ML19207B413
| ML19207B413 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Crane  |
| Issue date: | 08/21/1979 |
| From: | NRC - TMI-2 BULLETINS & ORDERS TASK FORCE |
| To: | |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 7908290107 | |
| Download: ML19207B413 (100) | |
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TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS PRESIDENT'S COMMISSION ON THE ACCIDENT AT THREE MILE ISLAND PUBLIC HEARING
- TUESDAY, August 21, 1979
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PRESIDENT'S COMMISSION ON THE ACCIDENT AT THREE MILE ISLAND 2
3 PUBLIC REARING 4
- TUESDAY, 5
August 21, 1979 6
Hall of Nations 7
Edmund Walsh Building Georgetown University g
36th Street, N.W.
Washington, D.C.
9 The hearing sas convened pursuant to notice at 9:07 a.m.
10 John G. Kemeny, Chair =an, presiding.
11 PARTICIPANTS:
12 John G. Kemeny President 13 Dartmouth College 14 Bruce Sabbitt Governor of Arizona 15 Patrick E. Haggerty Retired President I0 Texas Instru=ents 17 Carolyn Lewis Associate Professor of Journalism 18 Graduate School of Journalism Columbia University 19 Paul E. Marks Vice President for Health Sciences 20 Columbia University 21 Cora 3. Marrett Associate Professor of Sociology
( 22 University of Wisconsin r
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Lloyd McBride I
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United Steelaorkers of A= erica Harry McPherson
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)* 424,
Attorney l
1 PARTICIPANTS:
(continued)
O 2
Russell Peterson President Audubon Society Theodore Taylor 4
Professor of Aerospace and Mechanical Science 3
Princeton University Anne Trunk 0
Resident of Middletown, Pennsylvania 7
8 9
10 11 12 O
13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 I22 Iv, 23 i
G i 24 5
/77
i c_ 0 N T E N T S_.
Page 2
3 WITNESS:
4 Richard Thornburgh - Governor of Pennsylvania 1
5 6
7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21
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1 GREZ:RICOD I
_P _R _O _C _E.E D _I _II _G _S 2
CHAIRMAN KEME!!Y: Will the meeting please come to 3
order?
4 This is the beginning of the sixth set of public 5
hearings by the President's Comission on the Accident 6
at Three Mile Island.
I have been asked to make an 7
announcement that the air-conditioning has been turned on 8
fairly recently.
So, we hope we will have some relief from 9
the heat in here before very long.
10 Would C.ounsel Harvey please call a witness this 11 morning?
12 MR. EARVEY:
Governor Thornburgh, please?
13 CHAIRMAN KEMEUY:
And would you please swear him 14 in?
15 Whereupon, 16 RICHARD THORITSURGH 17 was called as a witness and, after being first duly sworn, 18 was examined and testified as follows:
19 CHAIRMA:i KIMENY:
Governor, may I just ask you 20 to state for the record your full name and your elected 21 position?
- 1 22 GOVER !OR THOR:IBURGH:
I am Dick Thornburgh, t
3v, 23. Governor of the Ccemenwealth cf Pennsylvania.
l 2
i 1
i g 24 l CHAIR 'A:I KEME!!Y:
Thank you.
li
} 2f l Counsel Harvey?
j 1759 1 4
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MR. HARVEY:
Governor, during our last hearings we g
2 heard from several uitnesses concerning the events leading 3
to your advisory on March 30, to recommend that pregna't 4
women and pre-school children leave the area within a five-mile 5
radius, and we would like to pick up that thread, if we could, 6
today, by getting your perspective on those events.
7 I might note that from the Lieutenant-Governor we 8
heard that on Wednesday, March 23, there was a process of 9
trying to acquire infornation concerning what was happening 10 at the site, and as he described that process, he told us 11 on Thursday that there was a decision made that he should 12 go to the site and personally inspect conditions at the site.
O 13 Was that decision to send the Lieutenant-Governor 14 on Thursday to the Three Mile Island Plant made in consultation 15 with you?
16 GOVEPliOR THORNBURGH:
Yes, it was.
17 MR. HARVEY:
Could you describe the considerations 18 that led to having the Lieutenant-Governor visit the plant?
19 GCVEPJTOR THORNBURGE:
I think there are probably 20 two considerations that went into that decision.
21 First of all, by that time, approximately 30 hours3.472222e-4 days <br />0.00833 hours <br />4.960317e-5 weeks <br />1.1415e-5 months <br />
>2 22 or so had elacsed since we had first been notified of the r
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23 incident, and we were becoming increasingly concerned about i
lh I 24 the reliability of various sources of infor=ation uhich would l 5
I
} 25 li crovide a factual basis for us carrying out our responsibil ties 1759 180
3 1
and making whatever decisions were necessary to look after the 2
health and safety of the people of the area, and part of our 3
concern was what kind of atmosphere existed at the site.
4 Were we being given information by people who were in command 5
of the situation?
Was there any degree of panic or 6
irrationality at the site among employees and others who were 7
there, and it seemed to me that the Lieutenant-Governor who 8
had been actively supervising most of the state activities 9
during the first day or so was well-qualified to go and give 10 me a reading as to precisely what the atmosphere was there.
11 Secondly, I think there was a representational 12 aspect to it, that is to say in view of the uncertainty and 13 the possibility that people might perceive the situation to be other than it was on either the up side or the down side 14 15 that the Lieutenant-Governor's presence there would indicate 16 that at least there wac not any concern about imminent 17 catastrophe.
18 In both those considerations I think the visit 19 served its purpose.
The Lieutenant-Governor was able to 20 report to me that there was an air of calm, although concern 21 at the site, and his presence there, I think, did give scme I
{ 22 i con:1dence to the people who were apprised of it that there l
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$ 23 was not any threat of imminent catastrophic event.
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- 12. RARV2Y:
Fcilcwing the Lieutenant-Governcr 's l
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} 25 ' visit the site, you held a press conference that afterncen
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4 1
on Thursday and reported to the people of Central Pennsylvania (g) 2 your sense of what the conditions were at the site.
3 Could you give us an indication of the kind of 4
attitude you tried to convey at that press conference?
5 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
From the outset we had tried 6
to acquaint the public through the news media with 'whatever 7
we had in the way of firm fact with regard to the conditions 8
at the site.
?
The Lieutenant-Governor had had three separate 10 press conferences on Wednesday, March 23, and on Thursday 11 there had been a press conference which was held ultimately 12 at 5:15 in the afternoon, following his visit.
13 The purpose of the afternoon press conference on la Thursday, March 29, was to indicate the results of his visit 15 in the manr.er which I previously described, and at that time 16 we, also, were available with officials of the NRC Regional 17 Office and with people from our Department of Environmental 18 Resources and Department of Health to answer questions as best l
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we could on the basis of the information that we had that came 20 from the press in general.
21 MR. EAR'7EY :
At that press conference one of the l
f 22 representatives of the NRC reported that the danger to the r
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site was over.
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J 24 i Can you describe your reaction to that statement j
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l759 182 '
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GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
My reaction to that statement 2
really has to be looked at in the context of our constant 3
desire to get a reliable reading on the facts out of the 4
variety of sources that were available to us, and throughout 5
Wednesday and Thursday we had been kind of testing the 6
reliability of sources of information we had from the utility, 7
from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Regional Office, from 8
our own people, because I don't think I can adequately 9
convey the frustration that we felt in trying to separate 10 fact from fiction and acquaint the news media and the general 11 public with the facts, because that we perceived to be one 12 of the prime responsibilities that we had in our office.
13 The statement made toward the end of the press 14 conference by one of the representatives of the NRC that the 15 danger at the site was, or off-site danger was over jarred 16 me a little bit, and I later found it really kind of concerned 17 others because we simply did not have that kind of a factual 18 basis for that conclusion, and T think that that really began 19 the unraveling of the situation that took place on Thursday 20 night, March 29, and culminated in the events of Friday, 21 March 30.
>g 22 We began to lose a little bit of our confidence in iu 23 the information that we were getting and the characterizations 2
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qui:e a bit of concern to those who were with me and advising r.
1759 183 l
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me.
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MR. HARVEY:
What happened on Thursday night that 3
caused you to lose confidence?
4 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: The next thing after this 5
characterization of the problem being, off-site problem being 6
over, we heard that there had been a discharge from.the 7
facility on Thursday afternoon of water which we had not been 8
apprised of previously, and furthermore that there was a 9
plant discharge to take place later that night which we were 10 told required our approval.
11 Thereafter in the course of the evening, an official 12 of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Regional Office called 13 Paul Critchlow, my press secretary, and stated that he shared 14 the misgivings about the rather optimistic view that had been 15 expressed at the tail end of the press conference and that 16 there really was a cause for concern about the status of the 17 reactor facility, in particular that there was considerable 18 concern about possible fuel damage and that the optimism that 19 was exuded by his colleague at the press conference was 20 perhaps a little bit overstated.
21 We felt that this kind of confirmed the general f22 uneasiness we had about the reliability of the information b, 23 we were getting at that time, and I went to bed that night j
l 24 i fairly troubled about where we were going to 1cok to determine !
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i j 25l precisely what was the situation at the reactor.
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1759 18L a
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MR. EARVEY:
Could you describe what happened on 2
Friday morning after the events of Thursday?
3 GOVERNOR THORNEURGH:
On Friday morning I was 4
up early because I had an interview at one of the television 5
stations during which I think I betrayed the fact that I was 6
troubled about the reliability of our information sources.
7 When I got to the office I was apprised immediately 8
that the fadility had reported an unplanned emission from 9
the site, and at about 9:06 a.m.,
referring to my rough 10 draft of the chronology of events, I learned from the 11 Lieutenant-Governor that a Mr. Harold Collins of the Nuclear 12 Regulatory Commission was recommending that we undertake an 13 evacuation.
14 I did not know Mr. Collins.
I never met him or 15 heard of him, and I asked the Lieutenant-Governor to determine 16 who Mr. Collins was and what his authority was for making such 17 a recommendation.
I, also, asked Paul Critchlow, my press 18 secretary to confer with his counterpart who was in his office 19 to determine who Mr. Collins was, whether this recommendation 20 was in order.
21 I then talked to Colonel O.
K.
Henderson, the 1 22 Director of our Imergency Management Agency to ask him what I
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", 23 ;I his appraisal was of this reported advice no evacuate, and i
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i 24 l by 10 o ' clock, within the hour, e
i I was su:::ctent_y encertain i
3 2f about the genesis of this reccmmendatien that I placed a call 1759 185 1
8 I
to Chairman Hendry of the NRC because by that time we felt 2
that our reliable sources of information had just about dried 3
up, and we had better talk to the Chairman about precisely 4
what the situation was.
5 I placed that call to him around 10 o'cloch, and 6
spoke with him with regard to the need for evacuation, to 7
verify whether or not Mr. Collins was authorized to recommend 8
evacuation and whether or not, in fact, this recommendation, 9
if it had been made was based on sufficient in. formation to 10 justify it.
II MR. HARVEY:
Could you describe the resolution of 12 the issues you intended to raise with the Commissioner with 9
13 that telephone call?
I4 GOVERNOR THOR:TEURGH:
The first resolution was that 15 we agreed or he advised that evacuation was not necessary.
16 He did recommend to us on the basis of conversations 17 in the group that he was with that we recommend for people 18 to stay inside until further notice.
19 I had mentioned to him on the basis of concerns 20 that had been expressed previously during the preceding 21 day whether there was any particular concern that we should
>g 22 he expressing with regard to pregnanc women and pre-school i
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23 children in the area in view of the release that had taken 2
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I 24 l place the day before.
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>2 25 All of this, I believe, is -- it was on a speaker i
1759 186
9 I
phone, and I think it is in the transcripts that have been 2
made available by the NRC.
3 It was a brief conversation.
I was satisfied that 4
we had, from the Chairman, received assurances that whatever 5
recommendation made by Mr. Collins was either unnecessary 6
or had been obviated by further re-examination of the 7
situation, and we resolved to keep in touch so that we had 8
a reliable source.
9 During that conversation I expressed =y concern 10 to Mr. Hendry that we had been plagued by a variety of sources 11 for information which seemed to be eroding so far as their 12 respective credibilities went, and indicated that I would 13 like to have some kind of central source for information 14 that was necessary for us to utilise in making decisions 15 about any planned evacuation, if it were necessary or other 16 precautionary measures that we had to give to the people of 17 Pennsylvania.
18 I think I said to him, "I am looking for one gcod 19 man that I can rely upon to give us information that we could 20 use in coming to decisions.
21 l Bia. HARVEY:
As you hung up the phone from talking i
,} 22 j with Chairman Hendry, did you feel that the MEC had any
$ 23,f l
9 better information or more centrol cver the situation than i
2 1
i 24 ; you did?
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) 25 I GCVERMCR CHORN3CEGH:
I was not terribly assured.
1759 187 4
10 1
I got a sense of the Chairman's frustration in our
~
9 2
conversation as well, although it was not expressed directly 3
to me.
4 I think that my impression was that they were just 5
as concerned as I was about the reliability of information 6
coming frcm the site.
7 MR. HARVEY:
I take it that after your conversation 8
wity Chairman Hendry the President called.
Can you tell us 9
who initiated that call?
10 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
The call was initiated by 11 President Carter, and according to our records was received 12 about 11:15.
13 MR. HARVEY:
Could you describe what took place 14 during that conversation?
15 GOVERNOR THORUBURGH:
The first thing the President 16 said was that he agreed that our decision to unde rtake no 17 massive evacuation at the time was correct.
He sa.d that he 18 thought we were doing the right thing.
He had been -learly 19 in touch with people at the NRC, and with Chairman r.endry.
20 He stated that our communications problems had b.en brought 21 to his attention, the difficulty in overloading of the
>g 22 regular telephone lines and our inability of ten to get throughi i
y 23 l co the site and to other people upcn whom we had to rely for a
24 information and stated that the Signal Corps wculd establish s
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} 25 l an appropriate cc=munications systems between the Uhite House,
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11 1
the Three Mile Island facility and my office.
2 He stated that Jessica Tuckman Matthevs of his 3
staff had been assigned to represent him on TMI matters and 4
finally that he was dispatching Mr. Harold Denton of the 5
Nuclear Regulatory Commission as his personal representative 6
to the site to meet my prescription of a reliable source 7
for us to look to.
8 The conversation was not particularly lengthy.
I 9
stated to the President that I appreciated his interest and 10 the fact that he had met some of the needs that I had stated 11 both to him and to Chairman Hendry.
12 MR. EARVEY:
I understand that after the President 13 called, Chairman Hendry called again.
14 Could you describe that conversation?
15 GOVERMOR THORMBURGH:
He called Ee about one-half 16 hour1.851852e-4 days <br />0.00444 hours <br />2.645503e-5 weeks <br />6.088e-6 months <br /> later, again, according to my records, indicated 11:40 17 a.m., that we again raised, as we did constantly, with any la source of information that we had, really, two questions 19 that we were concerned about, one, what is the worst case 20 foreseeable at that particular time, and what kind of lead 21 time would we have with regard to that eventuality?
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Those questions were important to us because we r
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- 24 i assess the situation precisely what we had to look for in the s
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1759 189 i
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don't think we still had a good fix on that, but more O
2 importantly, we had to know how much time we had to activate 3
our Civil Defense people with regard eo any action that they 4
had to undertake.
5 In that regard I raised again the question of 6
evacuation because it had been planted in our minds rather 7
firmly by Mr. Collins' recommendations earlier in the day, and 8
af ter a rundown on the technology, the diagnosis of the 9
present situation at the site, the Chairman stated.that his 10 recommendation at that time was that pregnant women and 11 pre-school children should be advised to leave the area.
12 I, at that time, had had similar advice from O
13 Dr. Gordon McCloud, the Secretary of Health, based on his 14 conversations with other health experts, and we determined 15 as a result of that phone call that we would reccmmend that 16 pregnant women and pre-school children within the five-mile 17 radius surrounding the site leave the area until further 18 notice.
19 MR. HARVEY:
And that advisory was made at a press 20 conference subsequent to the phone call?
21 GOVERNCR THORN 3URGH:
That is right.
The press
>1 22 conference according to my records was held about 12:30.
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a 24 closed for logistical reasons, our thinking being tha:
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pre-school children would have children in school as well, 2
and rather than disrupt the whole schooling process by 3
deciding which was supposed to be there and which wasn't, we recommended that those schools within that. five-mile area S
be closed.
0 MR. EARVEY:
Finally, Governor, I understand that 7
on Friday the members of your staff talked with members of 8
the White House staff concerning a declaration of emergency 9
and whether or not such a declaration should be made.
10 Could you describe the considerations that went into Il not declaring such a state of energency?
I2 GOVERMOR THORNBURGH:
Yes, following the President's I3 conversation with me, there were a number of conversations Id made between, held between persons at the White House and 15 their counterparts on my staff.
16 My Executive Assistant, Jay Waldman spoke with 17 Jack Watson and Gene Eidenberg during the day.
I think, 18 according to my records he advised me of a conversation that 19 was held at 4:30 on Friday afternoon respecting the 20 declaration of an emergency.
21 Obviously we knew that a formal declaration of
>j 22 emergency under normal conditions would trigger a variety 3
23 of resconses
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frcm the Federal Government that micht not be x
I 24 available in the absence of such a declaration,but the upshot I i
1a 25 of the conversation becueen "r.
Naldman and I believe Jack i
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14 1
Watson was that we would be assured in Pennsylvania of all O
2 available federal assistance, both during the incident and 3
in the aftermath that we would get with a declaration of 4
emergency and that the declaration of emergency at that 5
particular time, being Friday afternocn March 30, might have 6
a tendency to escalate the concern of the populace over what 7
it should be based on the facts as we had them and become 8
kind of a self-fulfilling prophecy.
9 We were constantly concerned about the semantics of 10 the event.
A declaration of emergency, while it would be done 11 only to trigger certain responses in terms of aid from the 12 Federal Government would not necessarily be perceived in that 13 way by the public, and we were extremely sensitive to that.
14 We had a siren go off by mistake in the morning, for 15 example, which caused all kinds of concern and there had been 16 false reports of evacuation orders and the like so that we 17 decided not to seek a declaration of emergency, based on the 18 assurance that we would lose nothing in the way of logistical 19 support or aid that would be forthcoming in the event the 20 declaration were in.
21 MR. EARVEY:
Thank you, Governor.
>1 22 I have no further questions, Mr. Chairman.
r 3
I 23 CIIAIPP1.II ICCIY:
Governor Thornburgh, let
.e preface a
i 24 my first question by saying that university presidents very lh 5
} 25 of ten have to make decisions on subjects that they knew l
175?
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15 1
absolutely nothing about.
I know you find yourself in a 2
totally unprecedented situation.
I would like very much to 3
know what kind of decision-making process did you go through 4
in a situation where you had very confusing and bad informa-5 tion and where I believe you and your immediate aids were not 6
experts at all on the subject?
7 GOVERHOR THORNBURGH:
I think my training is as 8
an engineer and as a lawyer, fir. Chairman, and both of those 9
callings I think promote a respect, a very high respect for 10 the integrity of the facts with which you must deal, and
~
11 from the very first notification. that I received of an 12 accident at the Three Mile Island site until we were able to 13 report that at least the prospects for something catastrophic 14 had passed, my instincts and those of my staff were to 15 constantly probe, re-examine, cross examine sources of 16 information so as to get the best approximation of the 17 facts that were available.
18 I did a lot of that myself.
My immediate staff, 19 my Executive Assistant Jay Waldman and my Press Secretary 20 Paul Critchicw, members of our administration charged with 21 responsibilities in this area, Lieutenant-Governor William
>g 22 Scranton, my Secretary of Budget and Administration Rober:
5
$ 23 Wilburn, all of them were constantly admonished by me to a
1g 24 search cut the facts of particular situations.
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} 25 We would frecuently review these facts and out of 759 193
16 1
that,would come additional questions to be asked.
O 2
Perhaps the most difficult and frustrating aspect 3
of this type of event, and what I would suggest would be the 4
most important need to be met would be a diagnostic 5
capability from the technical side and the ability to 6
communicate that to those of us who.were not well-versed 7
in the technology of something as complex as a nuclear 8
reactor.
9 Heither of those were present during the first 10 48 hours5.555556e-4 days <br />0.0133 hours <br />7.936508e-5 weeks <br />1.8264e-5 months <br /> folicwing the event, and accordingly, we were left 11 to our cwn devices to try to diagnose as best we could what the consequences o'f these indefinite events were, keeping 12 O
13 in mind that our sole responsibility or prime responsibility 14 was for the health and safety of the residents of the area 15 and the integrity of the environment.
16 CHAI1WAN KEMENY:
Responding to the suggestion 17 you have just made of your major problem, what kind of 18 corrective action would you suggest if any governor is evar 19 faced with such a situation again?
Where would you like to 20 see this diagnostic capability ccming from and hcw should 21 it be organized?
>g 22 GOVERNOR THORN 3URGH:
I think the first improvement l
$ 23 that. I would like to see in the capability of all concerned m
i f24 to respond to an event like this,1f it happens again,is f
} 25 within the utility itself at the site.
One person after I
1759 194
17 I
another within the NRC characterized to me the so-called 2
" thinness" of the technological capability of Metropolitan 3
Edison at the Three Mile Island site.
4 That manifested itself to me in this inability to 5
diagnose what precisely had gone wrong on the morning of 6
March 28.
7 Accordingly, I think that while that tells us 8
something about the utility, it also tells us something 9
about the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's licensing standards, 10 and I feel that it would be advantageous to not only-upgrade 11 the training of those people in charge of operating the 12 reactor and ensure their capability of response in a crisis, 13 but to require certain standards to be established for 14 management people as well, so that there was an instantaneous 15 recognition or capability for instantaneous recognition 16 of the nature of the problem on the part of those people 17 on site and those to whom they were responsible within the 18 hierarchy of the utility.
19 secondly, I think the response capability of the 20 NRC itself, while I was very glad to see Harold Centon arrive 21 on Friday, March 30, I would have been i=mensely more ha==v I
$ 22 to see him there on Wednesday, March 23, and that interim i
.r, 23;c: uncertainty about to whom we could look within the NRC i
I 24 for reliable in:ormation was a handicap as well In other i
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"t i759 195
18 1
inspector at the site or a much quicker response capability 9
2 from Washington or Bethesda, the NRC's presence at the site 3
of any kind of accident of this nature ought to be ensured in a much quicker time, and thirdly, obviously the very 4
5 mechanics of communication ought to be improved at each of 6
the sites of like facilities around the country.
7 The Signal Corps' response by Friday was excellent.
8 Thereafter we had the kinds of communications we needed, but 9
the communications capability from a technical point of view 10 was not up to the standards that I would think would be 11 necessary during the previous two days.
12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21
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CHAIRMAN KEENY:
Governor, were you satisfied with 2
the NRC as a source of information after Friday?
3 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Yes, I was.
I was very 4
pleased that Mr. Denton was there.
The President assured me 5
he was the best man available, and I have no reason to, in 6
retrospect, dispute that characterization.
He arrived in the 7
afternoon of March 30 and reported to me within a couple of 8
hours that he had established four separate study groups to 9
carry out this diagnosis of the problem, and we developed a 10 feeling of confidence about Mr. Denton and thereafter, I think, 11 were able to work closely with him in not only being better 12 apprised of the technological situation at the site but being 13 able to rely upon him for the explanations to the public and 14 to tha. press that were required to keep them informed as to 15 matters the.t were clearly beyond my reach, and we were very 16 grateful to have him there.
17 CHAIRMAN KEMENY:
The reason I asked that last ques-18 tion is that we have had testimony at the previous public 19 hearing that on Saturday and Sunday morning there was a major 20 dispute within the ranks of the NRC representatives and, 21 indeed, the NRC came very close to recommending to you a major
[ 22 evacuation based en what we new know to be totally false d, 23 scientific analysis of the situation.
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I 24 Nere you expcsed to that confusion, and if so, hcw l
f 2f did vou resnond to it?
l 1759 197 i
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20 1
GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I didn't need expose to any 9
2 more confusion, and I am grateful that I didn't know of what 3
was going on.
4 I think Harold Denton saif it about as well as anyone 5
could when he left, finally, a grateful Pennsylvania, and while 6
he is well able to speak for himself, I think, if I might quote 7
to you what he said when he did leave, that it might be useful 8
in that regard.
It was to the effect, and I am quoting him:
9 "I guess I've learned that emergencies can only be managed by 10 people at the site; they can't be managed back at Washington."
11 I think there was an awful lot of managing that was 12 going on out of Washington and Bethesda, certainly on Friday 13 and Saturday, but I suspect previously and subsequent thereto 14 as well, that I can't fault because the responsibility lay with 15 those individuals, but I can't help but echo Mr. Denton's 16 sentiments that that kind of management from afar is a poor 17 substitute for bringing together the technological know-how 18 with the factual assessment that can only be made at the site.
19 Mr. Denton, I am well aware, was -- now, and I did 20 not know this at the time -- but concurred in the recommenda-21 tion, apparently, that was made to us on Friday morning by I
I 22 Mr. Collins that there be an evacuation, a reccmmendation which r
3 23 he very quickly, upon arriving at the site, acknowledged c
a f24 have been in error and which, by now, I think the general con '
llh i
} 25 sensus is was an erroneous reccmmendation.
I759 i98 i
3 21 1
CHAIRMAN KEMENY:
Perhaps what you have just said is 2
the natural lead-in for my final question.
You said that you 3
cannot manage an emergency from Washington, quoting Mr.
4 Denton.
How about when you do not have an emergency situation?
5 You must have given considerable thought since the accident 6
to what the role of the state should be in general in nuclear 7
power, in licensing, in inspection, or whatever way, and I 8
would very much appreciate having your thoughts on what you 9
feel the state role should be in nuclear power.
10 GOVERNOR THOPNBURGH:
Well, I think, clearly, that 11 the people of my state at the present feel that, there must be 12 a much broader constituency consulted about the siting of 13 nuclear facilities than has been the case in the past, and I 14 must say I agree with that view.
I think that hereafter, if 15 there are to be additional reactor sites built in this nation, 16 that the NRC or other appropriate agencies -- because this is 17 a field where the federal government has preempted the field --
18 is going to have to be extremely attentive to the concerns of 19 state end local officials and the public at large about those 20 decisions, and I think, with regard to our own situation, I 21 have expressed and other residents of central Pennsylvania f22 have expressed from time to time misgivings about proposed b, 23 actions of the NRC with regard to reopening Unit 1 or cleaning a
f24 up the contamination in Unit 2.
I j 25 In short, it seems to me this is no longer a. field 1759 199 l
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4 22 I
which can be left to the experts from Washington from the lll 2
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and that all of us in government 3
generally would be better advised to carry out a more deliberate 4
process of seeking citizen input and, at the same time, recog-5 nizing that there is a real opportunity to educate people 6
about the potential dangers of nuclear energy and what steps 7
have been taken to obviate the recurrence of events such as 8
this.
9 So I do think that with regard to siting, there is 10 a need to expand the decisionmaking process to include states 11 and parhaps local agencies as well.
12 Secondly, with regard to --
13 COMMISSIONER McPEERSON:
Could I interrupt you there?
14 Oc you mean give the states a veto?
15 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I am not sure that that, at 16 this time, is necessary, Commissioner.
Clearly, now there is 17 an opportunity for states to appear in a legal capacity before 18 any licensing proceeding.
Whether it is necessary to go to 19 the other extreme and provide an absolute veto, I am not pre-20 pared to say at this moment.
I hhink there must be some 21 mechanism established to expand the number of persons who have
{22 input into the siting process, clearly.
r 3
l
, 23 Secondly, I think, with regard to inspection of these J
f 24 facilities, that the states, through their appropriate agencies, e
I (Il j 25 l qust have the right to visit, inspect, and examine the sites v
1
<.,d I/59 200 s
5 23 1
from our point of view.
That again is somewhat, I think, a 2
fail / safe or belt-and-suspenders type of operation, recognizing 3
that the NRC has responsibilities of inspection; nonetheless, 4
the states are closer in and more immediately concerned about 5
the facilities, and I think that it would be an incentive to 6
each of us as states to do what we have done in Pennsylvania, 7
and that is undertake, obviously in the aftermath of this 8
event, a beefing up of our own capability to monitor and 9
inspect these sites.
10 I think those two areas, one, the initial decision 11 with regard to siting, and secondly, the ongoing responsibility 12 or authority to inspect the sites, are areas that I would 13 recommend be given real consideration by the Commission.
14 The third one is an internal one of ours, as I men-15 tiened, of developing our own capability to deal with these 16 events in terms of having monitoring equipment facilities, 17 trained personnel at the state level.
I think most states are 18 probably like us, that in the absence of having had anything 19 to deal with like Three Mile Island, their cupboard was reason-l 20 ably bare when it came to expertise to deal with this kind of 21 a situation.
{22 CHAIP. MAN KIMENY:
Governer Peterson?
5-
$ 23 CCMMISSIONIR PETIRSCN:
Governor Thcrnburgh, I wculd inI 24 i like to ask some questions relative to che concept of safety e
t 2f first.
You pointed out chat you would have been happier if
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-4 %
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6 24 1
Harold Denton had shown up on March 28 instead of March 30.
h 2
The President dispatched Harold Denton as a reliable source of 3
information, and as you pointed out a few minutes ago, Harold 4
Denton was the senior official present in the meeting in Beth-3 esda at the time the recommendation was made to ask you people 6
in Pennsylvania to evacuate the immediate area.
As I under-7 stand it, he was the person who asked Mr. Collins to call 8
Pennsylvania, and that your person, Colonel Henderson, in 9
charge of emergency preparedness in Pennsylvania, recccmended to also that the area be evacuated, and yet the decision was made 11 not to make that recommendation.
12 In hindsight, with many days to think about it, 13 Harold Denton and others say that that recommendation was not 14 sound, and from what we learned here, the scientific basis for 13 it did not exist.
But you can' t wait for that kind of analysis 16 in time of emergency.
Obviously, you have to act promptly if 17 a real tragedy is in the making.
18 So wouldn't it have been appropriate, as a safety 19 first measure, to evacuate when there was any uncertainty of 20 a tragedy occurring?
And my question is, what were you trying 21 to protect the people frem by not ordering an evacuation?
l 22 GOVERNOR THORN 3 URGE:
I think that is a very fair 5
$23 question, and I -hink the best way I can answer it-is to a
24 examine the events of Friday T.orning and a continuum of events
} ;3 that began when I was first notified of this acciden: a:
1759 202
7 25 1
7:50 a. m. on Wednesday, March 28.
2 The thought of evacuation crossed my mind t= mediately 3
at that time, and it was never out of my mind for the next 10 4
days, because that was the obvious most ecmpelling response to 5
a radiation expansion throughout the area.
6 There are known risks, I was told, in an evacuation.
7 The movement of elderly persons, people in intensive care units 8
babies in incubators, the simple traffic on the highway that 9
results from even the best of an orderly evacuation, are going 10 to exert a toll in lives and in injuries.
11 Moreover, this type of evacuation had never been 12 carried out before on the face of this earth, and it is an 10 evacuation that was quite different in kind and quality than 14 one undertaken in time of flood or hurricane or tornado or 15 what have you -- you can always look out and say, Well, the 16 river is rising; it's coming up to 10 feet, and when it gets 17 to 20 feet, we will have to move these folks and those folks.
18 When you talk about evacuating people within a five 19 mile radius of the site of a nuclear reactor, you must recog-20 nize that that will have ten-mile consequences, 20-mile conse-21 quences, hundred-mile consequences, as we heard during the
>; 22 course of this event.
That is to say, it is an event that r
3
$ 23 pecple are net able to see, to hear, to taste, to smell.
They sI i 24 cannot say tha: the radiatien cloud is new five miles out from i
} 25 the facility because it cannot be that carefully established, i
I L.' :
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1759 203
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and differing in that way from any kind of natural disaster lll 2
that we have had to deal with in the past in our experience.
3 All of that, it seems to me, militates in favor of 4
being sure that there is in fact a need for evacuation before 5
evacuation is undertaken.
It would have been very easy, and 6
perhaps prudent -
" safety first," in your terminology -- for 7
us to order an evacuation immediately at 7:50 a. m. on Wednes-8 day, March 28.
In retrospect, that would have been unnecessary.
9 It might have taken the toll that I outlined in terms of lives 10 and injury, but it would have been defensible at the time.
11 The reason why we did not undertake immediately an 12 evacuation on the recommendation of a Mr. Harold Collins, whom, 13 to this day, I have never met, was in furtherance of the type 14 of process that I described we went through constantly in this 15 crisis.
That is to test our facts.
16 I had never heard of Mr. Collins.
I didn't know who 17 he was, what his position was within the NRC, and it seemed to 18
=e prudent to spend a half an hour trying to verify who he was 19 and whether or not he was authorized to make the recommendatio.n 20 and whether his recommendation had any basis in fact.
21 Ultimately, when I did reach his boss, the Chairman y 22 of the Commission, it turned out that the recommendation was b
23 not one that had the approval of the Commission, or at least s
I IJ 24 it was so expressed to me.
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} 23 One thing I think it is important to note, I did not '
1759 204
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ask nor receive from Colonel Henderson a recommendation to 2
evacuate independent of the recommendation made by Mr. Collins.
3 I called Mr. Henderson, Colonel Henderson, to verify who Mr.
4 Collins was and whether he was in a position to make this 5
recommendation, and Colonel Henderson repeated that he, too, 6
had had the recommendation passed on to him from the site, 7
from the Met. Ed. people and from the _ offices of Mr. Collins.
8 But I think that process served us well in avoiding 9
the need for an evacuation with respect to which there were 10 known and unknown risks, and I am satisfied that a little care 11 taken in examining the source of facts and in determining the 12 authority of the individuals who are making these recommenda-13 tions so that they can be checked out and verified against 14 other sources of that type of recommendation which I relied on 15 was worthwhile.
16 COMMISSIONER PETERSON:
Governor, I was wondering 17 if, today, you would recommend to other governors around the 18 country that if a semewhat similar incident occurred at a 19 plant in their state and they got recommendations frem the 20 plant site and frem the Nuclear Regulatory Ccmmission and frcm 21 the head of their emergency precaredness, that they shouldn':
>; 22 i==ediately order evacuation, e
23 GOVERNCR THCRNSURGE:
I think : would recommend than 24 if the steps that I have recccmended here this morning had been I
i
} 2f taken.
That is te sav that there has been identified a persen,
1759 205
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10 28 1
upon whom I can rely, to whom I am to look.
Frankly, Governor, 4h 2
if Harold Denton and not Harold Collins had given me that recom -
3 mendation and it had come on Friday afternoon and not Friday 4
morning, it would have taken me much less time to verify and 5
act accordingly.
6 But if I were to have gotten a call from some --
7 suppose, as happens during these types of events, a hoax were 8
carried out.
An individual calls me and says, This is such 9
and such from the NRC; you've got to evacuate within 10 miles.
10 I think it would be absolutely insane for me to act on that 11 kind of recommendation.
12 In effect, that is somewhat like the recommendation 13 I got on Friday morning, because I knew -- never heard of 14 Harold Collins.
I didn't know whether he worked for the NRC, 15 and I think spending half an hour being prudent and finding 16 out who he was and whether his recommendation was in order was 17 a good investment of time.
18 COMMISSIONER PETERSON:
I respect that very much.
I 19 think it was certainly in order to find out who Harold Collins 20 was.
But in hindsight again, we now know that Harold Collins 21 was calling as a result of a decision of a meeting where the
[ 22 leading person there was Harold Danton and key people involved b
23 with licensing and regulations, Victor Stello and Roger Mattson, a
1 24 Paul Collins, were all there in that meeting when the decision j 2f was made to ask Mr. Collins to call Pennsylvania to r> commend 1159 206I
11 29 1
an evacuation; in fact, people who, in my judgment, were much 2
more qualified to make that recommendation than the Chairman 3
of the Commission.
4 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
They were all there and they 3
were all wrong.
6 COMMISSIONER PETERSON:
Yes, in hindsight, yes.
7 CHAIRMAN KEMENY:
Professor Taylor?
8 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
I would like to explore what 9
kind of information, from what sources, would have triggered 10 a response from you to evacuate.
Now, let me put that in con-11 text.
As I understand it, you were concerned about two differ-12 ent situations:
first of all, what had actually been released, 13 what people were being exposed to, what the hazard of that was, 14 and second, what might happen if something worse developed 15 that had to do with the power plant.
16 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Yes.
17 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
So my first question is, 18 between these two causes for concern, which concerned you the 19 most, what had actually been released or what might be released?
20 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I don't know that I ever made 21 that kind of differentiation.
As I said, my concern of the
>g 22 technical people was what is the worst thing that can happen, ia 23 based on the facts as you knew them now, and how much time p
s 1
I 24 would we have te respond in the even that did happen?
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} 25 I We had -- the menu kept growing of cencerns, scme time's i
l 6"
1759 207
12 JU 1
with bogus additions of things that, as it turned out, really g
2 were not of tremendous concern.
I am not a technical person.
3 I never attempted to masquerade as someone who could make the 4
kinds of technical judgments, but I did know enough to deter-5 mine that if there was going to be an explosion or a meltdown, 6
that we had better be concerned about moving some people, and 7
consequently, our concern about these types of catastrophic 8
events was raised almost hourly as conditions changed and the 9
ability to diagnose the status of the site improved.
10 With regard to the cumulative potential doses of 11 radiation, the same kinds of concerns were expressed there.
12 The decision to recommend to pregnant women and preschool 13 children that they leave the area on Friday, March 30, was llk 14 based on advice given to me by health experts after learning 15 of the potential for cumulative doses that would particularly 16 impact on this categerv of persons, that it was no longer safe 17 for them to remain there.
18 But it is rather hard to look and say, well, what 19 would have made you do something, because the variety of things 20 that could have happened is almost infinite.
21 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Yes.
Ncw, I would like to get
>g 22 some idea of the extent to which you had in mind or people 5
$ 23 that you had confidence in on your staff or in NRC, including ai I 24 Harold Denton, to what extent was there any discussion of a i
j 25 level of radioactive radiation intensities at which ycu would ;
i l
f7by 208
13 31 I
sort of automatically decide to evacuate.
Was there discussion 2
of what, under what conditions of direct measurement of radia-3 tion levels you would then decide to evacuate?
4 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
There was considerable discus-5 sion by Dr. Gordon MacLeod, our Secretary of Health, in con-6 jection with Dr. Neal Wald of the University of Pittsburgh, 7
officials of the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, 8
including the Food and Drug Administration, and others who 9
were not medical dcctors but were in a position to assess the 10 level of radiation that might be foreseeable from the event 11 from time to time.
12 I am not, frankly, well versed enough in the techno-13 logy to give you the facts and figures.
My question to them 14 was, what do you recommend?
Should we be moving people?
What 15 kinds of advisories should be forthcoming frem me as the chief 16 executive of the state, based upon your expertise?
And that 17 process ensued from the very beginning of our efforts to assess 18 precisely what had happened and what the consequences were.
19 And as I mentioned, the only tangible or specific action taken 20 was the recommendation with regard to pregnant ve=en and pre-21 school children.
$ 22 CCMMISSICUER TAY CR:
Well, Wednesday afterncon, r
5
$ 23 suppose that there had been -- suppose the radioactive releases a
1y 24 had been much hicher than they actually were.
I am interested; i
{
t j 25linknowinewhcmyouwouldhavelccked:c,what individual, no j
I.
i 1
1759 20.9
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14 32 1
tell you what had happened and what the meaning of it was and jlg 2
under what -- who would you have trusted to form the basis for 3
your own decision to evacuate?
Would that have been -- let me 4
ask it this way:
Suppose that one of the officials of the 5
utility had told you this, that the radiation levels were now 6
dangerous.
Would that have been sufficient to pretty auto-7 matically suggest the decision to evacuate?
8 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Nell, I am afraid I would have 9
to put that utility official in the Harold Collins test cate-10 gory.
It depends on who it was, what his background was, 11 whether he was a person who could assess the need to undertake 12 an evacuation.
I would take the time, frankly, to verify that 13 recommendation with appropriate health officials, whoever was 14 available.
15 One of the first things that I t'old the Lieutenant 16 Governor when I talked to him Wednesday morning was to marshal 17 whatever we could in the way of all governmental resources and 18 all private sector resources to enable us to make decisions 19 about things that we simply were not equipped, by way of 20 background, to assess the tacts on.
I am not & medical doctor 21 or a nuclear engineer or any one of a number of other expertises y 22 that cught to be brought to bear on this kind of thing.
r d
23 COMMISSICNER TAYLOR:
Now, in connecticn with the a
11 24 other possible reason to evacuate -- than is, because of the Ill i
j 2f possibility of a much bigger release than had actually happened I
~
1759 210
15 33 1
-- was there any discussion in your office about the statement 2
of the probability of a big release that would then cause you 3
to order an evacuation?
In other words, was there any discus-4 sion of whether, if Harold Denton, for example, had said, Look, 5
there is a 10 percent chance --
6 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Yes.
7 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
-- or a one percent chance or 8
a 50-50 chance -- was there discussion of that number and for 9
what value of that " guesstimate" you would then decide that it 10 would be a correct decision to evacuate?
11 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Again, I would not be in a 12 position to give you the specifics of that type of discussion 13 as far as the numbers go because I am simply not technologically 14 equipped to do it.
But obviously, our concern after the sizable 15 release of priday morning was whether or not there was a chance 16 of that repeating, of our having to deal with another release 17 of that size during the day or thereafter, and that was a sub-18 ject of intense concern on Friday and through the day until 19 Mr. Centon arrived and was able to give us his assessment of 20 what was acutally occurring on site.
21 COMMISSICNER TA? LOR:
Well, let me put it this way.
>1 22 Suppose that now, or at some time in the future, it was deter-r i
5 8
$ 23 mined, with hindsight, tha Wednesday,orThursday,orFriday,l I
I I 24 i or later, when the hydrogen bubble was identified, _tha: the l
I l
} 25 best technical assessment of the situation on the basis of 1759 2i1 l
3..
.c;i
L6 34 1
e'verything now known or known in the next several months, 9
2 would say there is a 50 percent chance of a major release of 3
radioactive material that would have killed people if they had 4
not been evacuated -- suppose it developed that that was in 5
fact the case then, but not known to anybody then.
Would you 6
then say that the decision not to. evacuate was a correct 7
decision?
8 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I would count myself and the 9
people of central Pennsylvania ill served by not knowing that.
10 But if you are going to go through a whole list of "what if's" 11 and " supposes," I am just unable to cope with that.
12 COMMfSSIONER TAYLOR:
No, I understand.
But what I 13 am trying to get a sense of, you were very concerned about the ggg 14 ambiguity of information you were getting, and so on.
15 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Yes.
16 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
I don't know -- I don't believe 17 anyone knows that I have been able to identify -- what all of 18 the analysis of what happened would yield in terms of a state-19 ment now about the likeliheed of a core =elt of sufficient 20 magnitude to cause a release from containment.
There are 21 still some open questions about the effects of a hydrogen
$ 22 explosion of the kind that we knew did take place, or at leasu I
$ 23 a hydrogen burn.
s f24 Suppose it should develop -- and this is, at leas j
i j 23 in my mind, a real pessibility -- that things were in a much i
i 1759 212
17 35 1
more dangerous state than was recognized then.
- Suppose, 2
further, that we had a really good system of information 3
gathering and analysis in the utility as well as a sort of 4
checking authority in NRC so that the real experts in whom 5
you would have confidence, whom you knew or felt confidence in 6
through investigations by your staff.
Suppose that they all 7
said, Look, this is the situation.
There has been a great deal 8
of fuel damage.
It is still going on, let's say Wednesday 9
afternoon, which is.apparently a possibility, and so you were 10 now flooded with accurate information which we identify now 11 or during the next several months, but you didn't have that.
12 In other words, suppose that what I guess you were 13 recommending --
14 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Well, if you are asking me if 15 I would have ordered a --
16 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
had now really existed, then 17 is there any possibility that under those conditions, the net la result would have been that you would have ordered an evacua-19 tion and it would have turned out, for reasons having to do, 20 perhaps, with luck, to have been unnecessary.
21 GOVERNOR THCRNBURGE:
I don't think there would be
>1 22 a possibility I would order an evacuation; there would be a r
5Y I
, 23 certainty I would order an evacuation under the conditions ycuj s
I j
I 24 : pose; that is, having reliable informatica from people whose j
e.
i 2f authcrity and expertise were established.
I thinkitwCuld.bef i
1759 213 e
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18 36 I
a default on my responsibilities to act.
h 2
There was no reluctance on my part to act on the 3
basis of information in which I had confidence; witness the 4
recommendation to the pregnant women and preschool children, 5
that once we were satisfied that there was a possibility of a 6
recurrence of the Friday morning event sufficient to express 7
concern for that particularly susceptible group of the populace, 8
we recommended that they move.
9 But I think that, in a way, caution can be reckless 10 abandon.
As I mentioned, if you were to act immediately at II 7:50 on Wednesday, March 28, to move everybody out within a 12 five, ten, 20, 50 mile area, against the possibility, however 13 dim, that scme catastrophe might ensue, we would be facing 14 that every single day, and the process, particularly with the 15 safeguards that I have recommended and strongly urge upon you 16 today for the fact-gathering, diagnostic, and communications 17 process, I think will greatly enhance the ability to make those 18 decisions in a far better way than we did.
19 20 21
{ 22 iV, 23 l
1 7 24 i
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,v 1759 2f4'
37 CO 1 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Just one final question about TMI d-21-79 2
the conditions under which you would have felt comfortable wit.1 Tape 3 3
your sources of information.
You have indicated that as soon 4
as Harold Denton had been there for some time that you felt 5
much better about your knowledge of what was actually going 6
on there.
7 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I figured if the President of 8
the United States recommended him, he must be pretty good.
9 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Well, that is the question I 10 would like to raise.
You presumably had never heard of Harold 11 Denton before --
12 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I had heard of Jimmy Carter, 13 though.
14 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Pardon me.
15 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Yes.
You had heard of Jimmy 16 Carter; however, I presume that you have been in situations 17 in which people whom you have a high confidence have recommen-18 ded people who have turned out not to know what they were doing.
19 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Yes.
20 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
What I am getting at is this.
21 I am no: trying to say anything about Harold Centon's capabil-
{ 22 inies, but I am interested in knowing whether you wculd advise e
f 3
1
$ 23 really that there be ene persen nominated by :he Presiden: Of '
s f24 the United States as the sole source of information er would i
i l
j 25 you rather, for example, have the situation in which there I
i 1759 215'
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38 002 1
were very knowledgeable people at the operator level and the 2
management level at the utility who are also giving you inform-3 ation, which might or might not contradict information that 4
you had gotten from someone nominated specifically by the Pres--
5 ident.
6 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
In all seriousness, I think-7 the dispatch of Mr. Denton in the context within which my re-8 quest was made and the well known frustration of all of us 9
about the inability to develop reliable information gave me mo re 10 confidence in him than I would have if he had been dispatched 11 out of the blue.
I think that is important.
12 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Because on a relative scale, 13 among other things, relative to the situation that you had be-14 fore --
15 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Absolutely.
Because the 16 President knew of my concerns and Chairman Henry knew of my 17 concerns and Chairman Henry knew the people within his organi-18
- ation who could do the job.
But you refer to in your quest-19 ion is precisely what I would reco.c.end and have recommended 20 to you this morning, lest I be mistaken, that the degree of 21 capability be enhanced at every level.
At the operating level.,
l
[ 22 at the management level within the utility, within the NRC to i I
$. 23 have a group of trouble shooters, if you like, who are avail-
- h24lable, ala Harold ::enton, to come to a size i =ediately and i
j 25 establish an authoritative lens through which we can view this
'I I
1759 216
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situation rather than being beset from all sides by _enflict-2 ing stories -- cutting down the conflict.
3 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Now, if that happened, would 4
you then use your staff to some extent the same way that you 5
did at Three Mile Island; t'aat is, to pool these different 6
sources and not just act on what you were told by one person?
7 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Absolutely.
8 COMMISSIONER TAYLOR:
Thank you very much.
9 CHAIRMLN KEMENY:
There are five commissioners 10 waiting to question.
Dr. Marks was first.
11 COMMISSIONEh MARKS:
Governor Thornburgh, I would 12 like to turn for a minute to the issues of safety and preven-13 tion during what might be called normal operations of the nu-14 clear reactor plants.
You do have that situation in the State 13 of Pennsylvania and also in the context of the fact that an 16 apparatus that is in existence, presumably oriented toward 17 issues of health and safety of both the workers and the public 18 can better deal with this emergency situation.
And I wonder 19 whether you could tell us what you have been able to do with rat-20 spect to the issues of ongoing monitoring of public health and 21 safety issues and, if appropriate, worker health and safety 22 issues in the nuclear plants in the State of Pennsylvania since 5
$ 23 the accident.
a f 24 GOVERNCR THORMBURGH:
Most of the review process and ij 25 assessment of the aftermath of the Thraa v' ' a Island acciden:
I i
i 1759 217 b
40 004 I
has been carried out by a commission appointed by me and head-0 2
ed by the Lieutenant Governor, containing within its membershi p 3
appropriate cabinet level members and other experts from the 4
private sector and from the govern = ental sector, with just 5
that charge.
I think there has been a lot of comment about 6
proliferation of commicaions and examining bodies, but in this 7
instance ours is directed at two kinds of efforts.
One, the 8
kind of in-house review that clearly is necessary in dealing 9
with response to an unprecendented event and, secondly, an 10 assessment of the economic, health, environmental, psychologi-it cal, what have you consequences of the event.
That group is 12 at its task presently and I think it would be somewhat prema-13 ture for me to anticipate what they may well recommend.
But gg 14 their responsibility and their charge is to accomplish precise -
15 ly what you suggested.
16 COMMISSIONER MARKS:
Well, we heard testimony from 17 Dr. MacLeod, for example, that the Department of Health has 18 still no capability of dealing with issues related to radia-19 tion hazards, radiological safety, with respect to nuclear 20 plant operations in the state.
And, I guess specifically, I 21 wonder if you have been able to formulate any sense or priori-
[ 22 ties with regard to state commitments to this effort.
e 5
$, 23 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
The process for establishing g4 those priorities and making ISCommendations is the Commission j
41>
2f which the ieuten== cove==o= chai== >=d : 2111 teck with 1
,.C
1759
?19
41 DOS 1
anticipation to what they recommend.
Dr. MacLeod is a member 2
of the commission.
He has stated quite forcefully his views 3
with respect to the condition of the department he found when 4
he took it over earlier this year.
There are shortcomings.
3 There are shortcomings, I will warrant, in almost every aspect 6
of our ability to respond to this kind of an event.
But our 7
feeling is that we can address those within the context of the 8
findings of this commission with regard to what happened and 9
within the confines of what the Scranton committee is looking 10 at within looking at what our response was, where the inade-jj quacies were and where we can shore it up.
12 COMMISSIONER MARKS:
Do you have any sense of a de-13 ficiency with regard to information transfer to health profes-ja sionals or..the public residing in the area of Three Mile Island 15 right now.
The consequences of the accident are obviously 16 still with us.
The clean up is still going on.
In this re-j7 gard we heard testimony again that the Department of Health 18 has no capability of providing any, if you will, support ser-39 vices for the ongoing events.
GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
If that was Dr. MacLeod's 20 testimony, I am in no position to contradict it.
I think his 21 y 22 judgment en those matters will be incorporated into whatever r
3
$ 23 changes are made within the Department of Health to be more 3
f24 respcnsive in this regard.
I COMMISS:CNER MARKS:
Have you had any requests coming j 25 1,
s O_-
e 1759 219
42 DO6 1
to you at this juncture for either budgets o'r personnel to O
2 deal with health and safety issues surrounding Three Mile Is-3 land right now?
4 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Not specifically.
I think we 3
have been discussing with Dr. MacLeod his recommendations in 6
many respects for reorganization of a health department, that 7
leaves much to be desired.
And I will look to him for guid-8 ance in that respect.
Specifically, at the moment, I think 9
that what we want to weigh is the complete assessment, the re-10 sponse capability within state government from Governor Scran-11 ton's group.
12 COMMISSIONER MARKS:
This, in your view, include's j3 not only a response to emergency, but ong6ing surveillance of g
ja the issues related to public health and safety for those re-15 actors that will be operating in the state?
GOVERNOR THORNBURG:
That was part of the specific 16 j7 charge given to the Scranton Commission when it was established.
COMMISSICNER MARKS:
Thank you, Governor.
jg CHAIRMAN KEMENY:
Professor Lewis.
39 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
Governor, I would like to just 20 21 g
back to a statement that you made about a call that you f22 had fr m the President en Friday, in which he said that your decision for no massive evacuation was correct.
What support-23 s
(
,,4 ing evidence did the President indicate that he had en Friday
= rning that that decision was correct?
25 I759 220
..(
)
43 D07 1
GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I don't know.
He did not in-2 dicate to me -- it was obvious that he had talked with Chair-3 man Henry, but I did not cross examine him.
4 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
The reason I am asking that is 5
I am curious.
This was just shortly after Harold Collins and 6
a group that included Denton an'd Mattson and so forth was say-7 ing that there was a danger there at Three Mile Island.
How 8
do you account for the discrepancy between that soothing phras e
9 from the White House and what you were getting from NRC in 10 Washington?
11 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I wasn't getting it from NRC.
12 I had no idea that Messrs. Denton, Mattson, whomever, were 13 recommending evacuation.
I didn't find that out until well 14 after the event when the transcripts were first made public.
13 COMMISSICNER LEWIS:
I see.
16 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
All I knew was that scmeone 17 whcm I had never heard of, named Harold Collins, was recommen-18 ding an evacuation.
Within half an hour, I was able to verify 19 that that wasn't really expressing the view of the chairman of 20 the commission and accordingly I discarded it.
There was no 21 controversy or discrepancy, to my mind.
$ 22 CCMMISSICNER LEWIS:
Okay.
You had heard fr0m ij 23 Harold Collins that there was a danger and an evacuation.
l f24 should be --
j i
j 25 l GCVERNCR THCRN3URGH:
I never talked :
Mr. Collins.
' - 1
1759 221 l
44 DO8 1
COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
You had gotten that information 2
from Mr. Collins.
Then you had a call from the White House 3
saying the decision not to evacuate was correct.
I am just 4
trying to find out what was the thinking.
Were there, in your 5
view, considerations about the future of nuclear power and 6
what this whole thing might do to the industry at that point?
7 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I had only one consideration in 8
my mind; the health and the safety of the people of central 9
It was a very tense time and there was very 10 little time to think about the future of nuclear power at that 11 tLme.
12 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
Well, with all due respect to 13 the President, he has been trained in nuclear power in Navy llh 14 submarines, but he is not an expert himself and I am, again, 15 trying to evaluate your decision to follow his advice in terms 16 of not pursuing the evacuation.
17 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: He didn't give me any advice.
18 I didn't ask him for any advice.
He knew the decision that we 19 had made and he expressed general agreement.
This was not an 20 extended colloquy.
It was really a very quick conversation 21 because things were happening rather thick and fast.
$ 22 COMMISSIONER LINIS:
Did you have any discussions r
3 23 with him or anyone else from the White House about the pcssible a
1J 24 pclitical fallout from this incident in terms of the future j 23 of nuclear pcwer?
1759 222
45 009 1
GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: No.
2 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
So, that never came up as a 3
consideration in not ordering an evacuation?
4 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: Absolutely not.
5 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
I want to ask you some other 6
questions if I might. ' Could you assess the impact of the 7
Three Mile Island coverage, that is the news coverage, on your 8
ability to manage the event?
9 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:. There were two events that I 10 could single out as making our task more difficult.
But I 11 think, by and large, the reporting under the circumstances was 12 responsible.
When I say "under the circumstances", I mean 13 that news reporters, even experienced news reporters were hav-14 ing the sames kinds of difficulties that I and my staff were 15 having in trying to pin down the facts.
In fact, I,
from time 16 to time, expressed great sympathy with them in that regard 17 because we were in effect doing the same job, trying to corre-18 late sources.
The two events that were comewhat troubleseme 19 was, first of all, a report en Friday afternoon, relating to 20 a supposed i=minence of a meltdown and a report on Saturday 21 evening relating to the supposed incidence of an explosion.
>g 22 Both of those reports were distorted at best and caused a gcod b
23 deal of concern, not cnly among my staff and c hers a: the a
E I 24 site and among the general pcpulace, but a=cng considerable i} 2f numbers of news persens who were there as well and who l759 223 i.
I
46 0010 1
perceived the reports to be somewhat inaccurate.
But I would O
2 say, by and large, that the reporting job done was a responsi-3 ble one, with the exception of those two events.
4 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
Governor, were you aware that 5
both of those reports came from NRC sources?
6 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I later learned that, yes.
7 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
So, they had been cross checked 8
and the reporters were only indicating the confusion within 9
the NRC.
10 GOVERNQR THORNBURGH:
I would only paraphrase Mr.
11 Denton and say that, perhaps, the management of the news from 12 Washington or Bethesda is not really appropriate either in an 13 incident like this and that is why we tried to -- over sobe ggg 14 objection from the news media -- to establish one voice on 15 technological matters, i.e. Mr. Denton, one voice on the emer-16 gency response matters, myself.
And I think that worked fair-17 ly well, although it was frustrating because it cut off a lot 18 of sources.
19 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
It was frustrating to the media,
20 too.
2:
Governor, in terms of, again, managing the event, f22 do you think it is okay for the people to be aware of the 5
y 23 ccnfusien that exists?
In fact, the media were reflecting the 24 Ccnfusion that was in existence.
Co you think that is useful j
III 25 or i=sortant that the public znow that the experts are 1759 224
47 Doll 1
disagreeing?
2 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
That is one of the toughest 3
questions to wrestle in retrospect that I have found.
I think 4
it is important to apprise the public in an event like this, 5
which is so unprecendented of every bit of factual =aterial 6
that there is.
To cover up any of the consequences for what-7 ever reason or any of the conditions for whatever reason is 8
tcally not serving the public well.
But part of the facts --
9 well, let me just say -- it was a fact that during this inter-10 val that we didn't know the facts and that we had five or six
)1 different versions of a particular event and obviously, there 12 is a real danger of eroding the confidence of the public in 13 the sources of their information if that kind of scenario is 14 played out in full.
We worked very hard to try to make the 15 Governor's office an island of credibility in this event.
I 16 don't know that we fully succeeded.
But we resisted the temp 17 tation to speak to the press and through the press to the pub 18 lic until we had some reascnable fix on the facts and didn't 19 hesitate to come back and say we were wrong, the information 20 we got was wrong.
We did that several times.
In fact, we gor 21 a little bit tired of it.
But it is an extremely difficult f 22 judgment to make and I don't know what the answer to your i
$ 23 questien is.
I hope you can give us some guidance on that sIy 24 with regard to proper disseminati:n of inic= nation policy.
i j 25 COMMISSICUZR '_ZU!S:
Well, Governor, in light of the t
4u-l/by idb
48 Dol 2 1
Three tiile Island experience and what it did to public credi-0 2
bility, what has it done to the public perception of those 3
who run the nuclear power industry, including the NRC, utili-4 ties, etcetera?
Is there any way, ever, to recover the belief 5
of the citizens that they will get the straight answers or eye t 6
that these people know the straight answers.
7 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I don't know what it has done, 8
because you have to use some fairly sophisticated polling tech -
9 niques to really get a picture of what the public thinks.
But 10 I do think that the future of the nuclear industry, to some 11 extent, does depend upon two things, one of which is the imple -
12 mentation of the types of changes that I have recommended here 13 and Governor Babbitt knows through the National Governors Assc -
ja ciation, which are designed to create a procese for the report-
- 3 ing of facts and the diagnosis of difficulties at these reac-16 tors which enhances the public's confidence in that process.
17 And the second is the far more difficult and intan-18 gible process of earning back the trust and the confidence of 19 the public on the part of the utilities, Nuclear Regulatory 20 Commission, the Governor of Pennsylvania, all of us who had 21 responsibilities which were difficult to meet.
I don't know --
$ 22 I can't assess where that stands at the present time.
But I e
3
$ 23 think that is key frem the industry's point of view, which a
f24 you were asking ne about, really, from their point of view to 2f earn back scme degree of confidence before any new initiatives llh 1759 ??A
% M
w 0013 1
are undertaken in nuclear power development.
2 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
All right, Governor.
Just one 3
more line of questioning if I might.
4 You said earlier that you would not favor a state 5
veto over the decision by the NRC to site any new plants with-6 in your state.
How do you feel about a local plebicite, allow-7 ing the people in an area to decide for themselves, whether or 8
not they do want that nuclear plant in their territory?
9 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
I think it would be useful, 10 perhaps, as part of a process designed to decide these quest-11 ions.
I am not convinced at this time that either the veto 12 power or a plebicite veto power is the best answer.
13 COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
Can you tell me why you feel 14 that way?
It is interesting to hear a state governor willing 13 to relinquish a certain amount of control over his territory 16 and I would like to knew your thinking on this.
37 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
It is few and far between, I 18 assure you.
I don't know.
I am scmewha suspicious of the j9 race to referenda on every single questien that ccmes down the 20 pike.
We are a representative government.
We elect people in 21 ur legislatures and in our executive a:.d judicial branches ::
I 22 carry cut decisiens.
We expand and contract as the demands r
3
$ 23 increase or decrease these areas where we utilize a direct re-a f24 farendum, in scme states mere than others.
States, still I
\\
s I
like to think of as labcra:Ories of democracy, in Justice l
l 25 l!
1 1759 227
50 "D014 1
Brandeis' term.
I am just not sure that a blanket rule laying 2
down a plebicite requirement or giving the veto power to 3
governors is advisable.
It is tempting, believe me, but I am 4
really not confident enough myself that that is the real answer.
5 I think there are processes that can be developed that allow 6
a maximum input from all concerned parties.
Somebody has to 7
make the decision.
g COMMISSIONER LEWIS:
From a citizen's point of view, 9
the NRC is not elected.
It is not as though you have the final 10 decision made by your elected leaders.
So, it is a different 11 setup where it is being decided by a group in Washington that 12 is appointed and has long terms.
I am interested to ask you 13 that because it seems your Lieutenant Governor told us that he gW.
14 really wouldn't mind a plebicite.
I don't know whether that 15 reflects a division of opinion or that I might have caught hir 16 more in surprise.
17 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
No.
He is free to and ably 18 expresses his own views.
I don't know.
I would challenge 19 your own imagination in terms of a recommendation.
I don't 20 know whether there is a place for the Congross, a joint commit-21 tee, for example.
There are any number of ways, but I am the
$ 22 last one to urge en the basis of giving it not all that much I
$ 23 thought.
Luc I will be glad to and if I have any further a
f 24 thoughts, maybe I can submit them.
j 25 CCMMISSICNER LIWIS:
Thank you.
lll 1759 228
51 D015 1
CHAIRMAN KEMENY:
Commissioner McBride.
2 COGiISSIONER MC BRIDE:
Mr. Chairman, the question 3
I was going to ask, I believe, has been fairly well addressed 4
by Governor Thornburgh, not directly and so, perhaps, it might 3
be well to pin it down.
6 I gather frca your responses, Governor, that in the 7
event the likelihood for continued reliance on nuclear genera-8 ting facilities is a realistic appraisal of our future needs 9
and the question of locating such facilities arises with re-10 spect to Pennsylvania, that you are not hostile to the idea 11 but that you would want to look at it in the light of the addi-12 tional technical training and the implementation of certain 13 recommendations that might be made as a result of this exper-14 ience.
That is my general impression.
But I would appreciate is it if you would give us the benefit of your thinking with that 16 respect.
17 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
Well, I think both with re-18 spect to those sites currently being cperated in Pennsylvania, j9 those that are under construction and any new construction that 20 would be planned -- although I find that unlikely in the fore-seeable future -- that the types of recommendations that I made 21
$22 this morning from the point of view of emergency response, I r
5j 23 would regard as almest an absolute necessity.
In fact, I a
f24 think we would be extremely disturbed if that kind of result ij 73,
dcesn't come out of this commission's findings and the respense I
o_,!
1759 229 j
52 dol 6 1
to those findings per the order of the President and the NRC.
2 With regard to the future, I think we will have a 3
lot to say about the planning of sites within Pennsylvania.
4 The people of Pennsylvania have made clear that they share my 5
view; my level of skepticism about the future of nuclear power 6
has been raised substantially by this event.
Those who urge 7
increased reliance on nuclear power have a much greater burden 8
of proof to meet now than they did before March 28.
On the 9
other hand, I think it is equally inadmissable to call for the 10 immediate shutdown of those sites which are operating in Penn-11 sylvania,to enact a statewide or nationwide moratorium on the 12 basis of information available now.
Although, I would not 13 rule out such a proposition depending on what the findings of 14 this commission are.
15 The point is that I think that all of us have had 16 our sensitivity about the future of nuclear ~ power raised sub-j7 stantially by this kind of event,and I think those of us who 18 are governors or local officials and citizen's groups are not j9 going to be bashful about raising concerns in the public arena 20 as it should be as this process unfolds.
7; CHAIRMAN.M ENY:
Commissioner McPherson.
( 22 CCMMISSIONER MC PEERSCN:
Governor Thornburgh, scme r
73 of these questions have also been a3ked, but I Want to fill i..
t 74 the interstices if I may.
I want to address them not to 2f Friday, but to your decisions on Wednesday, on the first day, h
j 1759 230 i
53 dol 7 1
Were you aware on Wednesday afternoon that there was consider-2 able likelihood that there had been core damage?
3 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
The first full briefing that 4
I had on the matter of the status of the facility was on 5
Wednesday evening at my home.
Although I had gotten reports 6
throughout the day from the Lieutenant Governor and from mem-7 bers of my staff as they sought to put together some kind of 8
picture of precisely what the status of the facility, the 9
evening meeting at 11 o' clock was the first sit down that we 10 had of all persons concerned.
And at that meeting members of 11 the staff of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Regional Office 12 and of our Department of Environmental Resources gave me as 13 best they could some description of what had transpired during 14 the early morning hours and some prognosis of what we could j3 expect thereafter.
At that meeting the problem -- I remember 16 this particularly -- the problem of core damage was not dis-37 cussed and I remembered it because after everyone had left and 18 I was preparing to get some sleep, my =e=ory went back, as al j9 of us layman do, to the only bcok that I had ever. read about 20 nuclear facilities and possible difficulties, a' book called "We Almost Lost Detroit", which I had read a couple of years 21
$ 22 ago.
And a little kncwledge -- I don't know whether it is a I
$ 23 dangerous thing or not, but it is all I had.
And I remembered l
f24 the description of what the consequences of the core becoming I
ej uncovered and the So-called " china syndrome-and meledewn and 25 I
i s
a 1759 231 l
54 018 1
I was puzzled that that had not been raised at the mee' ting O
2 that we had had previously.
In retrospect, it appears that it 3
simply had not been raise,d because of an oversight.
It had 4
been discussed earlier with others during the day, but on 5
Thursday morning, I immediately raised with the Lieutenant 6
Governor and with Paul Kritschlow, my press secretary, who 7
was in contact with the NRC people, why this hadn't been dis-8 cussed.
Was there core damage?
Was there something that we 9
had not touched on in the briefing in the previous evening 10 that we should be concerned about.
11 During the day on Thursday, I guess my message got 12 through we discussed in some greater detail in the afternoon 13 the fact that there was fuel damage and, thereafter, it was a ggg 14 very great concern of ours throughout the period of time.
But 15 I do rememb'er the fact that I was perplexed a little bit by 16 the fact that the briefing that we had gotten had failed to 17 touch on that particular item.
18 19 20 21
>1 22 e
a 23 p
f i 24 i
ll>
2f 1759 232 e
1 55
'REEIiWOOD I
CO!G1ISSIOliER MC PHERSON:
I know this'is a hard APE 4 2
question to answer, but about noon on Wednesday, do you have 3
any recollection of what your understanding of the physical 4
situation at the plant was at that time, at Wednesday noon?
5 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH:
About noon on Wednesday 6
I had just finished discussing with the Lieutenant-Governor 7
his press conference which had been held at about 11 o' clock, 8
and we were meeting in my office with the Lieutenant-Governor, 9
with William Dornsife, our nuclear engineer from the 10 Department of Environmental Resources and others, and 11 continuing this constant process of rolling over what we 12 had in the way of facts and what we did not have in the 13 way of facts and hcw we were going to close that gap.
14 At that time unbeknownst to me, of course, there 15 was a release of radiation taking place from the facility 16 under the supervision of the utility which we did not have 17 prior notice of, but I did not learn about that until later 18 on when the Lieutenant-Governor had a second press conference 19 to bring that undisclosed release to the attention of the 20 public and the press.
21 COMMISSIONER MC PHERSON:
What I am getting at with g 22 respect to both what you knew on Wednesday on the core 5
$ 23 damage is this, to ask you on whom you relied to translate a
I I
i 24 what you knew or what you were being told about the physical
} 2f ! condition of the plant into consequences.
I used to work fcr
{
a' 17CO 777
\\.
iiJ/
LJJ
2 56
~
1 a man who when I would describe a problem and sit back ggg 2
satisfied with having done so would say, "Therefore."
3 Therefore,what?
I am frankly surprised that, well, let me 4
hold that back.
Before I will be surprised, tell me what 5
you --
6 GOVERNOR THORITBURGH:
Let me answer your question.
7 At that time we were about three or four hours into our 8
response capability, and my sources of advice with regard 9
to the consequence.s of what wa.s transpiring at the facility 10 were largely Bill Dornsife and Tom Gerusky of our Department 11 of Environmental Resources.
12 Later in the day Messrs. Galena and Higgens from 13 the NRC and Mr. Freas from the Department of Energy joined 14 us at the briefing we had that evening in my home, but at that 15 time Messrs. Dornsife and Gerusky were the only game in town 16 as far as I was concerned, and I was looking to them for some 17 assessment of precisely what was going on at this facility.
18 Our information came to them and to the Lieutenant-19 Governor from :!etropolitan Edison, but quite frankly, the 20 events that were occurring around noontime subsequently 21 robbed them of considerable credibility because they had not
$ 22 told us what they were going to do and had not told us even I
$ 23 at the meeting at 2 : 30 with the Lieutenant-Governor that they 5
7; 24 had done it, so that it became apparent to us that we were O
} 25 going to have to begin anew this process of casting abcut j
i.
s
3 57 I
for additional sources of information.
2 COMMISSIONER MC PEERSON:
Let me stop you right 3
there.
What did Gerusky say about the situation, say, at 4
2:30 when you learned of the new release?
5 GOVERNOR THORNEURGH:
I was not at the meeting at 6
2:30, but I saw him throughout the day, and he was very 7
upset because of the fact that in order for him to filter 8
the facts into recommendations to me he had to know those 9
facts, and if he did not know when releases were going to be 10 made from the facility, he was deprived of any ability to 11 make meaningful recc=mendations.
12 We were all very much annoyed by the fact.
In fact, 13 we more or less discounted the credibility of Metropolitan 14 Edison substantially at that point, and we stated so to the 15 press.
16 COMMISSIONER MC PEERSON:
Now, to express my 17 surprise, my surprise is that'in this situation uhere 18 something unprecedented but obviously very dangerous has 19 happened,. potentially dangerous and where your own best 20 advisers are in a state of confusion because you lack the 21 information, it frankly surprises me that you did not order
$ 22 an evacuation out to five miles on Wednesday in that siccation.
e 5
23 You were waiting for confirmation or for better
=
7 I
I 24 understanding of the facts.
I suppose I would have, had I
}-2f been in ycur shces, would prcbably have ordered the evacuation,
v.
t s.
i 1759 235
4 38 I
first and then tried to get the facts.
lll 2
GOVERNOR THORN 3URGH:
There are two things to 3
keep in mind, Commissioner.
There was considerable uncertainty 4
about what was going on at the site, but the radiation 5
readings that we were getting were nowhere near a level that 6
would have, I was advised by people in whose judgment I had 7
confidence at that time, nowhere near the level where an 8
evacuation would be called for.
9 The only time that the radiation levels anywhere 10 near approached the, well, did not even then, but the only 11 substantial radiation release was on Friday at which time 12 the Collins recommendation was made and then quickly 13 withdrawn.
14 So, our uncertainty was not whether or not there 15 should be an evacuation.
Our uncertainty was really as to 16 what precisely was the difficulty at the reactor.
17 Now, again, I will grant you there is a school of 18 thought that says if anything goes wrong with the reactor 19 you had bete-2 get everybody out frem five, 10, 15, 20 miles.
20 That does not happen n be the view that I subscribe to.
21 We kept pushing.
After we discounted the :tet Ed t 22 as a source, we had :-tessrs. Galena and Higgins frem the URC r
3
$23 there, and as I indicated, we relied upon them for another l
a 14 24 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />, and until we got into the difficulties of Thursday h
I
} 25 night, icoked around for another source.
j J. 236 l l 6
JJ I COtC1ISSIONER MC PIIEPSON: You have mentioned this 2 evacuation as if it would go out to 10 or 20 miles or whatever, 3 100 miles. The evacuation plan, as I understand it, was for 4 a five-mile evacuation. 5 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: That is right. 6 CO!CIISSIONER MC PHERSON: Pad in that five miles, 7 I believe there are no hospitals that would have required 8 evacuation? 9 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: That is correct. 10 COMMISSIONER MC PEERSON: And the population is 11 about 15,000, something of that order? 12 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I don't have those figures 13 at my fingertips at this point. 14 COMMISSIONER MC PEERSON: That, again, does not 15 seem like such a big deal. 16 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: It is not a big deal if you 17 can control it to a five-mile evacuation, but if you can look 18 me in the eye and tell me that nobody within the 10-mile, 19 20-mile or 50-mile area is not going to on their own begin 20 to evacuate, when you say, "Well, five miles, gang, everything 21 is all right outside of that, ' I would doubt it. I think that t 22 the nature of this event would have been such, and we had r 3 v I , 23 l constantly in mind that there was a real possibility tha a I I I i 24 I you would be unable to contain an evacuation within a five-mile I l } 25 l area because of the difference in the type of threat. l759 237 8 .s. x..
6 60 1 If you told somebody, let me just labor this a bit, ggg 2 because I think it is important. Somebody within a five-mile 3 area that is facing a flood can look and see that the water 4 is rising and by gosh it might well cover a five-mile area, 5 and somebody outside'that.five-mile area, 10 miles, 20 miles 6 can say, "There is no way in the world ever, short of a 7 reprise of Noah's parformance that the water is going to come 8 out 10 miles or 20 miles," but you cannot do that. You cannot 9 convince people, and I Sm not sure that it is accurate to 10 say that that same kind of analytical process can be brought 11 to bear in the case of a radiation plume, if such there were 12 that was extending out in one direction or another. 13 COMMISSIONER MC PHERSON: Would it be your judgment 14 then that it is essentially futile to have only five-mile 15 evacuation plans because any trouble with a reactor may go 16 out and affect people 100 miles away? 17 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: No, I think it is not futile 18 at all. It is necessary, but it is well to keep in mind the 19 linitations of that plan as distinguished from the traditional 20 type of evacuation which all Civil Defense people say they 21 can carry out as easy as can be. $ 22 This is a unicue kind of situation in =y mind. r 5 23 Perhaps you disagree, but it seems to me that there are l i i t i 24 i characteristics of this type c: incident that make it whcily j I } 2f l different from an evacuation carried out in the face of a I 171i9 238
7 61 I flood or a fire or some other type of disaster that we are 2 used to dealing with. 3 COMMISSIONER MC PHERSON: Essentially that people d beyond the immediate danger zone would, also, evacuate? 5 . GOVERNOR THORUBURGH: I think there is a danger, a 6 very real danger that they would perceive that their health 7 and we.'.1-being were in jeopardy as well and that you would hava 8 an unplanned evacuation that woQld impinge on the -- now, that 9 is not a reason not to undertake the evacuation. Please 10 understand, but it is a reason to factor in. That risk is 11 something to factor in to the process of decision making, 12 and it weighs against a precipitous evacuation of the type 13 that might well have been and I again acknowledge that there 14 is every reason for someone to say, "Well, if something goes 15 wrong at a nuclear facility evacuate everybody within five, 16 10, 15, 20 miles." 17 Interestingly enough, we have had a plethora of 18 events reported frem nuclear facilities within Pennsylvania 19 since the Three Mile Island accident that were never reported 20 beforehand because of a rightful sensitivity on the part of 21 the utility and the :TRC to the perceptions of people in the 1 22 area, and an argument could be made that whenever anything i u, 23 goes wrong there should be an evacuation, in which case we l 2 1 1 I 24 i would have carried out 15 or 20 evacuations since March 23. l 3 I l } 25 It is a very difficul: judgment call, and we did the best l l M p A 1 n at-1 i., s,-
8 62 I we could. lll 2 ~ COMMISSIONER MC PHERSON: I appreciate that. The 3 purpose of our investign' '.on, of course, is not to second 4 guess governors and c .r-cularly those who were sitting in the e 5 situation you weere, but to try to give some counsel with 6 respect to the future, to perhaps tell other governors why 7 you decided what you did and what or how the decision making 8 might have been even more effective if more information had 9 been available. 10 Did you during this period look at the evacuation 11 plan for this area? 12 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I had had a briefing on the 13 evacuation plan, a cursory briefing during the first month 14 of my administration. During the actual interval itself 15 following March 23, I did not look at the plan. I asked 16 Dr. Wilburn, Secretary of Budget and Administration in my 17 administration to monitor the performance of the Emergency 18 Management Agency in carrying out the plan, to shore up the 19 plan where it needed it because every moment that went by 20 gac; us ample additional opportunity to improve that 21 response capability. { 22 The plan itself, it seems to me, is secondary to the b \\ , 23 l capabilities of those people who are in place to carry it out. i a l i
- 24 l All of us have seen those nicely plastic bound plans with tabs l I
I } 25 I on them telling you what to do in every evencuality, and oftentimes i t' i t 1759 240
) 63 I they really fall short of the r. ark. 2 If you have people in place who are experienced and 3 can exercise cool judgment during the situation they are. more 4 important than having the plan itself, and in the heat of this 5 event I don' t think that anybcdy was expecting to pull down 6 a plan and find an answer to their problers, so that the plan 7 itself, while it was on the books, had passed muster with 8 previous administrations, I did not regard that as the be-all 9 and end-all of our response capability as far as any 10 evacuation that had to be carried out. 11 What I regarded as far more important was to verify 12 that there were, in fact, specific steps being taken to 13 supply vehicles, medical treatment, blankets, aircraft, sites 14 where people could go, all of this was carried out or all of 15 this assessment was carried out in close cooperation with 16 federal officials who extended their aid to us from the i 17 beginning in determining that in the event we did have to 18 undertake an evacuation we were in shape to do it. 19 COID1ISSIOliER MC ?EERSON: Was all that in place 20 on Wednesday? 21 GOVERNOR THORN 3 URGE: No. There is no way in the [ 22 world that you are going to have an emergency management i I $ 23 capability in place 24 hours a day for every type of foreseeable 1 7 I 1 24; event. i I l i } 25, COMMISSICUER MC PEERSON: 2 anderstanc,. cut was.1:s I i t I g i 1759 241
10 64 I absence a factor in your decision? lll 2 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: No, we never got that close 3 to that weighing in. If we were in a very close call on 4 evacuation, perhaps on Friday, that would have weighed in, but 5 by Friday, I think that our folks had had a couple of days 6 to begin to sharpen up their capability. So, I think that 7 if you have to carry out an evacuation, you obviously have 8 to do the best you can, and we would hope to have been, if that 9 were necessary, in the best possible shape to do it, but I 10 cannot really assess that. 11 COfE1ISSIOliER MC PHERSON: One last question. Did 12 your Attorney General or did any other lawyer with whom you 13 talked give you an opinion as to the legal liability of the 14 state in the event A, you ordered an evacuation or B, you did 15 not order an evacuation? 16 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: No. I never requested any 17 such opinion.. The liability of the state, the cost that we 18 would have to undergo would be wholly secondary to the 19 safety of the populace and the integrity of the environment. 20 COMMISSIONER MC PHERSCN: I can appreciate that, but 21 the consideration itself never entered into -- f22 GOVERNOR THOR'IBURGH: No. 3 $ 23 col'MISSIONER MC PHERSON: The question never arose? f a l3 24 ' GOVERNOR THORNBCRGH: No, :::y only discussions with i l I } 25 the Attorney General during this entire proceeding were to have 1759 242 1 e
65 I him prepare in draf t form documents that we might need in the 2 event of a declaration of emergency or whatever else we could 3 foresee. 4 IIis job was to see that the paperwork that would be 5 necessary for us to act was in place. I did not ask him for 6 any opinion, nor have I to this day asked him for any opinion 7 on the liability. The liability would be met regardless 8 of what the source was if we accrued it. 9 CHAIRMAN KEMC:Pl: Dr. Marks, did you have a follow 10 on? 11 COMMISSIONER MARKS: Yes, I have one follow-on 12 question, Governor. We have centered a good deal of the 13 testimony today and in previous hearings on the er.ergency 14 and evacuation aspects of the accident. 15 Obviously, if we are to go forward with the 16 development of nuclear energy, we have to emphasize safety 17 and prevention of the exposure of public to hazards, and I 18 suspect if we had such a mode, it is likely that we would 19 be better prepared to deal with the accidents themselves, 20 and therefore, I wonder whether you can share with us any 21 insights you have as to why there is such a lack of f22 capability at the state level to deal with either the ongoing 5 $ 23 health and safety issues related to operating nuclear a I i y 24 reactors c- ~~ ""e current clean-up situation at'Three Mile s i j: '25 l Island? l 1759 243 i I r-0
12 66 1 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I don't know. You would have gg 2 to ask my predecessor in office. I took office in January 3 of this year. The event occurred in March, and what we are 4 trying to do now is to devise a better response capability. 5 Why that capability was allowed to deteriorate or why it was 6 ignored, I simply cannot speculate on. I don't know. 7 COMMISSIONER MARKS: But you sense that there is 8 this -- 9 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I know Dr. McCloud -- 10 COMMISSIONER MARKS: -- considerable lack of -- 11 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I know Dr. McCloud feels that 12 way, end I have no reason to contradict him at this moment. 13 CO!2iISSIONER MARKS: Thank you. 14 CHAIRMAN KEMENY: We will have questioning by 15 two more Commissioners, Commissioner Trunk? 16 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: Governor, you ordered the 17 National Guard and Civil Defense on an alert status. 18 Now, from my understanding, you would give the 19 information to PEMA. PEMA would give it to Civil Defense, 20 and the Divil Defense would give it to the local communities. 21 Uhy then was PEMA frozen out on Friday? {22 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I don't knew that they were. 5 $ 23 I am not really sure what you are referring to. l n I g 24 COMMISSICNER TRUNK: Colonel Henderson stated that i I l } 25 on Friday about the cime that Mr. Denton came he wasn't getting 'I l 8 1759 244
13 67 I any more information. 2 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I am not aware of that. So, 3 I don't know how to respond. Colonel Henderson was, to my 4 knowledge, in contact with the Lieutenant-Governor who is the 5 head of the Emergency Management Council throughout the entire 6 10-day period. So, I am not quite sure what he is referring 7 to. 8 COMMISSIONER TRU:!K: I know the Lieutenant-Governor 9 finally went down to the Civil Defense Headquarters. 10 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I know he was there for a 11 meeting of the Council on Friday afternoon. My records 12 indicate that on Fr iday, let me see -- I am sorry, I am 13 referring, I guess, to Thursday afternoon. Well, let us see? 14 The Lieutenant-Governor was at PEMA at 10 o' clock Friday 15 morning. I don't know. I am trying to temporize. The 16 Lieutenant-Governor was in more direct contact with PEMA than 17 I was throughout the entire event. So, I cannot really 18 answer the question, but I don't know of any inclination on, 19 certainly on my part or on the Lieutenant-Governor's part to 20 freeze out, as you put it, Colonel Henderson or the PEMA 21 superstructure. They were our operating ar=, insofar as >g 22 emergency nanagement went. 5 i v 23 l CO?SCSSIONER TRC R: Colonel Henderson said that l y i l l ai 24 l they were getting calls frcm people, and they just were not t l } 25 j able to answer them because they did not knew anything. 1759 245 l .m ?
14 68 1 GOVERNOR THORNEURGS r We were in the same position. lh 2 During Friday there was a considerable amount of uncertainty 3 as to precisely what was going on, and we did not make any 4 public statements until that evening when Mr. Denton had 5 arrived and was able to inform us as to precisely what was 6 going on, at which time we held a briefing for the press on the 7 theory that that was the best way to acquaint the general 8 populace with what the situation was. 9 It was a very turbulent time, and as I stated 10 previously, it was our policy not to run with every last 11 snippet or rumor or bit of information to the public but to 12 gather what we felt were the sound facts and present them 13 to them as Mr. Denton and I did on Friday evening. 14 It was very difficult to respond to every inquiry 15 that we were getting, and I think that difficulty was at its 16 height on Friday, March 30. 17 CO!GiISSIONER TRUUK: I know. 18 We have a Civil Defense station. Couldn't it have 19 been a good idea to activate it and give an hourly evaluation 20 of what was happening? I mean we depended solely on your 21 daily press releases and the media, and then at night when $ 22 we would listen to Cronkite or somebcdy like that we would e i 23 go to sleep afraid. sI ( ! 24 Wouldn't it have been a good idea for the state to 5 i } 25 sort of give us some relief, even if it was the same thing i ( l ~ l759 246
15 69 1 over and over again? 2 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: As I stated, I suppose there 3 are two schools of thought, that every hour you ought to tell d what you know, whether you are satisfied it is accurate or not. 5 I believe I dealt with the dilemma that you are in 6 when you are not sure of your information. Do you have an 7 obligation to pass it on to the public, nonetheless? I don't 8 know what the answer is. Our choice was to, on Friday, in 9 particular, when there was so much uncertainty, to wait until 10 we had received an assessment from Mr. Denton of precisely 11 what was going on, on the theory that a wait, a delay to 12 provide accurate information is better than the periodic 13 supplying of misinformation. 14 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: But if the state or you or 15 your press were giving the reports, I mean we believed you. 16 So, getting it on the hourly basis would have been just as 17 good as waiting. 18 GOVERNOR THORNSURGH: We just did not have reliable 19 information, Commissioner, and I just -- that was our problem. 20 Ue did not knew until we had a thorough briefing from 21 Mr. Centon, first by phone in the afternoon and then later } 22 that evening what the situation was. I 3 , 23 Now, I suppose : could go on every hour and say, l m i I I 24 ; *We really don't knew what is going on here, folks,bu:" l 3 i } 25 l CO"MISSIONER TRCNK: I don't mean just you, but 4, ' J' ~ ~ 1759 247
Ao 70 I Friday was not the only bad day. We had a very bad day on g 2 Sunday. The rumor in Middletown was that we would have a 3 six-hour leeway to get out.. That did not leave us very 4 comfortable, and we were waiting for you, and then I remember 5 waiting for you to come on, and they said, 'Well, the 6 Governor is coming on," and it would go on another 15 minutes, 7 and yes, we are waiting for the Governor, you know, and I 8 think we waited about an hour before you finally came on. 9 GOVERNOR THOPlIBURGE: That hour was spent, I mus t 10 say, in trying to make sure that what we did present to the 11 public was as accurate as could ba. Sunday was the day that 12 the President was there. It was a busy day for us. We came 13 to Middletown. We met with the press and the public there lh 14 af ter the visit with President and Mrs. Carter to the site. 15 I am certainly not here to try to convince you and other 16 residents of the area that we did an apple pie perfect job, 17 but I think it is important to recognize the difficulties 18 that I dealt wi th in some context of what you do when you 19 are in a highly volatile situation, and you are not sure of 20 the facts. 21 We frecuently would give our best estimate of the { 22 facts and then have to come back at the next briefing and say, i i I v, 23 "Well, that was wrong, and in fact, here is what happened." m 1 i a 24! We were having the same kinds of problems that you i ,'} 25 lll i were in some respects. I wish it were otherwise. I wish i f 1759 248 4
17 71 I there were a capacity that we could instantaneously determine 2 the facts and assess their veracity, but really that is not 3 the case. 4 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: I am not criticizing you. I 5 just -- 6 GOVERNOR THORNBURGE: There is room for criticism. 7 Don't get me wrong. .I think there is plenty of room for 8 criticism. 9 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: There is also one other thing. 10 Do you think it is fair for the communities around the area 11 of a nuclear plant to be the last to know that an incident 12 has happened? 13 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I certainly would not think 14 that would be fair, although I am not sure that that was the 15 case here. Colonel Henderson informed me daat PEMA during 16 the early morning hours of March 28, notified all of the 17 county officials and the county officials' responsibility then 18 is to notify people in the community. 19 Now, you are going to miss certain individuals. 20 I was greatly distressed to learn that Amish residents of 21 Lancaster County, for example, who have no radio and no g 22 newspaper, no access to the outside world did net have timely l 5 $ 23 nctice of an event that might well have affected them. I a l I1 24 The information dissemination problems are enormcus, ; i i } 2f but believe me, they are ncwhere near as enor=cus as the 4 t a 9 FA O O I/37 L1/ s
18 72 I information accumulation problems. ggg 2 In order to get information out, you have to have 3 it in the first place, and I am, from my vantage point 4 terribly concerned that the process of gathering information 5 that is accurate and reliable be greatly enhanced in the 6 event that this kind of event has to be dealt with again. 7 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: I just cannot see Met Ed is 8 two, thrps miles away from Middletown. They had to call 9 Harrisburg. Harrisburg in turn calls Middletown. I mean 10 they sort of go over us and then come back. Why couldn't 11 we be notified about the same time you are? 12 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I don't know. It is certainly 13 physically possible. Whether it is desirable or not, I don't 4 14 know. As I say, the information dissemination problems are 15 extremely difficult. 16 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: There is one more thing I 17 wanted to ask. Since you put the National Guard on the 18 alert status, did you realize that the personnel in the 19 vicinity of Harrisburg were not available? I mean I am 20 getting this from the Patriot News on August 9, where they 21 said that the National Guard ranks were very thin. I22 GCVERNOR THORNBURGH: I don ' t know. General Scott r 3 23 who is the Adjutant General, the Commandant of the National i n 1a 24 Guard was part of our response team. He raised no such l k } 25 question with me. So, I j ust si= ply ' don ' t know, I am arralc, j J 1759 250~
19 73 1 Commissioner. 2 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: There is, also, a statement 3 here that the Adjutant General guarantees that no National 4 Guard will go into an area that is exposed to dangerous 5 levels of radiation or fallout. I am under the impression 6 that a National Guard would be called out in case we had a 7 larger accident. Eow far away would they be from us and 8 helping us? 9 I mean since they would not be able to go into 10 Middletown or Gouldsboro, how would they help us? 11 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I am not really -- I think 12 you would have to ask General Scott. I am not familiar 13 with the logistics of troop movements in the event of an 14 emergency. 15 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: Should the National Gua'rd be 16 given such a guaranty? 17 GOVERNOR THORNEURGH: I am not sure what the 18 guaranty is. It is reported in the newspaper that what? 19 COMMISSIONER TRUNK: It says, "You can assure your 20 wives and families that the Adjutant General of Pennsylvania 21 will not, I repeat, will not assign Pennsylvania National f22 Guard personnel to missions or in areas where the possibility 5 y 23, exists that they may be exposed to dangerous levels of j i I i 24l radiation or fallou.. i l l } 2f GOVERNOR THOPl:3URCE: I am not fa= g w@ hat l 4 - e h I l a t. 3 i u 4
20 74 lh 1 statement or that policy. I will look into it, but I am 2 not quite sure what he is driving at, and I really would not 3 want to rely on what is in the newspaper account. 4 CHAIRMAN KEMENY: I think Commissioner Trunk is 5 asking an absolutely key question here. Wouldn ' t that 6 present a very major dilemma if one depends on the National 7 Guard to help citizens get out of such an area? 8 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: I don't know what dangerous 9 levels of radiation are. If you are talking about -- there 10 were not dangerous levels of radiation at any time, as I was 11 advised during this l incident, if we had to undertake an 12 evacuation that chey would be available, but I would want 9 13 to refine that statement a lot more before I assessed. 14 CHAIR!Wi KEMENY: Yes, I am sure this did not 15 refer to the incident because it speaks about the future 16 as I heard you quote it, Ccmmissioner Trunk, and not about 17 the past. That does raise a rather odd issue as to whether 18 as you are trying to get people out of -- obviously if it is 19 lethal, it is one kind of situation. 20 GOVERNOR THORNBURGH: Yes. 21 CHAIR WI KEME:iY: But suppose you have some in between >1 22 kind of situation. If those who you count on to be most i 3 l 23 helpful to the citizens are being protected first, it seems a L 4 24 to me it is women and children last. 1 i W } 25 GOVERNCR THOR:!EURGH: That certainly is not mv i I i l 1759 252
21 75 1 feeling, and again, I had not heard of this before, and I am 2 not really sure what General Scott meant by that statement, but clearly no National Guardsmen, no Pennsylvania E=ergency 3 4 Management personnel, no one in state government is going 5 to abandon people in a dangerous are,a. Our responsibility 6 is emergency management, and I can rest reasonably assured 7 that that is not what he meant by that statement. 8 CHAIRMAN ICtENY: Governor Babbitt? 9 COMMISSIONER BA3DITT: Governor Thornburgh, in 10 the transcript of your interview prior to today, you indicated 11 that there was a discussion on Wednesday of the risks of an 12 evacuation, and you made specific reference to a flood 13 evacuation and to a discussion with Gordon McCloud about the 14 Colorado situation. I wonder if you could identify those 15 two incidents for me and if you can recollect what specific 16 discussions or lessons you drew from discussing those two 17 incidents? 18 GOVERNOR THORNEURGE: I don't have any particular 19 recollection of specific conversations. What we were looking 20 at on Uednesday in the context of a possible evacuatien 21 was what risks were there, and my best recollection is that $ 22 3ill Scranton, the Lieutenant-Governor had been in the l r 5 i $. 23 Wilkes Barre area during the Agenes, Hurricane Agnes floccs l t i i I 1 I 24 ' during which there was a sizable evacuation undertaken. j ij 25, Gcrdon had talked to scmeone, and then had talked I i j i n 1759 253
_ 22 76 I to Jay Waldman who had talked to me about an evacuation 2 that had been undertaken, as I remember in Colorado, but 3 what we were looking at was trying to gather as much 4 information as we could from wherever source we could to 5 catalog the kinds of things we ought to be concerned about in 6 an evacuation, and the thing that impressed, was impressed 7 most on me was that when you evacuate, you are not *just 8 talking about the evacuation of able-bodied adult men and 9 women, that there are an awful lot of people with special 10 needs that would have to' be provided for especially during 11 an evacuation and that the risk of death or injury to those 12 persons was substantially greater daan it was to the populace 13 at large. / 14 So, I. don't think that we really had much of a 15 seminar on evacuations, but we tried to pick up as much 16 information as we could from whomever had the experience. 17 CO!1IIISSIONER BABBIC : Was there any suggestion 18 that the Colorado situation was a radiological emergency? 19 GOVERNOR THORMBURGH: I don't remember. That is an 20 offhand recollection of mine, Governor. Jay Waldman, =y 21 Executive Assistant or Gordon :tcCloud might be betto a {22 to answer that. I'just don't know at the present time. b 23 CHAIRMAN KEMENY: !ay I just T.ake a brief announcement a 2$ before we adjourn for today? lll h 25 The remaining hearing schedule is that we will be i 1759 254
o 23 77 I in hearing all day tomorrow, that is morning until about 2 6 p.m., in the Ef ternoon and then Thursday morning, and the 3 subject will be the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 4 Governor Thornburgh, may we thank you very much 5 on behalf of the Commission for appearing, and we are recessed 6 with these hearings until 9 a.m. tomorrow morning. 7 GOVERMOR THORITBURGH: Thank you. 8 (Thereupon, at 11:13 a.m., a recess was taken 9 until 9 a.m., the following day, Wednesday, August 22, 1979.) 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 I 22 Iv j 23 2 i 24 l } 23, 1759 255 l .}}