3 things in leak investigation that was -- let me think 4 about that a little bit.

5 We had conversations and meetings about 6 our plans for going in and looking for the leakage 7 that I remember being challenged and limited by a 8 solid enough plan that justified the dose that people 9 would be receiving.

.10 So we had a plan, and we were going and 11 looking, and we were doing helium shots, and we were 12 doing-smoke testing, and looking-for the leakage, and 13 we were not successful in finding the leakage.

14 And I remember that we had gone to the OTE 15 committee and said this is our plan, and they assessed 16 some value of dose'associated with it, and we were in 17, the process of, hey, we have-taken all the dose that 18 we have allotted to our plan, and we still have not 19 found it.

20 What do you want to do next, and the plan 21 was not solid enough to.justify allotting more dose to 22 the effort at that time Until we fixed the plant and 23 made'it more solid. I think that there was that type 24 of activity going on.

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1 in the procesd as far as evaluating the leak?:Did 2 they evaluate it after the window was exceeded?

3 I believe so. I believe that:

4 they were involved at 75 FTFM.

5 MR. BARBER: Can you explain why that 6 occurred, or why do you think that occurred, as 7 opposed to earlier on when the trend began?

8 Well, engineering was engaged 9 in trying to .identify the source, but not.engaged in 10 -validation of the limit. I don't think that we 11 expected to exceed the limit, and I think 'that we 12 rationalized that the was not a limit-.

.13 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: More of the same 14 rationalization and justification type of decisions 15 that you don't see and that-yrou have gotten away from?

16 . -] I1. believe solidly that we have 17 gotten awayt from that behavior mode.

18 SPECIALAGENT NEFF: At what point in time 19 do you. see that changing? That you came to the 20 realization that that is not the way to operate? Do 21 you see a point in time for that being delineated?

22 MR., BARBER: You. mentioned aboul 23 and is that the only factor that has played into this?

24 No, I don't think so. I think 25 he has been the solidification to it, but I think the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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106 1 problem with the diesel was enough for me, and the 2 Bravo diesel was the last time that I was going to be 3 in that boat.

4 MR. BARBER: One thing we have heard, and 5 some of this you hear, and you don't know how much 6 weight to attribute to it, but it has come from a 7 couple of different people, is that there is some 8 significant parts issues on-site; spare parts, 9 critical spares, and having the ability just to repair 10 the unit when equipment breaks or becomes unreliable.

Ii. ,.j And I would say that I can 12 lend credence to that because I go to the manager's 13 meeting and I have seen notifications come across that 14 talked about parts issues with some kind of 15 regularity.

16 So what is -- well, what parts is the 17 organization required to have on hand, and what 18 components are there, and what systems are you going 19 to support that to.

20 It is one of those balancing acts between 21 -- you know, parts cost money, and I am not going to 22 keep a huge parts inventory, and I need to balance 23 that with that I have to have the right parts here so 24 that I can effect repairs in a timely fashion.

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107 1 are quality parts, and I understand the impact that 2 has on me as a equipment reliability SRO hat on, and 3 I don't understand all the impacts of that from a 4 business decision of keeping a spare part or keeping 5 a spare plant out in the material center.

6 And I know that I can't keep a spare plant 7 out there. That would be cost prohibitive, and I know 8 that I can't order all the parts when I need them, and 9 who makes that determination and that balance in the 10 interim, that is not my field, and I don't know that.

11 MR. BARBER: Well, that is part of the 12 issue. It seems like no one has any -, and not to.

13 point the finger at you, but no one seems to have any 14 sort of understanding of who is responsible for that 15 other than the warehouse folks who have been accused, 16 either rightfully or wrongfully, of sending parts back 17 to the distributors and to the manufacturers because 18 they are told that they paid too much tax.

19 That they are told that the company pays 20 too much income tax on the parts that are stored, and 21 so they sent almost as a rule almost everything back,

.22 and that is probably an overstatement, but we have 23 heard that has contributed to the problem of being 24 able to get the right repair parts for the diesels.

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108 1 washers, and parts of a very small value, very nominal 2 value.

3 Sure, I have heard that kind 4 of thing, too. And sometimes I hear, well, this is a 5 pretty important part, and why wouldn't we have this 6 part available to us. I mean, you can expect these to 7 go bad and why wouldn't we have one int he storehouse.

8 And then I have also heard the same thing 9 that, gee, it is just a washer, and why wouldn't we 10 have that washer. Why do I have to wait until I get 11 that washer. And I think that we also do battle with 12 .obsolete spare parts, and the manufacturer no longer 13 supplies them for that equipment.

14 It is very frustrating and I think the 15 maintenance people are more frustrated with it even 16 than I am, because they deal with it on a day to day 17 basis, and the parts issue is significant to them. It 18 frustrates me -in the timeliness and repair, and 19 equipment reliability that I am looking for in the 20 facility.

21 But I would tell you that I don't know how 22 that game is played in the business, and I don't have 23 the business accruement to understand how a facility 24 is supposed to maintain the right parts and the right 25 quantity for a commercial facility, let alone a NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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109 1 nuclear facility.

2 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Well, had that been 3 explained to you as the reason why you don't have the 4 part that you are looking for, and have you heard that 5 explanation before; that .we can't have it sitting 6 around because we have to pay taxes on it?

~No.

7 8 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And that is not 9 something that you heard, and you don't --

10 We can't' have it sitting 11 around because we have to pay taxes on it? No.

12 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF:. You are saying that 13 you.have been missing parts, and you questioned why 14 wouldn't we have a certain part, but you don't 15 understand why and where is the breakdown?

16 ]Right.

17 MR. BARBER: Well, actually that is a good

.18 segment into the next area that we want to discuss, 19 which is economic deregulation. You mentioned that 20 you have been in this industry for 25 plus years, and 21 you have been doing this a long time, and have seen a 22 lot of different things over those years I'm sure.

23 For the most part it seems like most of 24 your career has been in the regulated --

25 Yes, it has.

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110 1 MR. BARBER: -- let's say portion of the 2 industry, and. what is the most recent is the 3 deregulated portion, and I guess I would like to ask 4 your opinion of where you see the effect or the change 5 and how it affects operations, and in what way it 6 affects operations.

7 That is not a part of my 8 routine thought process on the impact of regulation 9 and deregulation. It is kind of a topical area that 10 is an after hours conversation, and I don't think 11 about that, and I don't have time to think about that.

12 But looking back on it, in a regulated 13 industry whatever you needed for your facility you 14 got, and passed the costs on to the customer, and had 15 your profit on top of that.

16 The concept of having and that making the 17 nuclear industry be a competitive industry just like 18 the rest of the United States and other commercial 19 endeavors is - my personal opinion is that that is 20 unfortunate.. That is unfortunate that nuclear 21 power has to be competitive, because I don't want to 22 be in the position where I ever have to take my SRO 23 hat off and have a discussion about dollars.

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ill 1 out of that arena. I try to say that this piece of 2 equipment doesn't work and I want it fixed, and this 3 is why.

4 But you can't -- but I'also can't be that 5 naive about things, and I can't make unreasonable 6 demands on an organization that is budgeting and 7 financially controlling itself, because now we have to 8 -- this is what we want to do, and let's grade it, and 9 let's rank it, and let's prioritize it, where you 10 never had to do that before.

11 And what you asked for you could have 12 because you asked for it and justified the need for 13 the power, plant. So I think it is unfortunate that 14 the nuclear industry, the electric industry, has 15 become deregulated. I think we should be outside of 16 that.

17 MR. BARBER: Have you ever sensed a direct 18 effect on something that you wanted to do, and maybe 19 not so much on safety related equipment, but maybe 20 non-safety related valves to the plant?

21 .A/Absolutely, Scott. I 22 participate in the plant health prioritization 23 committee, and people come to that committee with we 24 want to do this design change to the facility, and 25 this is why, and I say absolutely, let's get that NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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112 1 done.

2 It will make my life better for my 3 operators, and it will make the reliability of the 4 system easier, but what is the safety impact of that?

5 What is the system health impact to that? You know, 6 the safety impact is not that high. So it gets a low 7 score.

8 But it might be something that drives the 9 operators insane with how they have to operate that 10 system, or maybe even do compensatory actions to the 11 system, and that could be on a non-safety related 12 balance of plant piece of equipment, and it is down 13 here in the prioritization because the facility is 14 operated out of a checkbook.

15 There is a set amount of money for doing 16 improvements to the facility, and with a facility that 17 is as old as this one is, and when you look at how the 18 facility has been maintained over its lifetime, and 19 the number of obsolete spare parts that the technology 20 was great 20 years ago, or 15 years ago, and it is 21 woefully behind the times now, it is very frustrating, 22 very frustrating.

23 And I see it with some kind of regularity.

24. There is only so much money in the pot to go out and 25 do things. So it is important for us to provide the NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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113 1 justification that says that this one really needs to 2 be done, and we need to find the money someplace, and 3 we need to reprioritize other things and the list 4 changes as to the top things that we are going to go 5 tackle.

6 MR. BARBER: Were you aware that the 7 company is supposedly allocating an additional $750 8 million for capital projects over the next 5 years?

9 10 MR. BARBER: That was sent to us in a 1l, letter in January.

12 Well, here is some feedback 13 that I got from my He.said 14 that there are other facilities out there that operate 15 on budgets of $90 to $110 million per unit.

16 So on a 3 unit facility like we have here, 17 that is $300 million. Our budget this year is $435 18 million. He said where is all that money going, and 19 I said I don't know.

20 Money is always an issue for making 21 improvements. He said you have a lot of money, and we 22 need to find out where it is being spent so that you 23 can ensure that it gets invested in the equipment 24 reliability of the facility, versus wherever it is 25 going now. /1 NEAL R. GROSS A'ýý -

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114 1 Well, that was a big shock to me. That is 2 a fourth unit's worth of money that should be 3 available to do the things that you need to do at a 4 facility like ours that appears to be spent somewhere 5 else.

6 So the feedback from NRB was that you have 7 plenty of money here, and you are not spending it 8 right.

9 MR. BARBER: You know, this is something 10 that we don't usually get involved with, and nor do we 11 necessarily want to, but I am just mentioning it just 12 as a way of providing some feedback to you that the levels is now saying 13 company at least at the highest 14 that we are committing a lot of resources here.

15 And that these are dollars that we are 16 going to provide for capital improvements, and I don't 17 know of any limitation or overhead, and whether it is 18 going 'to go to O&M, but the implication is that we are 19 committed to this facility, and we are going to open 20 the purse strings to address a lot of these issues 21 that have been outstanding.

22 And we don't know if that had been 23 communicated to you, but I think it --

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o

115 1 offered as a !result of something that was already 2 under way, or could be attributed to some of the 3 insights that have come out recently as far as the way 4 the equipment is operating, and as you point out the 5 repairs, and replacing obsolete equipment, and things 6 of that nature.

7 And which kind of leads us into the next 8 item of discussion, which is the January 28th letter 9 that we sent. Did you get a chance to read that?

10 Yes, I did.

11 MR. BARBER: And what did you think of the 12 letter?

13 NInitially or'--

14- MR. BARBER: Initially. What was your 15 reaction?

16 21 was disappointed that the 17 NRC found the necessity to communicate that to us in 18 a formal letter of that nature and public awareness.

19 (Brief recess.)

20 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We are back on 21 the record. It is 5:23.

22 So I was disappointed that the 23 NRC found the necessity to ring our bell on that one.

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116 1 organization were, because I have had some -- because 2 sinc3 is here, we have had some sitdown 3 coaching and philosophy kind of conversations, and 4 understanding some of that.

5 Lo xcomes to us with a lot of 6 battle scars. He has learned a lot of things by 7 having lived through what we are talking about here 8 now. So he shares that, which is good. He is the one 9 *that helped me see the difference in the impact of the 10 previous management organization had the potential 11 impact on the employees in addressing issues.

12 And without realization that that was 13 "actually what may have been taking place. I was 14 embarrassed when it was rolled out to us, and people 15 said -- people in'the audience said that we heard you 16 say don't be in 'denial, and that we need to embrace 17 this and move forward.

18 And a guy said, I'm sorry, but. that I 19 don't really see this in my organization, and I don't 20' know of anything that would indicate that we have a 21 safety conscious work environment issue. And that the 22 only example that the *Vice President provided, 23 although he said that there were many, was the diesel 24 generator exhaust leak issue.

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117 1 that one is a big challenge for me, and the 75 FTFM, 2 and I said that I have learned from that, and the 3 reactivity event was painful beyond, but the problem 4 with diesel is painful on a day to day basis, because 5 it is a challenge to employee safety.

6 So that one hurts when you think about 7 talking about that one, and with that being the 8 example of we have a safety conscious work environment 9 issue here, that is a big challenge for me, because 10 when I look back at some of the events that we talked 11 about, let's say, what is the commonality here, and 12 oh, I was part of that decision; and, oh, I was part 13 of that decision.

14 So I look at the effectiveness of where my 15 mind is in the safety conscious work environment, and 16 I think that I told you earlier that my issue ont he 17 Bravo diesel was to make it safe for the operators to 18 perform the task.

19 And not make the operators do the task and 20 what do I need to do to make them do it. So it 21 provides a different perspective, and to think that we 22 had an organization that we haven't been branded with 23 the industry chilling atmosphere, and god forbid that 24 we go there, but those words strike fear in me that an 25 organization would have a -chilling effect on its NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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118 1 employees when they don't address issues.

2 And I look at my own organization and I 3 think that my operators say plenty. They don't seem 4 to be shy about addressing issues and concerns, and so 5 I said that is not a problem with my people.

6 But when you look back on an organization 7 that challenges people when they address concerns, to 8 the point where I spent 3 or 4 hours4.62963e-5 days 0.00111 hours 6.613757e-6 weeks 1.522e-6 months in trying to 9 provide a justification for doing the right thing to 10 the facility, I would say that could challenge 11 individuals in our organization to-not stand by their 12 convictions and do what they need to do.

13 And so I would Say, okay, I am sorry that 14 the.NRC has gotten involved, but I would tell you that 15 PSEG recognized it before the letter, and that's why 16 was hired, and that's wh was 17 hired.

18 And so I think the organization recognized 19 and said okay, we are going to do something about 20 this, and then it got -- and, oh, by the way. Here is 21 a regulatory concern that you need to tell us that you 22 are going to do the right thing.

23 So we did not get the opportunity to make 24 it right all by ourselves, and now we have some 25 assistance to demonstrate that we are doing the right

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119 1 thing, and we are going to fix the problem.

2 So now you will never know whether or not 3 we will fix the problem by ourselves. We are going to 4 fix it because we have the attention of the regulator, 5 and you won't know whether or not we had the strength 6 of our convictions in our own organization to fix it 7 before we got the letter.

8 So that is the painful part of it. So I 9 am not denying that there is a challenge to the safety 10 conscious work environment here. When I look at the 11 initial Centergy survey data, J see that the 12 professional people on the island, my day worker 13 people, the engineering groups, they have high 14 positive scores and think that life is a bowl of 15 cherries.

16 When you look at the organizations of the 17 people that have technicians, and operators, and 18 mechanics working, and the plant manager at Salem, and 19 the plant manager at Hope Creek scores, and for all 20 the people who work at the facilities hands-on, the 21 scores are considerably less.

22 And they are challenging, and they say 23 that you have an issue here. So there is a big break 24 in where you work in the organization, and your 25 perception of do you have a problem or not.

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120 1 And the professional people don't 2 recognize that we have a problem, and the people who 3 deal with workers say we have a problem. So that was 4 my take on the letter.

5 MR. BARBER: That is good insight. You 6 know, one of the things that has come out in the 7 review is this concept of production over safety, and 8 listening to the way that you describe what the 9 Centergy results were, I was just kind of struck by 10 the fact that the groups that seem to have the most 11 issues as you have described them are the production 12 folks.

..-13 r That's correct.

14 MR.- BARBER: I mean, they are responsible 15 for a product of some sort, whether it be generation 16 from operations, or maintenance for repairs in the 17 power plant, and for the outage group for planning and 18 implementing -effective outages, whether it be short 19 duration or long term.

20 And that the further that you get away 21 from the plant,-- you know, you talked about kind of 22 the day*shift engineering groups, and'the less they 23 feel the production pressures.

24 Well, you can talk a lot about 25 production pressures and following a schedule, but the NEAL R.GROSS At( -1 COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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121 1 basic premise behind following a schedule is that work 2 is bucketed and sequenced so that it is performed at 3 the right time so that when I do this job, and it ends 4 now, and I start this job, that these two jobs are not

5. happening at the same time.

6 Following the schedule is -- the premise 7 -of that is to safely perform maintenance at the 8 facility in a sequence that has been thought out by 9 people ahead of time, instead of at the point of 10 contact.

11 Just like my expectations are for people 12 in following procedures; follow what is in the 13 procedure and don't be making your own decisions when 14 you are challenged at the point of contact or 15 execution.

16 That concept of following the schedule is 17 convoluted 'into production pressure in different 18 people's minds. I am not telling you that there isn't 19 production pressure.

20 I am telling you that when I tell you that 21 this job is supposed to be done at 10 o'clock, and I 22 want us to work to accomplish that, then I am having 23 confidence in the schedule that we have properly 24 looked at, and we know how long it takes and it takes 25 this many people, we should be able to accomplish it NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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122 1 in that amount of time.

2 And when you tell people that it is 3 supposed to be done at 10 o'clock in the morning, 4 without explaining the rationale behind following a 5 schedule for. a safety impact result, it is 6 communicated as get the job done.

7 It is production pressure.

8 And I have never seen anybody in my entire 9 career who doesn't self-impose production pressure on 10 themselves for whatever reason. I want to look good 11 to my boss, and I want to be recognized as a go-12 getter.

13 Doing the balancing act -- and I have said 14 that enough times.haven't I? But doing the balance 15 between I-want the job done and I want- the job done 16 right, and if it takes long, and it takes longer, are

.17 words that we say.

18 But they are not sent by the field 19 operators, and they are, not sent by the mechanic.

20 They always feel the pressure of getting the job done, 21 and I don't know how you change that, and I have 22 looked.at it right in the face, and I said that if it 23 takes you longer to do this, we will fix it the next 24 time, and I will write in here as feedback this job 25 takes two people and it takes four hours, and not one NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE.. N.W.

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123 1 guy and two hours.

2 And the next time the schedule will be 3 right, and it will reflect what it actually does take 4 to do the job. And, oh, by the way, it does take this 5 much longer to do the work than it used to.

6 The standards expectation, the peer 7 checking, the number of activities that we ask people 8 to do to make sure that they do things safely and 9 don't get hurt take longer with standards expectation 10 and peer checking.

11 So those were not activities that we did 12 when I got into the industry in 1978, and I would 13 SCRAM a unit on day shift, and I would have it started 14 up by night, and there would be two operators in the 15 control room in 1880.

16 The industry has significantly changed in 17 the oversight and execution of our duties to make sure 18 that we do things to protect the health and safety of 19 the public.

20 But I am telling you that production 21 pressure is sensed at every level and every job, and 22 you have to do something different and extraordinary 23 to communicate a different message to people so that 24 it doesn't have a negative impact on what you are 25 trying to do. It is tough. It is tough.

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124 1 MR. BARBER: Have you had the opportunity 2 to go out and talk to some maintenance workers 3 firsthand just informally about what they think about 4 the job that they are doing, and how it is going, and 5 getting feedback on it?

6 Yes, I would love to tell you 7 that I do that, Scott, but I don't. It is a challenge 8 enough for me with the recovery from five forced 9 outages, and a reactivity event, and a subcriticality 10 event, that it challenges me to make sure that I do ii that function in my own organization, let along share 12 my interests in the other technical crafts here.

13 MR. BARBER: I understand. You know, that 14 is a really interesting area for us because like I 15 said, *we have talked to all others in the 16 organization, and I think that one thing that we 17 picked up is that there is not enough interaction 18 necessarily between the supervisors and the.workers.

19 The supervisors don' t know what the workers are doing.

20 You know, I hear that, and I 21 will tell you that there may not be enough. There 22 still may. not be enough, I am going to tell you that 23 my supervisors are engaged with their operators at a 24 higher level than they ever have been before.

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125 1 positioning operations, and to put a management face 2 in the field, and I went out of my way to make sure 3 that -- well, I don't know if that has been 4 successful, but I went out of my way to make sure that 5 the field supervisors understood that their job is not 6 to be out there cracking the whip.

7 Their job out there is to be removing 8 obstacles for their people and the hurdles that they 9 have to climb over to accomplish their work, and that 10 my field supervisors are supposed to be out there 11 championing the things that the equipment operators 12 have as issues.

13 And I am going to tell you that I think 14 that you can question my people, and I think you could 15 find some people who would say that, but I don't know 16 that they would say that across the board.

17 I think that you could ask all my 18 operators do they see the field supervisor and do they 19 see supervision :in the field, and I would think that 20 they would tell you, yes, considerably more than we 21 ever did before.

22 I think that they see management out in 23 the field now more than they ever did before. It is 24 still not enough. It is still not enough, and that is 25 something that we are working on to make better.

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126 1 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Anything further?

2 MR. BARBER: No.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. We have been 4 with you for a good deal of time, and is there 5 anything that we are not covering that is of concern 6 to you, and that you would like to discuss, or 7 anything that you have to offer that we somehow have 8 not gotten into?

9 I think that I mentioned to 10 you that I had some personal -- and not public, but 11 some personal push back in the you have a problem with 12 a safety conscious work environment.

13 And I think that I am over that to the 14 point where I am kind of embracing what we need to do 15 and trying-to move the organization along that vain.

16 And I told you a number of situations that the 17 understanding of what you have now, and what you have 18 now, and what you have now, is a maturing thing.

19 So back in the bad old days and before 20 this new management team showed up, do I think we were 21 unsafe? I am going to tell you no. No, absolutely 22 not. And then as we matured some more, but still not 23 where we are today,- did I think that we were unsafe?

24 No, absolutely not.

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127 1 later, do I think I am unsafe today? No, I don't. So 2 I think *there is a line in the sand saying are you 3 upgrading your facilities safety, and I think that we

4 have always been on the right side of the line, but I 5 think we have matured in our understanding of the 6 margin that we want to have to that line, and we are 7 working to consistently increase it.

8 I think that as the industry has grown 9 that we have changed our opinion and our decision 10 about what is a safe way to operate facilities, and I 11 think we have consistently moved forward to the right 12 where it is safe all the time.

13' So even though I talked about these other 14 events, do I think that operating at 75 FTFM is i5 unsafe? No, I don't. Do I think that type of 16 procedure of use adherence is acceptable? Well, no, 17 I don't.

18 However, the comeback to that would be 19 that if you don't think that is the right way to 20 operate the facility, and that type of procedure where 21 you use adherence is not applicable, then that is not 22 safe.

23 It is not that easy of a conclusion.to 24 make, and I don't think that one justifies -- that if 25 you are not using your procedures, then you are unsafe NEAL R. GROSS COURT REPORTERS AND TRANSCRIBERS 1323 RHODE ISLAND AVE., N.W.

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128 is the conclusion that you come to.

2 So I think we are progressing and I never 3 had a realization or a sense that we were an unsafe 4 organization. I didn't. But I can look back, and I 5 can look at these events and see how they raise flags 6 individually, and now in aggregate, where they say you 7 were not right about the way that you executed those 8 things, and that that needs to be different now.

9 But I think there are different levels of 10 safety and I think that we have always been on the 11 proper side of it.

12 MR. BARBER: Just so you know, we wrote 13 the letter to Salem and Hope Creek, and that was

-.14.. intentional. So we have talked about issues just here 15 at Hope Creek here today, but there are other things 16 that have gone on at Salem that we have called 17 attention to, and we have talked to the people at 18 Salem.

19 And so that brings in the 20 commonality of the type of management organization 21 that we had, but I would tell you that the issues of 22 interest that I have to wear on my sleeve on a daily 23 basis'are at Hope Creek.

24 MR. BARBER: Absolutely.

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129 1 sister unit to be giving me a black eye, but we could 2 certainly put up a fence between the two of us and it 3 would not bother me at all, because I have plenty to 4 do to be focused over here to make sure that we are 5 doing the right thing.

6 So I understand that when you look at this 7 in totality and you talk about it as being not just a 8 Hope Creek issue, and an island issue, and I have 9 heard stories about things that have done on over 10 there that we have issues with, and are addressed from 11 that viewpoint.

12 But I will tell you that my day to day 13 life is about Hope Creek, and I have a half-a-dozen

-14 issues that we talked about here that have been 15 painful to me for the last two years.

16 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. Do you have 17 anything further that you would like to add?

18 W No, I don't think so.

19 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. I have a few 20 closing questions. Have I or any other NRC 21 representative offered you any promises of reward or 22 threatened you, in any manner in exchange for your 23 information today?

24 No, not at all.

25 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: And have you appeared NEAL R. GROSSo .1("

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130 voluntar 1 here freely and 2 Yes, I have.

3 SPECIAL AGENT NEFF: Okay. At this point, 4 we will just thank you for your time, and it is 5 approximately 5:43 and we will go off the record, and 6 I have to thank you for the significant portion of 7 your time today.

8 (Whereupon, at 5:43 p.m., the interview 9 was concluded.)

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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 and Location: Hope Creek NPS 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.

Paul Intravia Official Transcriber Neal R. Gross & Co., Inc.

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