ML19242D904
| ML19242D904 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Crane  |
| Issue date: | 05/17/1979 |
| From: | Donnachie J METROPOLITAN EDISON CO. |
| To: | |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 7908280807 | |
| Download: ML19242D904 (65) | |
Text
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UNITED STATES OF AMEP.ICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY C0fn SSION r
I I
In the Matter of:
l 21 IE TMI INVESTIGATION INTERVIEW 3!
of l
41 John P. Donnachie Radiation Chemistry Technician 5,i 6!
7' 8!
I Trailer #203 9
NRC Investigation Site TMI Nuclear Power Plant 10; Middletown, Pennsylvania 11!
May 17, 1979 12l (Date of Interview) 13I July 3,1979 (Date Transcript Typec) 14i 214, 215 and 216
+
15 (Tape Numoer(:;))
16l i
171 18i 19l 20t 9.1l NRC PERSONNEL:
'22 Gregory P. Yuhas, Radiation Specialist 23) l Mark E. Resner, Investigator 24; 25l 770P u oeo7 p
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RESNER:
The following is an interview with Mr. John P. Donnachie.
Mr.
2' j
Donnachie is employed wit.: the Metropolitan Edison Company at the Three 31 l
Mile Island Facility and he is a Radiation Chemistry Technician.
The 41 present time is 11:12 p.m., eastern daylight time.
Today's date is May S
17, 1979.
This interview is being conducted in Trailer 203 which is 6
j located just outside the south gate to the Three Mile Island facility.
7 The individuals present for thi's interview are Mr. Gregory P. Yuhas.
O Mr. Yuhas is employed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and is a 9
Radiation Specialist with Region I.
Moderating this interview is i
10!
myself, Mark E. Resner.
I am an Investigator with the Office of It-pector l
11 and Auditor, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Headquarters.
Prior to 12!
taping this interview, we discussed with Mr. Donnachie a two page 13 document which advised him of the purpose, scope and authority with 14 which the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has to conduct this investigation.
15; In addition, it apm.ised Mr. Donr.achie that he is entitled to a repre-16[
sentative of his choice at this intervir.w should he desire one.
In no 17 way is he conpelled to talk to us shoJ1d he not desire to talk.
On the 181 second page of this document, Mr. Donnachie has answered three questions 19I which I will state.
20 21, RESNER:
Do you understand the above?
Mr. Donnachie has checked yes.
22 Is that correct, Mr. Donnachie?
23 2 41 25l P
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1 00NNACHIE:
Yes sir.
2:
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RESNER:
Question 2.
Do we have your permission to tape this interview?
4f Mr. Donnachie has also checked yes.
Is that also correct, Mr. Donnachie?
5 0
00NNACHIE:
Yes sir.
7 8
RESNER:
Question No. 3.
Do you want a copy of the tape? Mr. Donnachie 9
has checked yes.
Is that correct Mr. Donnachie?
10' 11 00NNACHIE:
Yes sir.
12{
13 RESNER:
We will provide you with a copy of the tape at the conclusion 14!
of the interview.
At this time I will ask Mr. Donnachie if he will 15 briefly state his educational and job experience in the nuclear field.
16!
17 DONNACHIE:
I have been employed for Met Ed since 1970.
I have been a 18j Radiation Chemistry Technician since 1974--two years as a Junior Technician 19!
and the last three and a half being a Senior Radiation Chemistry Technician.
2dj My educational background includes high school (graduate) and two years f
21j of college at Penn State l'niversity (non grad).
22f 2?!
RESNER:
Thank you Mr. Donnachie.
Now for the questioning of Mr.
2d Yuhas.
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YUHAS:
For the record, Mr. Donnachie prefers to be called Pat rather 21 than John.
So in the course of this interview I will be referring to i
31 you as Pat.---
4l DONNACHIE:
Okay--
6 7
YUHAS:
The.way we are going to do this is, I am going to ask you to O
give a description of how you became aware of the incident, when you came to work, and ask you to give us a general description of what you 10 did during the first three days.
That would have been Wednesday, the ll{
28th through midnight, Friday the 30th.
At the conclusion of your 12 chain of thought, I will come back and ask you some specific questions 13{
about your involvement and what jobs you did.
Then I will give you an 14 opportunity to discuss any comments or criticisms (complimentary or 15 not) regarding the health physics program here at Metropolitan Edison.
16!
So if would you begin by describing how you learned of the incident and i
17i what you did the first 3 days?
18!
19i 00NNACHIE:
Okay.
The first night of the incident I was here.
I had 20:
come to work 11 to 7 on the night of the 28th, and the reason I came in 21{
was they were a man short and they contacted me by telephone and asked 22I me my desire to come in which I came in that night.
During the course 23 of the evening, we wen
- through our normal procedures in HP as far as 24j doing the routine surveys, reactor entry surveys into Unit 2 and Unit 25l
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We took a Unit 2 entry survey somewhere around 2:00-2:30 that night 2
and we counted the results on a Ge(Li).
The results were routine and 3i i,
nothing out of the ordinary.
The results being it was safe to go in 4l the reactor building access -at that time.
At roughly between 4:00-4:30 5'
the announced turbine trip followed by reactor trip in the period of a minute; whereas, we have two surveillances that we have to satisfy being the offgases from the condenser and also the dose equivalent of 8
iodine surveillances.
I took the condenser back from exhaust oroxi-9 mately 5:00 where David Zeiter and Tom Davis were in chemistry that 1
night and they were taking care of the dose equivalent of iodine results.
11!
They had reactor coolant on recirc for approximately an hour, hour and 12I a half, going into 6:30 or a quarter of seven before they pulled up the 13 sample.
The sample I had pulled off the conduct condenser vacuum pump, 14 somewhere around 5:00 was counted on the Ge(Li) and results were xenon --
15i I can't give you a number right now because I don't remember what it 16i is -- but that was no where near the limitation set forth from our tech
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17 spec limits.
So at that tilne we felt it was still routine.
We were 18l 3ettiilg no input from operations as far as general mode of operation 1$l going into the... prior to the accident after the trip had occurred.
20l When we first learned that we had a nature that was serious was somewhere 21l between 6:30 and 7:00.
Well, excuse me, let's go back a little further 2h till about 5:30.
Mike Janouski was notified by operations to resample l
23l HPR 227 which is the atmosphere monitor off the Unit 2 reactor building.
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He pulled a particulate sample off of that and he got water out of the 25l i
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j lines which he said contaminated him.
I think he had his hands slightly 2
contaminated due to pulling the sample.
At that time he came back from 31 j
the lab and he informed me he thinks that Unit 2 had big problems 4!'
meaning there was a lot of steam in the building and it was following 5
through into the monitoring systems.
At that time we ~saw no levels buildir.g up in the lines coming over to Unit 1 sampling.
Then Dick Dubiel had come in somewhere around 6 o' clock and we were discussing 8
whether we were going to make a reactor building entry, being that we 9'
still did not know the seriousness of the problem.
So Mike Janouski 10 and I proceeded over to Unit 2 auxiliary building taking Scott Air 11 Packs over to make a reactor building entry somewhere around 7:00.
At 12!
about 20 minutes to seven, we discussed that we had only 20 minutes i
13 left to go until our shift ended and we could get out.
So ty the time 14 we got from the Unit 2 reactor building to Unit 1, the problem seemed 15l to increase at that time.
We walked into Unit 1 HP lab and heard an 16{
area monitor go off out in the hot machine shop which is adjacent to 1!
the nuc sampling room.
Lines from Unit 2 come directly through the hot l
18!
machine shop into the nuc sampling room.
So we went out and took an 19 E-520, checked the area and we saw 40 mR.
There is a period of time of 20' a couple of seconds till we tried to assess where it was coming from 21{
and we more or less looked up and noticed the lines, and right away I 22 ran into the unit nuc sampling room and checked the RC letdown lines 23l coming in.
At that time the readir.g was somewhere around 300 mR which 24, is somewhat high for the RC letdown Unit 2.
So I went back out and 25I l
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- hecked out the area of the hot nachine shop and the levels had increased 2!
l to somewhere around 200 mR during a period of one minute and a half.
3!
At that time we evacuated the security guard out of the area and went 4'
back in the nuc sampling room and rechecked the lines coming in, because I
Sl there we could reach the lines to get an accurate description of the radiation.
At that point the radiation levels had gone up to somewhere 7
close to an R.
So at that point Dick Dubiel got on the page system and 0
called George Kunder and stressed that we have a problem, what was 9
going on, and we are seeing these levels down here in the nuc sampling 10f room.
Somewhere around 6:30, I believe, just talking to Dave Zeiter, i
11 they had pulled the RC letdown from Unit 2 for the dose equivalent 12 iodine.
They had done a.1 in 9 ml of water dilution to count on the 13l Ge(Li) which is a routine dilution and found that it was too hot to be 14I counted at our highest geometry on the Ge(Li).
It showed up as about i
15 38 percent at that time so they did not count it at that time.
Mike 16 Janouski and I then proceeded from the Unit I area over to Unit 2 aux 17f building.
When we went over to the aux building, Terry Daugherty, who 18{
is a Unit 2 operator, had said that there is water coming up through 19l the floor drains in the aux building.
I had asked him where did he 20l think it was coming from.
He said it is probably coming up from overflows 21li on the tanks.
We asked him are you sure it is coming from the overflows 22l and he said well he is not sure where it is coming from at that time.
I 23 So we had no idea at that time that it was water from Unit 2 containment 24, so we proceeded further into the building.
We still had no concern for 25l
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the accident whereas we did not have any interface with Unit 2 operations 2
as far as any building monitors going up or down.
So then I had checked 3l HPR-227 -- the inlet coming in HPR-227 -
and we had checked that prior 4l about an hour before and it was reading approximately 10 mR which we i
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thought was fairly high coming into that monitor.
This is right around 6i the time we were ceginning to suspect that we had an out of the ordinary 7
trip.
So then I had checked it a second time and I used an R02 and put 0
it in on contact with the inlet line coming into HPR-227; it had read f
50 mR.
I had it on there for approximately 10-15 seconds and the scale 10' started going up and fin 211y went off scale with a c0 mR range.
So 11:
then I went to the 500 mR range and it was still steadily climbing.
So l
12!
I went to the 5 R range and it finally settled out at 1 R and this all 13 occurred in a period of about 45 seconds.
At that point I stepped 14!
back - you see -- it was a monitor malfunction and readings came down 15:
to ordinary levels and then I had put it back on the line to double ld check and it immediately went back up to 1 R.
At that time I looked 1l down and I saw some exhaust ccming out off of the monitor and at that i
18f point Mike Janouski ran by and said, "Let's get the hell out of here,"
l$l which we did.
We ran out, evacuated the building, and got all the 20j nonessential personnel out.
We had a few technicians in there taking 21 air samples which, at the time Mike Janouski went by, he had got the 22!
results of one of the air samples that Carl Mayers had taken briefly i
2 around 7:00-7:05 which had read high.
To this day I don't know what 24j those results were.
So we evacuated the building and at that point I 25i i
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walked into the shower room where there was a frisker to check myself 2'
j to see if I was contaminated.
As I walked in the shower room I got 3
within 3 feet of the frisker and she went off scale on the times one 4!
scale.
Further checking of my body I found that I had anywhere from 5
10-15,000 counts per minute on the whole body and on my clothes.
And Gi what I did I just disrobed and took a shower and I came clean from what 7
I could see on the frisker.
Whereas I worked basically arocad the ECS 0
station helping out for the next 3-4 nours because I did not have my 9
personals to work with.
That is about all I remember from that day.
10l Then somewhere later that morning I had left the site and got all my I
11l personals straightened out, cleaned and washed.
Those that I could not l
12!
clean I disposed of and exited the site to the 500 KV sub where I had 13 myself and the guard checked out.
We were checked out clean and I 14k proceeded home.
The next night we came in -- we came in Thursday the 15:
29th -- for the 3 to 11 shift.
We relieved Ken Berkholder and Jim 16!
Oukes, two radiation chemistry technicians who are on team Alpha onsite i
17 survey team.
Tom Pyke who is the Junior Technician and myself relieved 18:
those two and proceeded to take onsite readings on the perimeter fence.
19!
Readings being highest over by the mechanical draft cooling tuwer in 20l Unit 2 which happened to be where the wind was shifted that day --
21i anywhere from 9-15 mR the readings we were getting beta gamma.
Then 2 I
22 hours2.546296e-4 days <br />0.00611 hours <br />3.637566e-5 weeks <br />8.371e-6 months <br /> later the wind had shifted south and we were getting that had a 23l GE nine area down here.
Approximately ll:C0 we were called into the 24 Unit 1 control room and we were told to go down and cut an RC sample 25!
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l that was drawn earlier in the day by I think, Ed Houser.
I am not 2'
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sure -- I know he was in there drawing samples.
But there was a 1 ml 31 Unit 2 RC letdown sample in a 60 CC vial which they had wanted cut in 5 i
4l separate samples to be cut to less than 1 mR for counting purposes.
So we were told that the sample was reading 4 R.
When we went down, I checked the sample again before we even started work on i. and it turned out the sample was reading 11 R.
We cut the sample in 5 equal Of portions and we cut it by a factor of 10 to the 8th power before we 9
could get it down to less than 1 mR.
Those samples then we put in the ld' safe which is located in our count coom in the Unit 1 HP lab.
Later 11 that night we assumed duty in Unit 1 control room area and for briefly 12l for an hour - hour and a half we went back over to the observation i
131 center.
We ended our shif t at 7:00 Friday morning.
We worked a double 14 shift that night.
You want to go up to Friday night into Saturday?
15 16!
YUHAS:
Did you come back in on Friday?
17l 18!
00NNACHIE:
We came in on Friday night at 7:00, okay.
When we came 19!
back in -- when I came back in -- I was told to set up a trailer out at 20l the north gate and set up some type of card cystem so we could keep 21!
track of pe'sonnel exposures.
I, myself and three Philadelphia Electric 22l radiation technicians were responsible for that area.
We were out 23 there approximately 3 hours3.472222e-5 days <br />8.333333e-4 hours <br />4.960317e-6 weeks <br />1.1415e-6 months <br /> trying to set up the trailer and I was 24{
pulled off the trailer duty and brought into the Unit I control room 25l
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where I came in and worked with a member of the NSS crew for the rest 26 i
of the night taking air samples, doing area surveys in the turbine 3t building, and roughly watching what kind of readings were coming in 4!
from the offsite teams that is basically what I did all night.
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61 YUHAS:
Thank you very much.
Excellent reccll considering the anunt of time that has passed since the night of the 28th, 29th and 30th.
O What I en going to do now is go back and ask you some rather specific 9
questions regarding what happened.
To start off with, will you just 10 briefly go over the names of the rad chem techs that were on duty v. hat 11!
night and what their assignments were?
I 12!
13 CONNACHIE:
Okay, there were four of us.
There was myself and Mike 14 Janouski.
We were the senior tech - no we were not the senior -- I 15l was there in place of a junior that night just filling in for a body.
16 The normal shift that night was Mike Janouski, Dave Zeiter, who are 2 17!
senior technicians, and then there was Tom Davis who was a junior i
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technician.
We had responsibility for the 11-7 shift.
Mike Janouski 191 and I were respon5ible for HP and Dave Zeiter and Tom Davis were respon-20(
sible for chemistry.
21!
22 YUHAS:
Prior to the Unit 2 reactor trip, can you cescribe the conditions 23' in both Unit 1 and Unit 2?
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00NNACHIE:
Conditions in both Units 1 and 2 were normal conditions.
f Unit I was shut down and we had just completed refueling operations and v'l there was just a matter of a couple of days before we were going to 4!
back up.
We were in the process of cleaning up the system.
The reactor i
SI coolant system was up a point where it was too dirty to go back up to OI power.
Unit 2 was somewhere between 90 and 100 percent.
I had recalled that it was somewhere around 100 percent power at the time of the trip.
O!
So operations were at full power and operating normally before the 9
trip.
10l 11 YUHAS:
Are jou fairly sure that you pulled the VAR-748 sample at 5:00?
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131 00NNACHIE:
It was around 5:00.
I would say between 5 and 5:30 that I 14 pulled the 748 sample.
15' 16]
YUHAS:
The sample results for the Unit 2 condenser vacuum pump which 17l would have been VAR-748 indicate the sample was at 05:42.
Do you know t
18!
if that was the time ~the sample was counted or the time you took the 19!
sample?
20, 1
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CONNACHIE:
I would presume that it's probably the time it was counted.
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23l YUHAS:
Do you know if Mr. Janouski went alone to HPR-227 to pull the i
24I particulate and the cartridge at 0530?
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DONNACHIE:
To my knowledge it did.
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YUHAS:
You had not seen Dick Dubiel there at that time?
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DONNACHIE:
No.
6 YUHA5:
The decision to not make the reactor building, reactor contain-8 ment entry per Unit 2, was based on the fact that you only had 20 9
minutes left in the shift,,ot the fact that you had surmised that Unit 10 2 was in big trouble HP wise?
11t 12I 00NNACHIE:
Right.
At 20 minutes of seven we were still in the situation 13 where we figured it was a routine trip.
We knew we had somewhat of a 14 problem and we said that more or less in jest to begin with but I think 15 if it came down to the point where if we had to go in we probably would 16i have gone in.
The things being the way they were at the time we had i
17l not assessed t'e whole realm of the situation.
I think we probably 1
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would have went in.
And it is just lucky we didn't based on -- I 19l think -- the reason we did r.ot go in is that we got the word that 1
201 buildina pressure was going up and that changed our minds of going in.
21l Dick Dubiel more or less had a handle on the final decision on going 2h' in.
But we were going to make the entry somewhere around 7:00 and 7:30 23 24 25 m
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spare the manpower to go in, but at that time, between 6:30 and 7:00, 3
that's when the monitors started screaming and we hunted other things.
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YUHAC:
Can you describe the airborne activity monitor located in the 6
nuclear sample room?
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00NNACHIE:
It's a Victoreen monitor.
At the time it was in there I 9[1 don't even think it was even functioning because we have had problems 10 with that monitor via motors burning out, the alarm sensitivity on lli that, and the gas channel.
We had been trying to get it increased i
12l because of the xenon and at the time, I can't be sure on it, but I am i
131 pretty sure I imagine that was not even in operation.
You can check 14:
the operations checkoff list for that period of time because their 15!
operators are supposed to check that monitor whether it is in service 16!
or out of service every shif t.
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18l RESNER:
At this time we will break the tape.
It is now 11:36 p.m.,
lb eastern daylight time.
20!
21!
RESNER:
This is a continuation of the interview.
Mr. Donnachie, the 25 time now is 11:37 p.m., eastern daylight time.
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YbHAS:
You mentioned that the air sampler that is supposed to be in 2t j
operation ir. the nuclear sample room was probably not in operation, and 3l j
one of the reasons you mentionad vas because of noble gases frca the 4l reactor coolant samples set it off.
Are not the nuclear sample sinks 5
inside the hood?
6I 00NNACHIE:
Ut*quh.
8 9
YUHAS:
Do you know the linear flow rate in feet per minute into the 10 hood window; 1 11 l
12!
DONNACHIE:
No I don't.
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YUHAS:
Is there a perceptible inward flow when the reactor coolant 15{
samples are drawn, such that the gases could go up the hood rather than 16!
out to the room?
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18l 00NNACHIE:
There is a negative flow into the sample hood itself.
We 191 have taken Marenelli samples in there during actual sampling operations 20 which we have identified the gas as xenon-133.
Another thing I had 21 forgot to mention about the monitor is that the monitor sits below the 22' reactor coolant sample lines.
We felt also that on the gas channel the 23 interference was also coming from the radiation coming off the lines 2 41 themselves causing it to alarm not necessarily the noble gases in the t
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i 15 II atmosphere.
That is another reasoning for increasing the set points.
5 2l We only had that problem with the gas channel itself.
Normally we had 31 two other channels being particulate and charcoal channels and we would 4
have problems with the parti:ulate channel but that was based on a i
5 build up factor in which it had changed the particulate that more or 6
less come down to normal levels.
7 8
YUHAS:
Are the sample lines shielded inside the nuclear sample room?
9f 10' DONNACHIE:
No, Unit 2 or Unit I sample lines are not snielded.
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YUHAS:
Okay, When you initially heard the alarm from inside the hot I
13l machine shop, you stated you took an E-520 and you measured 40 mrem per 14 hour1.62037e-4 days <br />0.00389 hours <br />2.314815e-5 weeks <br />5.327e-6 months <br /> on the Unit 2 sample lines inside the nuclear sample room.
Can 15) you describe which lines you measure with the outlet of the cooler the 16!
inlet of the cooler? The lines?
17l 18l DONNACHIE:
The lines we measured at 40 mr was outside the hot machine 19!
shop -- that was general area.
We were still approximately 6-10 feet 20l away from the lines being that they run about 10 foot above the ficor.
21l When we had checked the lines inside, we had checked the inlet to the 22l cooler -- inlet being 15 feet from the cooler where it initially comes i
23!
through the wall penetration and makes a right angle down the room.
l 24l That is where I checked the lines at the time.
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16 li YUHAS:
And that's where you got the 300.
2' 3
00NNACHIE:
That's where I got the 300.
4l 5
YUHAS:
Now you said that 1.5 minutes later 40 mR had increased to 200 O!
millirem.
7 8
00NNACHIE:
Approximately in that period of time.
It seemed like a 9
minute and a half to me til the time I went in and came back out.
10 11' YUHAS:
At that point you as::ed the security guard to leave?
12.
13 DONNACHIE:
Uh huh.
14 15 YUHAS:
Did you check the lines at the same point when you read 1 R per 16 hour1.851852e-4 days <br />0.00444 hours <br />2.645503e-5 weeks <br />6.088e-6 months <br />?
17 18f DONNACHIE:
Yes.
19!
20i YUHAS:
You were back at the inlet to the coolant?
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DONNACHIE:
Yes.
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17 11 YUHAS:
Do you remember the discussion that you had when you related 2}'
this information to Dick Dubiel?
3 90NNACHIE:
Not approximately, we had just informed him of the readings.
5 Dick Dubiel was in the general area at the time we had checked.
He was 6l with us at the time we checked outside that machine shop.
Mike Janouski, 7
myself and Dick Dubiel had gone out into the area to check out the monitor.
We had checked and I had gone into the nuc sampling room and had relayed the message to him that the lines in there were reading 10f l
high but by the time I got back out they had come up further yet.
And 11 the second time I checked the nuc sampling room I relayed that informa-12 tion to him and at that time it seems to me he got on the page phone to 13 George Kunder, Unit 2 operations.
14!
l 15; YUHAS:
Do you know if the Unit 2 reactor coolant sample was still ld!
recirculating at the time that you made these measurements?
t 17l 18!
00NNACHIE:
To my knowledge, I think it was.
Based on the readings 19!
increasing I would be assured that it was.
20' 21; YUHAS:
Did anyone request that either the motor operated valve be 22 secured locally to secure recirculation flow or did someone call the 23l control room and suggest that the secure frca control rcom?
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00NNACHIE:
I am not sure.
I think later on somewhere around between 7:00 and 8:00 the word was spread to shut down the RC letdown system --
3 sampling.
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YUHAS:
You mentioned a sample that Mr. Zeiter was working on and that 61-it had a significant dead-time on the gamma spectrometer.
Did anyone 7
measure the raw sample, the undiluted sample, with the dose rate instrument 8
to determine how hot it was?
9 t
10' 00NNACHIE:
I have no idea on that.
I was not involved with that at that time.
12 13 YUHAS:
After being informed by Mr. Daugherty t' at water was comirg up, 14 I assume on the 281 elevation of the auxiliary building, did either you 15 or Mr. Janouski investigate further as to this water problem?
16[
17 00NNACHIE:
At that time we didn't.
We were going down the hallway in 18!
the 305 level and the readings along there were coming up.
We had 19{
noticec' that the readings going into the cubic vault to the makeup 20(
tank.
There is a set of hydrogen lines in there where they were,*eeding 21f the hydrogen overpressure into the system from that point.
It was a 22' temporary setup.
Those 1;nes were somewhere approximately 10 R.
As 23j you are walking down the corridor we noticed that the readings jumped 241 up outside that door and we investigated in that doorway there.
We I
i 25:
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i
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l found the lines -- the hydrogen lines -- into the core were reading 2t very high.
When we had started to come out of the building, we had 3
told Terrj-Daugherty and any other operators that he had known of in 4
the building at the time to evacuate.
5l 6
YUHAS:
Can you describe a little more about these hydrogen lines?
7 This is the makeup tank room, right?
8 9
DONNACHIE:
Right.
If you go inside the cubicles down there you will 10 run into a three foot concrete wall before you make a left to go back 11 around the place -- secondary shielding effect.
Well what happened was 12!
they had two or three hydrogen bottles -- cylinders
- sitting there 13!
and this is what we were told that they were using to feed into the i
14 hydrogen system for the overpressure of the build.ag because the opera-15!
tors had to change these cylinders at a set frequency based on their 16i pressure decreases.
They were checked once a shift by operations.
171 l
ld YUHAS:
Now you said hydrogen overpressure in the building.
Are you i
19' sure you don't mean cove red gas pressure in the makeup system?
t 20l i
21!
DONNACHIE:
Well, that's basically what they use.
It feeds into the r
22l makeup tank.
Right, and just going furth r into the reactor core that 23 is basically where the hydrogen overpressare is the source from the 24l makeup tank gas station.
25j
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20 It j
YUHAS:
When you took these measurements on the lines, is it possible 2{r that you were reading streaming coming from the makeup tank?
Is there 3l a penetration where the lines go through, could that have been what you 41 were read 1ng?
Sl I
6!
DONNACHIE:
It's possible.
The only thing that we checked on was just 7
l in that general area of the bottles themselves which is maybe a 2 0
square foot area.
We had checked it more than one time and it could o
have been streaming but at this time I couldn't tell you what was 10 streaming or actual.
I took it to read that it was off the lines ll!
themselves, generally coming off the hydrogen bank.
I 12!
i 131 YUHAS:
The hydrogen banks are what pressure?
i 14!
15l DONNACHIE:
I don't know what those hydrogen bottles are reading as far 16i as pressure.
17l l
18f YUHAS:
Would it be reasonable to assume that the hydrogen bottles were 19l at a pressure somewhat greater than the makeup tank?
20l 21l DONNACHIE:
I would assume they should have been.
I can see what you 22 are getting at and it is possible it could have been streaming either 23j the possibly that the pressure levels increased in the makeup tank due 24j to tho loss of coolant in the reactor and it started coming back into 25l
. Oo
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f 21 1!
the hydrogen bottles themselves.
We did not think of that at the time.
2t l
But we knew it was a high area in that corner and we made entries into 3I that area quite frequently.
We never see levels like that going inside the door.
There is also a letdown of liquid monitors that is in the Si area also.
We had also checked that and I remember checking that and Gi getting a high level but I can't remember what the level was to convey 7
to you.
8 I
9 YUHAS:
The monitor we are speaking of would be MUR-720?
10l l
11l DONNACHIE:
Yes.
12f i
13l YUHAS:
What does the dose rate normally read in that area when you' re 14 standing there in the makeup room?
15!
16 DONNACHIE:
Well, if you are familiar with the general layout in that 17 area when you go into the cubicle there is an outside cubicle before 18{
you go into the makeup tank itself.
Normally the general area there is 19!
5 to 10 mR if that.
Normally we don't go into the makeup tank cubicle 20I during operations unless it is absolutely necessary.
It is a normally 21{
locked area.
We have two purification demineralizers also coming off 22l that center cubicle which are locked areas.
So normally if you are 23 going into the center cubicle there where we have the haze gas analyzer, 24]
the letdown monitor and the hydrogen bank there, there is no problem as 25l b30!
i
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f 22 1!
far as radiation.
Now contamination wise you have some =round the i
2t j
monitor due to leakage through the small pump on the monitor -- t!)e 3i i
sealed leakage.
Other than that there is really no problem.
4 i
Si j
YUHAS:
So on this particular morning an area that normally read 5 to 6
10 mR read how much?
7 00NNACHIE:
Well, we didn' t go into the center cubicle itself.
We went 9f inside the door where the hydrogen bank was.
That is as far as we went t
10
,l and the hydrogen bank to my knowledge was 10 R, 'cause I had taken the 11 reading.
12t l
13!
YUHAS:
What instrument did you use to take that reading?
14!
15; DONNACHIE:
I had a teletector at the time.
16i 17 YUHAS:
Can you give us the best estimate of the time that you took 18!
that reading?
19i 20r DONNACHIE:
Probably, I can give it to you within a half hour -- somewhere 21i between 6:00 ana 7:00.
To clarify further, let's make it between 6:45 22!
and 7:15.
It would be in that area, i
23 24:
l 25I l
,n-ma c.i i
(
23 11 YUHAS:
When you went down 305 there in the hallway to the HPR-227, you i
2' i
indicate you saw rapidly increasing levels off the 227 monitor.
Were i
you holding your R02 at the line, at the cartridge holder? Whereabout on the monitor were you holding tne R0-2?
5 6i DONNACHIE:
My R02 would have come -- actually it would have been on 7
the exhaust line coming off the charcoal.
Because it was right above 8
the flow meter coming off the charcoal part of the monitor.
That's 9
where I got the reading.
10j 11l YUHAS:
So you were measuring really just the noble gases in the line 12 at that point.
It should have already -- the particulate should have i
13l been filtered out, the iodine that should have been accumulating in the 14 cartridge you were holding your instrument against the pipe of the 15' discharge or the return to the vent side, right?
16i 17l DONNACHIE:
Yes.
18l 19e YUHAS:
The return from that monitor to go back to the containment 20l building or the aux building?
l 21 22l DONNACHIE:
Back in the containment building.
23 1
24 25
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yo1 i
I
21 If YUHAS:
Returned to the containment.
I 2!
i DONNACHIE:
Right.
4{
i c;
YUHAS:
You indicated that there was some gas leakage.
61 i
DONNACHIE:
To my knowledge it seemed to me that there was gas leakage 8
when you looked down it may just have been the vapors coming out of ol
' I.
somewhere I coming out of the monitor which I assume there was some 10 leakage at that ;ime.
Steam leakage.
It is possible that it could 11' have come out of the particulate chamber and the alternate particulate 12{
sample that we have on there go on the outage site lines.
Because that 13!
particular night I have my doubts about that being air tight during 14 sampling so it is possible that the fumes that I had seer or the vapors 15j that were coming frcm the that point because I remember seeing the 16i vapors and thinking of getting out there as fast as possible after II taking that reading.
18 l' 19!
YUHAS:
Did you request the control rocm shut off the pump on that 20!
monitor?
21i l
22l 00NNACHIE:
No I did not.
23 24!
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l!
YUHAS:
When you exited the aux building and you checked yourself out 2!
l and found that you were contaminated went to shower did someone establish 31 an alternate control point to the unit 2 aux building at that point?
4!
i C
00NNACHIE:
To my knowledge no.
I don't have no idea what time they 6
had isolated the aux building itself whether they had closed the door 7
or not.
I think wha: 5appened somewhere going on between 8 and 9 o' 8
clock we had established isolation of the building and we went into our i
9f general emergency drills ottside the plant.
We had sent teams out 10' somewhere around 7:30 and a quarter of 8 as soon as people came in, 11 they saw a drastic increase in the bank monitors and we knew we had a 12!
problem then as far as going out to stacks so that was the reason we 13 sent the people out and I don't know the approximate time or when or if 14 they declared a general emergency.
15!
16i YUHAS:
Moving on to the night of the 29th, who told you or requested 17l that you go out and cut the reactor offsite monitor that had been drawn 18 by Mr. Houser and Glespe?
191 20j DONNACHE:
Sid Porter.
21f 22l YUHAS:
Sid Porter.
Do you normally respond to requests directly from 23 Sid Porter?
I 24j 25i n]
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I li j
DONNACHIE:
No we don't.
Sid Porter is a consultant for RHP or Met Ed 2
and basically he is a very intelligent man I have a great respect for 3
him and if he was going to tell me to cut the sample and it there was a 41
{
good reason behind it, at that time I figured there was a good reason 5l' because we had no appropriate sa..f.e to see what we had in the coolant 6i and being I myself and Tom Pyke were familiar with the techniques of 7
chemistry we were the most we were the best qualifed to do it at th 0
time.
So basically that is why we went down.
9I 10f YUHAS:
At this point, was Mr. Porter backing for either Mulleavy or 11!'
Dubiel?
12 13 DONNACHIE:
No as far as my knowledge he was not.
Being that se were 14 in that situation, and I knew that he was responsible for a lot of the 15!
readings we were getting and I don't know who he was working with 16!
directly but he seemed to be calling the shots at that type of situa-i 17 tion so I had no question at the time.
181 19!
YUHAS:
How much time did you and Mr. Py(e take in planning this splitting 20!
motion.
21 22 00NNACHIE:
We took approximately 10 minutes.
We wen: ;.' we found a 23 sample which was in the counting room beside the cave.
What we did is 24!
we layed it on a table outside the pen lab because the whole HP area 25!
,c-l-i i
t
27 l{'
was now a contaminated area.
Ard there was no reason to take that much 2t
{
care for us where you would contaminate something else.
But, why I 31 took a turn double checking the dose rate on it and as I srid previously 4[
the dose rate wasn't 4 R, it was 11 R, so we discussed how we wanted to i
5 do what we did was we did not have any extremity badges available at the time and being that we were in the emergency situation and I had i
7 made the decision as far as going ahead and cutting the sample.
And I 8
said Tom Pyke take the 100 mi volumetric and take a syringe and withdraw 9
the sample out of the 6 cc vial with the syringe and put it in the 1000 10j ml water and dilute it and then we will check it to see where we are.
11 So the whole evolution may have taken approximately anywhere from 3 to 12{
five minutes.
It takes that much time to do a dilution of that sort.
13!
And he, Tom, had relayed to me that we were still somewhere around a 1 1M R range in that 1000 ml. which now we had instead of 1 ml emitting 11 R I
15{
we now had a bigger area as far as 1000 mls of water emitting 1 mr.
So 16 we set up underneath the hood until we could obtain some more volumetrics 1
to split this.
He had split that even further and this would take 1 ml 18(
and do another dilution so at that time we had gotten down somewhere to 19!
100 me any where between 50 and 100 mrs and we had diluted it by a 20' factor of 100 them and we had finally gotten it down to less than 1 mr.
21 We had enough sample, we had 100 mi sample and we had r.ade up five 4
22l samples of 5 mis a piece.
Those are the ones that were supposed to be 23l 24!
25!
foA on.,
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28 I
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sent out somewhere to get counted after ten to the 8th dilution which 2l resolution of counting techniques is 10 to the 8th dilution I don't 31 think you would get very good results.
4l l
Si YUHAS:
Can you describe how you were dressed to perform this dilution?
Si 7
00NNACHIE:
We were dressed in coveralls, respirator hood and boots.
8 f
YUHAS:
What typ. of respirator?
I 10 11l DONNACHIE:
We had on, a I have to think about that one a bit.
We were in either an MSA model with the iodine cartridge or the Scott with the 13 filter cartridge which was not in charcoal.
To my knowledge I don't 14l remember which types of charcoal we used.
15l 16;-
YUHAS:
Let me make an effort to refresh your memory.
The two varieties 17f of iodine cartridges one was the purple foot ball shaped GMR canister 18!
the other variety tnat became available to you on site was the green 19I coffee can style.
Were you wearing a mask that contained either of 20 those were you wearing the small hand size particulates.
21j 22!
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24j 25!
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29 I
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11 l
DONNACHIE:
I am trying to recollect the type of respirator we had 2
available by the time going into the second night.
It was the MSA with 3
the football type canister that is the one that we had used.
I cannot i
t pinpoint down the type respirator we used that night.
5 6l RESNER:
We will break the tape.
The time is now twelve midnight.
7 8
YUHAS:
This is a continuation of the interview with Mr. John P. Donnachie.
9 The time now is 12:03 a.m., EDT, the date is May 18, 1979.
10 11 YUHAS:
Did yourself and Mr. Pyke run through a dry run prior to performing 12f this splitting of the evolution?
i 13!
14!
DONNACHIE:
No we did not.
I 15i 16 YUHAS:
So you did not time, estimated the amount of dose that he was
(
17 going to receive to the extremities in handling the samp b.
18f 19!
00NNACHIE:
We did tha.t, we did sit down and talk abou' the radiation l
20!
dosage.
i 21l 22 YUHAS:
This was based on the 4 r per hour number that.
23l l
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1!
l 00NNACHIE:
No this was based on the 11 r per hour.
2!
3 YUHAS:
What did you estimate?
4!
5I 00NNACHIE:
To my knowledge I what I just did was.. calculated it out 6
to what it was per second that you would handle that source to the 7
extremities being that I can't remember what it was but the basic 8
caiculation and I figured 11000 millirem to what it is a second we 9
based the exposure on that formula.
10' 11I YUHAS:
How long did you figure he was going to handle it?
12 5 l
13 DONNACHIE:
He would have handled it approximately 10 or 15 seconds 14!
enough to get the needle into the vial to withdraw the sample and put 15!
it into that 1000 ml volumetric. It would involve 10-15 seconds.
16!
I 17 YUHAS:
Did you time, did someone have a stop watch and actually time 18[
the amount of time you had contact with the sample.
19l 20j DONNACHIE:
No. Our health physics procedure at the time, although they 21l did apply at the time we were still aware of the physics procedure that 22 we were under.
We had enough sense at the time to sit down and evaluate 23l what the situation was of possible exposure which I felt at the time we 24l were not going to have any type of overexposure handling that amount of 25!
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31 I
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sample, so it was not any alarming type of sample it was not general 2h l
area type of radiation it was a contact of the vial and he may have 31 l
gotten a dose somewhere around 2-300 to the extremities.
4!
i Si l
YUHAS:
When you measured this 6cc vial, what instrument did you use?
6!
7 00NNACHIE:
The 6 cc vial is already measured when it is shipped.
It 8
is a vial that contains approximately 6 cc.
i 9l 10' YUHAS:
No. You are misunderstanding.
I mean the radiation level.
lli i
When you got to the 11 r per hour reading off the vial containing the 1 12I ml.
13 I
14' DONNACHIE:
We had measured that with the teletector.
15 16 YUHAS:
Did you take that measurement?
17l t
18I DONNACHIE:
Yes.
19i 20 YUHAS:
Can you describe as closely as possible the relationship of the 21{
teletector tube on the end to the sample? Was it an end on, side on?
22l 23l DONNACHIE:
It was a side.
i 24 25'i i
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l!
l YUHAS:
Who removed the sample, the 6 cc contained in 1 ml reactor 2
l coolant samples, from the safe?
3 4
DONNACHIEf I think I did.
i Si l
Si YUHAS:
<aere did you carry that to?
7 8
00NNACHIE:
I carried that to a cart that was sitting outside the radio chem lab door.
Which is a matter of a distance o' 20 feet.
10 11 YUHAS:
Then Tom Pyke picked it up and carried it to where?
12!
13!
DONNACHIE:
Well, I had taken it in to the Chem Lab and we had made our 14!
entry.
I had put it in the underneath the hood.
15i 16 YUHAS:
This would be the primary chem lab.
I 17!
I 18I DONNACHIE:
The primary chem lab.
Then Tom Pyke had removed the sample.
191 l
20' YUHAS:
Did he inject the syringe, withdraw the 1 ml and inject it into 21 the top of a one liter volumetric?
22I f
2 31 00NNACHIE:
Um hum.
I 24i 25!
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33 11 l
YUHAS:
Can you describe the volumetric is it the standard volumetric 2'
{
w e.5e long neck?
3l 4[
DONNACHIE:
Yes.
I 5
6 YUHAS:
The one ml or the one liter is engraved on the neck?
7 8
00NNACHIE:
Um hum.
i 9f l
10' YUHAS:
How did Mr. Pyke mix that sample?
11l 12 00NNACHIE:
Basically, I was not cognizant of his operation.
What I i
13j told him to do was basically chem procedure was to fill it 2/3 full of 14!
water before adding a sample to that.
You add a sample :o that 2/3 15j demineralizer water you mix it then you make up to the meniscus or on 16l the line and stabilizer the meniscus.
That is basically how we do our 17]
dilutions.
18f i
19!
YUHAS:
Is that how it was done this time?
20!
i 21!
DONNACHIE:
Yes.
22 i
23)
YUHAS:
Okay. Did tnat 1 liter volumetric have a stopper available?
24i 25l
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34 1;
DONNACHIE:
Yes it did.
2 '
f 31 YUHAS:
Did Pyke tell you that he injected the 1 ml, through the stt pper 41 in it and then shook it up?
00NNACHIE:
No.
Tom Pyke is a qualified chemistry tech.
That is 7
standard procedure, you know.
It is almost automatic. Whenever he O
doubted anything to mix and invert the volumetrics 7-8 times to get a 9I thorough mix.
10' 11 YUHAS:
Was there DI water available in the hood in the primary sample 12!
icop?
13 14l DONNACHIE:
Yes. There was but we did not utilize that DI water.
We i
15 have several sources of DI water in the chem lab and the DI water 16 source we used came frcm the corner sink.
17l l
18[
YUHAS:
So you took the one liter volumetric out of the hood and walked 19!
to the corner sink?
20' I
21f DONNACHIE:
No, he took the one liter volumetric, filled it with the i
22!
demin water from the corner sink, then took it to the hood to make its 23l dilution.
Then he proceeded back to the sink with the diluted sample.
24l 25i
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35 i
lt i
YUHAS:
And.
2I i,
00NNACHIE:
T.le other third water.
4l 5
YUHAS:
Was there. an air sample in the room when he was running this 0
thing back and forth?
l T
8 00NNACHIE:
There was not.
9 i
10 YUHAS:
Did you come in at that point and take the dose rate on the 11l full one liter volumetric?
i 12l 13 00NNACHIE:
Tom Pyke was assessing the dosage at that point.
14!
l 15{
YUHAS:
So did you enter the room again?
16i 17 D_0NNf,CHIE:
I was in the chem lab at the time he was doing the dilution, 18j what I was doing was helping to assist him in sp1rts, but I was just 19i more or less coordinating items in the chem lab because it looked like 2d!
a hell hole to begin with.
And just a matter of straightening out the i
21l chem lab so we had a suitable work area sc we could work in.
22l t
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i, 11
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YUHAS:
So you were not devoting your full attention to Mr. Pyke's 2t simple dilution?
3 4!
DONNACHIE:
No I wasn't. Basically whr.n he got the first dilution he 5
was more or less on his own.
Which I had my confidence in Tom that he 61 could do it without any problems.
He has a year and a half --he had up 7
until that time almost two years of experience in the field and he 8
handled primary coolant numerous times.
He is competent and he called people in the department confident of his ability to do a dilution.
10l 11 YUHAS:
Did you get involved in assisting Tom Pyke return the five cut 12l samples back to the vault?
13 r
14 00NNACHIE:
Um hum.
I was making up the vials anc with the proper 15!
labeling and we had when he got cut down to the transfer sample measured 16!
out five mis into the vial at the time he got down to less than 1 mr t
17!
and then we put it in the safe.
18!
191 YUHAS:
Did you label those vials as the cut reactor coolant sample?
20!
I f
21!
00NNACHIE:
Um hum.
r 22f i
23l YUHAS:
Did you tell anybody where you put them?
24l 25 n
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,i 37 l
1!
DONNACHIE:
Yes. We went back up and I told Sid Porter that the 5 ml 2:
l vials were back down in the safe and we had disposed of the empty lcc 31 l
vial, or 6 cc vial in the garbage in the primary lab.
41 t
~f" j
YUHAS:
Is that garbage inside?
6i
,i
'l DONNACHIE-No that garbage was bagged.
But the syringe the 6 cc vial 8
that the sample was in had a rubber stop cock to it and penetration was
~f j
made through a needle hole.
10l t
11 YUHAS:
Das the syringe disposed of in the same garbage can?
12l I
13j DONNACHIE:
I could not tell you what Tom Pyke did with that stringe.
144 t
15; YUHAS:
In the turnover that evening, did you inform Joe DeMann or any 16 of liis representatives where the cut samples were located?
17!
181 00NNAL.1IE:
I may have I don't remember reporting to Joe DeMann where 19!
the samples were.
I know I told Sid Porter and along with some operations 20t people up there also who I don't know who they were at the time but 21l more than one person was told where those samples were.
Joe DeMann had 22l told you previously that I told him, it is probably a good case, probably i
23i right that I did if he was there that night because I can't remember 24!
telling him at the time.
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38 t
i lt YUHAS:
At the conclusion af the splittng operation, do you remember if 2
he or yourself or Tom Pyke were contaminated?
31 00NNACHIE:
Yes we were.
S' 61 YUHAS:
Where were you contaminated?
7 8
00NNACHIE:
I was contaminated in the back of my hair.
This was due to 9
me taking off my respirator and exiting the area.
I had reached back 10f to take my hood off and that I did it on my own coming out and undressing.
1 I had taken a shower down at at the shower room numerous times and 12!
idoine complex protein with my hiir I guess and it was fixed so it was i.
13l just a matter of two or three days until it had decayed off to the i
14 ariginal norm.
I 15 16:
YUHAS:
What level of contamination was on your hair?
17!
I 18(
DONNACHIE:
Well in the frisker it was approximately 450 counts above 19!
background.
Nothirg real serious af ter shower.
20l 21!
YUHAS:
On the night of Friday 30th, can you describe the type of hard 22!
parts system you were setting up with the people from Philadelphia 23 Electric Company?
24 251 l
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l!
j DONNACHIE:
The hard part system we have is just a basic entry control 2!
j type card so we can get a handle on controlling exposures and what it 3
is a quarterly dose card and you assign the man's name and social 4'
security number and assign him a dose based on whether he has AEC form 5
4 or not which that particular night we were not exposing anyone to more than 1,000.
That is the word I got frcm my supervisors. So that 7
period of time 1000 was the limit for everybody whether it was the 8
contractor Met Ed or whatever.
And what haa happened, it was a con-fusing affair because they also had my input that I was gettino from 10f NMSS man from Unit 2 who had a card system operation up there.
So our 11 card system was kind of redundant to unit 2 card system but we also had 12 people that were going into Unit 1 who were not being processed tnrough i
li Unit 2 card system and we more or less stood out there shaking nur i
14 heads about the foolishness of the whole affair.
Because ya had absolutely lb no control at that point over anybody unless they were Unit 2 and I 1
don't have a feeling how they were operating the organization or at 17 that time.
But it was a start we were trying to get a handle on the 1
whole situation.
We were trying to set something that would be somewhat 19!
feasible and have some kind of control over people.
We were trying to 20l set up a control point at the front gate just to come over the Island 21l initially.
At the time we were setting it up everybody that came in 22, filleu out a card and I informed the guard at the gate anybody that 23 came out was to check with us so we could assess their exposure if any.
241 We made out a card on everybody that came in or out for a three hvor 25l period while I was out taere.
And tried to form some filing system and
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I was more or less training the PE technician, Philadelphia Electric 21 l
technician on the basics of the card.
We had been using these cards 3l now for the last three years for outage purposes.
And initially all it 4l is is, you put the date and RWP number, exposure in and out and supposedly 5'
weekly dose.
And on the back of the card it has exposures from 0 to 3 6i rem and those blocks are blocked out basically the exposures they can i
7l get through out the daily weekly all you have to do is look and see 8
what they have been picking up weekly and our Adm limit is 300 mr per f
week and you can also turn che M around and see what they have had 1
for the quarter.
It is just an admiristrative control type of mechanism 11!
we have.
l 12!
13 YUHAS:
At this point I would like you to bring forth any comments you 14 have about the radiction protection program in general at Met Ed.
15{
Either prior to the incident or during the 'ncident.
16 17I 00NNACHIE:
Well, I don't really know where to begin.
Based on my i
18I talks with people coming in from other power companies this is the only 19!
thing I have to compre our HP system with.
Some types some areas of 20i HP were fairly good at and others we are not.
We are really slack on 21 air samples.
And MPC hours were never taken to my knowledge up until 1
f 22!
this accident.
I think training is really haphazard and nil I think we 2bl should be concerned with training the technicians we have had technicians i
24j come in give an eight week HP course, which probably is one of the 25i qf 7 (,
- G 5
i
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k i
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41 1.
j better courses anyone has received in this last group of technicians 2'
{
that came in and then there is a two week whole chemistry course in 3i Ohio which goes over very basic chemistry procedure.
I was sent out 4l there two years ago and I had been a technician for 4 years and was i
Si j
nothing I grasped out of that course except maybe a basic theory.
So 6l it is a good program for someone coming in to the area but they don't 7l add on to that training. It is more or less working beside a technician 8l and having him take the time out to train you and if a particular technician is not that well trained himself well you can see how the 1Cf training just starts to glide off to the deep end but I think management i
11l although we do have Dick Dubiel and Tom Mulleavy, I feel who are two I
ld' very good HP superviscrs, Dick Dubiel being well versed in the science 13 but the problem is we don't he is so tied up in paper work you can' t 14 transmit hir knowledge through the training system to the technicians lk and the foreman although if you are the more qualified then I would 16!
grant you for any type of answer basically the whole bunch if I had a 17l problem I would try to research it myself before I wait to get an IN answer usually you do not even get an answer on a particular problems.
19i You have to research it out yourself.
You have to be a diligent tech-20l nician in order to learn what to do with the little bit of training 21 they give yau.
We have a six week rotation and six weeks is maybe 22{
training week where initially when we went on the training system it.
23j worked for approximately 3 quarters of a year.
And then it was just a i
24l matter of reading through a simple procedure which is like a text book 25l 7 o 6-r ov
l 42 1
]
type of thing where your foreman would come up and say okay read this 2!
j procedure and that is it and it was nothing that ever went into any 31 theory or science, body burns or anything like that.
It was just 4!
production HP.
It was basically the way the program runs around here.
Si l
I think our safety limit just to give you an example, I was down in the 6i office a few days ago requesting a revised copy of personnel decontam-e 7
ination.
Our procedure which is I think 16-12 for personnel decontamination 8l is based on nasal swabs whether it is 5000 dpm, 10,000, 50,000 each 9f figure there deems a certain critaria taking care of who ever is involved.
10 The skin contamination as far as fixed is unclear.
It is not in that 11 procedure.
When a man comes in he has skin contamination and you don't 12 see his nasal passage you have no guideline to go on.
That is what I 13 was trying to stress to those people, I said well there is a revised 14) addition tc that and I said well where is it at.
Well, we will get 15l back to you.
This is a classic I am sure you have heard that but I 16!
asked another engineer who is a technical support to our department and 17 we have a point 4 fixed guideline for tools and equipment.
I had asked 18f him that night what is fixed the point 4.
I said that is fine for 19!
material equipment but you are tal' King about a human being and he 20i shregged his shoulders.
It is probably a viable response from these i
21!
people and you can see it that there put under the gun.
You have a lot i
22' of pressure and a lot of forms data that they have to mass produce and 23 they just don't have the time for any suitable training and you have so 24j much going at one ti.2e where if we are short of people for one thing 25i s
A f.
4
i
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43 I
11 and it reflects on the job.
We have numerous people coming through and j
2!
j who were contaminated.
They were going out through the front door and 3!
I felt they should not have been going out there.
Based on thi accident 4i that is the worst contamination I saw anywhere in this plant since I Si j
have been here.
People were that contaminated that they were letting 61 going home and the one man c s due in on a job down in the RC evaporator i
71 one night and it was a hazardous job to begin with and they had Unit 2 8[
water in the feed tank of the RC evaporator and they wanteo to change 9
the diaphram on the valve, there was no isolation to the valve and the 10f line was coming out of the bottom of the feedtank and through a 1 foot 11 piece of pipe in the side and went into the pump suction.
There was 12!
absolutely no isolation and I questioned the RWP.
And Joe DeMann was l
13!
there that night and I said we can't go into do this job there is no 14i isolation on this tank.
I was not that familiar with the job to begin 15i with.
So the man involved was Dave Kimball.
We had set down a set of 16i prints to try to find the isolation because he was not sure and he i
17 determined that there was not.
So I explained this to Joe DeMann and I 18i said I was not signing the RWP to authorize the job.
Joe DeMann was 19 not signing the RWP so then the shift foreman came down and said he had 20!
changed the diagram before and had drained one third of the tank.
So I 21l said well how much water did you get out and he said oh, not too much.
22l So it kind of baffled me and Joe DeMann got on the phone to his supervisor 1
23j 24l 25l
/
i I
f 44 l!
l who is Tom Mulleavy and Tom Mulleavy has a tendency tc agree with 2l l
Operations and everybody else and we don't get that m vh support if we 3t have a legitimate reason to bitch.
4l l
5 RESNER:
Excuse me, at this time we have to break to change the tape 61 l
12:27 a.m.
i 7l 8!
RESNER:
The present time is 12:28 a.m., the date is May 18, 1979.
f This is a continuation of the interview of John Donnachie.
10f DONNACHIE:
Okay then back to the RC vap situation after Tom Mulleavy i
IPq had authorized the use of the RWP we went ahead and did the job in wet
'3i suits, cotton coveralls, double boots, double gloves, Scott air packs.
14l That is wnat I felt we needed for the job. I had put on the requirements 1
on the RWP and the last course of the RWP was to sign it. Which I had 16 the option of signing it and I refused that option and as I said prior, 17 Joe DeMann had refused it and went to Tom Mulleavy's level for aatbor-18!
ization.
So we had proceeded to go down the RC vap and he popped off 19 the old valve that he was going to replace and we had a of stream of 20l water approximately 3 inches in diameter and it just blew the valve
}
21l over in the next vault and we had a stream of water coming over there 22 like a fire house.
It was 3 r water and water temperature wise it was 23!
somewhere close to 200 degrees because Dave Kimball scalded his hand 2k trying to get the other valve back in.
He was assisted by Ike Waters 25l l
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45 l!
j
.vho is a utility worker assigned to mer.hanical maintenance and he is 2'
l not familiar 4 th work of that type in control areas.
He was somewhat 3i scared of the whole situation and Dick Himmel was literally getting a 7
41 l
shower in that water trying to get the valve back.
Trying to get the new valve back in.
So what I did I pushed Dave, Ike Waters out of the b
way and braced myself and took my foot and pushed the valve in so he 7
could get the four lock nuts on it and I pushed in on the valve which 8
increaed the flow and we got sprayed.
Dave was in a crouched position 9'
and somehow or another water got through the drain suit into his groin 10' area and when we finally completed the job we got everything back in we 11l drained probably 1/2 to 2/3 of the tank anyway in to the aux building 12 itself, reasoning being that they did not want to drain the tank because 13 the aux building was full and it had no place to go with the water and 14!
they were somewhat in emergency to get rid of this water, which is a 15 classic case of operations controlling HP, so when we came back to 16' check out the xenon in the area was high we had the friskers on the 100 17 scale we were reading somewhere between anywhere between 10 and 20 18[
thousand: counts on f-iskers and Dave Kimmel had checked his groin area 19!
and had a pegged x 100 scale times on the frisker.
At that time it was 20!
emotional on my part I was screaming at Joe DeMann and telling him we i
21!
will never do this job again and one word led to another and Mr. Nimitz 22' who is an NRC representative was sitting in the lab at the time and he 23l came over and talked to be about the whole situation, what had happened 24!
so then we checked Dick Kimbell was in E-520 and we were reading 40 mr I
25l
/qn
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46 1;
in the groin area.
We had checked him and another fellow from NMSS was 2'
{
back there 1 don't know who he was but he had taKen over the decon 3l l
operation and that is the last of saw of Dick Kimmell that night.
I 4 !
believe I had made out the contamination report on him and I do not
]k know where it might be at the moment, should be in the file. But two 61 nights later, Dick Kimbell came back into the lab when our background i
7 was down and checked himself with the frisker and he pegged out on the O
100 scale.
I asked him where did you get that. He said I dcn't know.
t 9
I was not even back in the contrl area for 2 days aad I can only assume 10l that he got it that night and he got by the friskers out front also.
I 11!
He had relayed to ne that he had gone home and went as far as having 12l intercourse with his wife.
So I got emotional that night and said okay
[
13 this is the end of the line and I am going to do something about it 1
right now.
So I took him out the front gate, front PC Center and I saw 15 Joe DeMann come out and I told Joe come on out.
I said look, "This has 16 gone far enough.
You had Ed Houser and now you have Dave Kimball, 17 these people should not be going home in the contamination status."
18 "Either you do something about it, you send them to the hospital or you 19!
get them cleaned up.
You clean them up here I don't care how you do it 20 but we are going to the NRC trailer right now and talk it over, the 21l measures to take."
He said, "Yes, I was going to take care of that."
22l So I sent Dave Kimball over to get a whole body count.
I said go over 23 right away I don't care what you are doing, tell your supervisor go get 2Ii a whole body count." Well he went in the whole body count drove it 25!
s
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47 ll' crazy.
The could not even do a bocy count on him.
He was too hat.
So i
2+
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then it was a matter of sweating it out of him the best they could.
I 31 i
guess they finally identified it and that was the last of heard of the whole incident.
I more or less put it in Joe's hands he was responsible for it and I hope he took measures to straighten it out.
We still never got any real guidelines from personal decontamination on the 7l guideline for release for limits.
We are knowledgeable enough that '
l h
can take the proper decon measures but we have to have the guidelines 9
set down not just based on the nasal swab.
That is what I am waiting 10 for right now that pa-ticular area we are poor in.
Unit 1 is being 11 turned over to Met Ed right now.
We are getting right back to where we 12 were before.
Air samples are not being taken enough and are not being 13 documented properly they need to be documented in three different areas 14 that if your writing out an RWP from my point the senior sechnkian I 15 have to read through all kinds of books to find data and you start to 16' assume a lot and you get in a bad habit you can't relay it so there is 17 nothing yuJ can do abcut it.
This is the kind of prot,lem you are up 18i against.
You have training and you have mass apathy, I think. They 191 just tie the hands of our supervisors to much to date they lose cartrol 2d!
of what is going on back there.
It may even take the accident to l
21l straighten it out, I don't know.
22I 23 YUHAS:
Do you have a procedure for documenting violations in Health 24l Physics procedures?
25l l
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f 48 l!
r
-DONNACHIE:
Um hum.
2t 3
YUHAS:
Do you use that procedure?
l 4!
i 5
DONNACHIE:
Yes we do.
But we have a peculiar situation here with, we 6l have a union and we have management. There is like an unwritten rule, 7
you don't write another union brother but you can write up a management 8
personnel, management personnel F.as the option to write up anybody they want.
Normally we don't run into personnel filing HP procedures they 10 are pretty precise.
We don't have too many unauthorized entries or 11 violation of procedures from other people.
We do have violations i
12 procedures I think more from operations standpoint than our own people 13 that are taken for granted but that is more or less you should know 14 better before it gets the violation.
But I have been in meetings with 15; my superiors at HP as far as change in procedures that were not applicable 16i to the situation.
One being release of gaseous wastes in Unit 1.
17 '.
Sampling techniques and also documentation.
Well I was down in the 18!
office almost eight months ago saying this is no longer feasible to do 19!
it this way you want to do it tnis way you better change your procedure 20t or document it likewise.
Okay initiate a TCM on it and change it.
It 21, was never done.
So you will have people that are still doing the t
2Nl sampling the old way which they should not be doing anymore.
And you 23l go up and you talk to them about it and they say yes it slipped my mind i
24l 25!
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49 I,
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I better get on that.
Then you get involved with other things and it 2l' might be a month or so later before you get back to that situation.
3t You find out later that there was nothing taken care of.
It is a serious matter.
t Si l
Gi YUHAS:
Are there enough instruments available for free incident conditions 7
such that the technical specification requireme,'its for entry into high rad areas are met?
i 9l t
10' 00NNACHIE:
We have lost control of our instrumentation as far as 11 portable instruments.
It is depends on how you want to look at a 12!
s i tuat'.S n.
We have a guideline limit set down on an RWP that is the 13 general area is greater than 100 mr who ever is going in that job cycle 14 will have a meter.
Three years ago we made up a book for signout for 15; metering, equipment that was fine for about 2 weeks and then that N
started slipping by the way side.
Now we have lost equipment.
Lost i
17 radio equipment they have purchased numerous portable monitoring equipment.
18!
It is still being lost or misplaced due to the fact that it is not 19!
being signed out we are losing controlled.
We have run into situations 20{
already where we have enough equipment in the lab to control that i
211 situation to find out what our readings were.
Air samplers especially I
%2 we do not have enough air samplers to go around.
In fact right now I 23[
think we have one in the lab right now we are lucky.
And dosimetry, i
2f dosimeters especially they are souvenier items around here.
We probably 25l g I U U i
-l l
l
{
50 1{
have gone through about 5-6 thousand dosimeters since this accident.
Respirators we totally lost control of the respirators we had thousands 3!
of respirators and now wa are down to you have to run over the yard to 4!
find one or two respirator 3 to do a job.
I can see it for the emergency 5
problems we have had in the last month.
But before hand we didn't have he problems with the respirators but we also had the problems with 7f monitoring equipment.
It was just a matter of buying new equipment.
8 9
YUHAS:
You are painting a picture of a marginal safe health physics 10 program, let me ask you it doesn't appear that all these problems 11 occurred within the week before the incident based on your discussion 12{
there are problems and you describe efforts you have made, for instance 13; efforts pursuant to Part 19 to contact the Commission and explain your 14!
concerns which you apparently had expressed them to the licensee and 15; actions were not forthwith.
16; 17 DONNACHIE:
We had two technicians express their concerns to NRC officials 18!
two years ago, well three years ago.
The situation was still apparent 19) back then.
These were at home situations where they talk to the NRC.
20j This being Dete Velez and Ed Houser. They had voiced their opinions of 21f the whole matter nothing changed.
Wnen this came to my attention, I 22l tried to straighten it out with my cwn inhouse people, it is just a i
231 matter of how your emotions are flowing at the time Jou know you can i
24l become apathatic and withdrawn from the whole scene wr.en you don't get 25l
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51 It any results and it can bounce back and get back into the scene again. I 2{'
am the steward for our department and more or less if tere are any 3l j
problems concerning the people in the department, they are done through me or Mike Janouski.
We have set down with the company numerous times 5l with mutual p oblems meeting. Training was always a big issue and it is 6l just a matter of we don't have a feel on how much control the NRC has 7
over the people, how much training the NRC requires a company to give 3
their people.
We have not feel for that.
We cco't put our finger and 9
say it that a problem for the NRC to be concerned about that or they 10' just dismiss it as a passing fancy.
We have regulatory training to go 11l through every year which is called general employee training.
Which 12 that is a farce as far as we are concerned because it goes through very 13 basic health physics standards limits that we use everyday and it is 14 not anything foreign to us so we just take the test when that section lb i comes up during the day and everybody ace's the test.
It is that 16' simple but it is hard for an employee tnat is not familiar with HP.
i 17!
The other items involved are QC and security and safety.
Safety aspect IN being how many accidents have occurred through out the last month.
The 19!
security is being security system, QC is being a matter of seineone 2bf standing out front and asking if you have any questions on QC, what QC 2h does.
And going to mix and how important it is in the area.
But 22' generally that is one day out of the year the year you gc to GET training 23l 24!
25!
s (s-
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52 i
i lf and that is regulatory requirement.
That to a technical field which we 2}'
are in in operations, it is not feasible for us.
It is like a first 31 grade education.
4l-5{
YUHAS:
Your training indicates that you had 24 hrs of health physics j
6
training from Unit 2 in December 1978.
Can you describe the training i
71 to me.
8 9f D0':G/.CHIE:
The 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> Unit 2 training is more or less on-the-job 10 tr.ning.
11:
i 12!
YUHAS:
On-the-job training is someone supervising you providing you i
13l with instructions and so on in one specific area?
14!
f 15:
DONNACHIE:
My instructions in Unit 2 were normal sample paths in the 16!
Unit 2 sample room.
All from the secondary sampling lab.
That is 17l basically my training in Unit 2.
1 18i 19' YUHAS:
Did that take 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />?
20j 21l 00NNACHIE:
It did not take 24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br />.
24 hours2.777778e-4 days <br />0.00667 hours <br />3.968254e-5 weeks <br />9.132e-6 months <br /> training is one week I i
22' was assigned to work in Unit 2 which I did routine chemistry.
Walked 23 through, showed me where the sample points were, whece I should dras my 24 samples to the chemistry.
25\\
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53 i
I l'
l YUHAS:
Who took you through the walk through and how long did it take?
21 l
31 l
DONNACHIE:
Well Cary Horn took us on walk through.
Ed Houser had 4l shown me sampling system in the sampling room.
Those are about the s
5'!
only things that I remember for training.
./
bl YUHAS:
How long did that take?
8 9
00NNACHIE:
It did not take more than 2-3 hours.
10l l
11l YUHAS:
Describe the other 20 hours2.314815e-4 days <br />0.00556 hours <br />3.306878e-5 weeks <br />7.61e-6 months <br />.
i 12f 13)
DONNACHIE:
The other 20 some hours are, I was there my body was in 14 Unit 2 and that was documented in training it was brought up in a 15i meeting with the company. Why I had all this training in Unit 2.
If 16!
you also look at my training record you will see that I and 3 other 1
members of my shift were also documented for SAM-2 training which we l
18!
nuver received.
Which we jumped on them fi a or six times about getting 19' the training which we still have not received.
This is through out a 20 year and a haif.
I 21l 2$
YUHAS:
When was the last time that you were either demonstrated to or 23l you actually operated the SAM-2 instrument prior to this incident?
l 24l 25j v,
i
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3 L--
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54 I,
11 j
00NNACHIE:
The last time that I actually operated the SAM-2 instrument 2
was last fall when we had an emergency drill.
This is the one and only 3t j
time we used SAM-2.
They are in our emergency kits.
Other than that 41 we don' t use them.
And the only reason I knew how to run it at tM Si j
time was it was a procedure with them.
I read the procedure step by Gi step on ti.9 procedure as far as operating, that I took it upon myself 7
to do.
But with four members in my shift alone that we try to train 8
you as a g' aup and we are documented for how many hours for SAM-2 9f training which we never receive, which was brought to their attention t
10 several times.
11l l
12{
YUHAS:
Who are the four members of your shift that never received l
13!
SAM-2 training?
14 15 00NNACHIE:
Vince Hamlin, Tom Pyke, Buzz Diamond.
16!
lif YUHAS:
You are sure this is documented in your traiaing records?
181 191 00NNACHIE:
It is documented i. mine.
20(
21l YUHAS:
When did jou bring this to the attention of management that 22' that documentation is not correct?
23 24!
25t
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55 1!
DONNACHIE:
That was probably last August or September before the 2!
j emergency drill and we were told yes you will be trained before the 3l drill comes up but we never were.
4!
i Si YUHAS:
During the drill, were you trained on how to use the instrument?
6 DONNACHIE:
No.
al 9f YUHAS:
Have you been trained since on how to use the instrument?
10 11 DONNACHIE:
No a
I 13!
YUHAS:
During the course of this incident this actual incident, were i
14 any of /co four expected to use that instrument?
15, 16 DONNACHIE:
Yes, we were all expected to count and use the instrument.
17 18!
YUHAS:
Did all of you try to make measurements using the SAM-2?
19i 20!
DONNACHIE:
Yes we did.
l 21j i
22l YUHAS:
And none of you had been trained.
23 2
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56 Il 00NNACHIE:
No none of us had been trained.
2!
i 3l i
YUHAS:
What response would you address and give me a name of the 4:
specific person in management tnat you had not been trained but your 5
records reflected that you had been trained. Who did you bring that up 61 with?
7 8
DONNACHIE:
Tom Mulleavy.
Of 10 YUHAS:
What response did you get?
11!
12 00NNACHIE:
We will train you, but he did not give up we have had two 13 or three sessions set up and some management problem arose that they 14 could not train us and they cancelled it.
That is basically what lh happened.
Whenever we were down in the mutual problem committee, I and 16!
Mike Janoaski we would compile a list of items of mutual problems being 17f something that should be looked into. Training was always at the top of 18l the list.
You would get the same old answer yes we are working on the 19!
sample training period as soon as you can break away from Unit 2.
The 20 Unit 2 put a lot of time on the foremen because we were in a hurry to 21.
get it up.
That is my impression, but it reflected on the training of 22l the people in the department and one thing I really needed training on i
2-h was Unit 2 RMS and unit 2 technicial specifications.
None of which was l
241 ever given us.
To anybody to my knowledge.
I in fact even told Tom 25t gR
~
I 57 1!
Mulleavy we were to get the data for the Unit 2 RMS system from an admin procedure from an operations procedure and what he had done he 3!
i had taken that procedure and also added on Unit 1 RMS system which I 4l had all the training I needed on RMS 1 and all the documented data in Sl my locker.
I had nothing for Unit 2 and it was brought back in documented 61 style and in a folder and handout here you go.
That is what you wanted, 7
here it is.
8f 9f YUHAS:
Was this handout just circulated to the people?
10' 11!
DONNACHIE:
Well, he did not give each person in the department a copy.
I 12!
He only brought back 5-6 copies one of which I used for my own personal 13 use.
Conveyed to the members c. my shif t, one I posted in a book in 14 the Unit 1 HP lab the other I put in the Unit 2 HP lab and the other in 15!
a loose-leaf binder RMS system for everybody to use.
So it is not like 16l I had a handle on something no body else did I tried to make sure 17!
everybody else was aware that we finally got something in the RMS.
18[
i 19I YUHAS:
How are you appraised of the changes and technical specs of 10 20i CFR part 19, 20 procedures?
21l 22l DONNACHIE:
We are -- since I have been here I was never set down and 23i trained on 10 CFR 19, 10 CFR 20 or tech specs.
10 CFR 19 and 10 CFR 20 I
24l I set down myself read what I had questions on I went to the supervisors i
25i
,{0
,uA o u e
a e
i.I
{f 58 i
1!
involved and they answered the questions for me to my satisfaction.
2 f
Technical specifications, we had a copy back there.
Unit 1 and Unit 2 3t but you would never be formally trained on Tech Specs.
i t
b 5
YUHAS:
Is that a control copy of the data and most recent revisions?
I 61 I
DONNACHIE:
To my knowledge it is nm.
It is not a control copy.
It 0
has a lot of loose pages in it that fali cuc when you use it and the 9i control copies to my knowledge are down front for tech specs,.
That is 10h basically if you have a question or something you look at tech specs.
i 11 It is probably a good amount of technicians back there that never even 12 saw tech specs.
13!
i 14 YUHAS:
When was the last internal audit, by internal I mean GPU, or 15; Met Ed of the Health Physics Chemistry Department?
16; i
17 DONNACHIE:
There was an audit taken back I think right before in 18l January, early February by NUS Corporation came in tr do an audit of 191 our department we had told them our gripes and proble2as and.
i 20t 21!
RESNER:
Once again we got cut off with a short tape.
Time now is 22{
12: 57 a.m. on May 18, 1979.
We will pick up where we cut off.
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l 59 l{t DONNACHIE:
Concerning HP audit and NUS Corporation performing the 2
audit, we were told after I had talked with the man who was here to 3t audit our department and this was getting in to the Unit 1 outage.
I 4l told him right after I asked him how did you make out with our audit.
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He said we definitely need more people, we definitely need training.
I said what did can you do about it.
He said well you don't have the 7i j
time and you don't have the financing to take care of the immediate 8
problem.
He just threw his hands up as if it were a waste of time.
9 That was the result of that audit.
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YUHAS:
Do you know if that audit was ever documented.
Was a report 12 issued to GPU by a NUS Corporation?
13 14 00NNACHIE:
I did not know you would have to check.ith NUS on that.
I 15{
could probably find the name of the person that was in there he was on 16 the back shift and we talked to the people the technicians themselves 17!
everybody in the department was talked to one way or another on their 18!
opinion of Met Ed health physics.
19i 20l YUHAS:
We already have requested it.
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22l DONNACHIE:
You have?
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i li YUHAS:
A copy of that audit from GPO.
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3 00NNACHIE:
Well that is not surprising.
But those are the probl ms l
come against and I hate to say we are not qualified to do our job but Sij if you really sit back and think about it we are not.
And I think I 6i j
was talking to an NMSS technician and he had written a docket to NRC 7
about certifying health physics technicians in the field which I think 8
could be done.
I think you would see more training come out of certi-9 fication I wholly support licensing of senior technicians because we 10' are the ones that have control of releasing radioactive material and 11 whatever form it is we are the ones doing the gamma scans on it we are 12l assessing what is there we are putting it down on release permits the IN!
documentation and tne people with the signature there are a phone call 14 away.
You tell them what the release limits are okay sign my name, and 15!
they you might put three signatures that way.
So that not one of them 16 has ever seen the release permit.
And it is kind of risky if you have 17 a new technician there that doesn't have a grasp of this.
If you don't 18!
have a knowledge of knowing wnat the effects of it are and the MPC 19 values and the restrictions that are put on these releases you are in 20!
violation.
Although we have not been caught at it yet.
I can't at i
21, this time can't specify any particular waste release that we have 2
processed although we have there were two suspects in the immediate t
23j emergncy where there was dumping water without doing treating results.
24l Which was justified at a later date.
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I 61 I
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YUHAS2 This was during the incident?
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00NNACHIE:
Um hun.
4f Si YUHAS:
Water was dumped from where without a permit?
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7 DONNACHIE:
Water was dumped from, our waste evap storage tanks in Unit 8
1 because our tritium analy::er was out of service.
9 10f DONNACHIE:
Prior to this if we had any problems with that Tri-Carb we 11 had sent our results over to Hershey Medical Center where they were 12 processed before any dumped.
Or if we were not able to perform a gamma 13 scan they were run down to Phil and to RNC and they would do an analysis.
1U But this particular time being I questioned I was given this was the 15l second night that I was up in the control room and I was handed a 16i release permit by Ken Bryan.
Here take care of this, I looked at it i
17l and I had basic results from a ganana scan.
I don't know who did it.
18 There was no time or date or anything on the sample, and I said well I 19 can't process this I don't have enough information and he said well I 20j don't care hcw you do it just do it.
I said you can't dump this unless 21j I get more data he said well call Tom Mulleavy in Unit 2 so I called 22; Tom Mulleavy and what I did what don' t you have and he said what don' t i
23l you have and I said I really don't have a chemistry on this which at 24l that time I called Gary Regg was doing some analysis downstairs and I 25l l
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asked him to process the chemistry for us.
Gary Regg being a chemistry 2!
j supervisor, he honored my request.
He did the chemistry results were within specifications.
Then he gave me the time and date of the sa.71e 4!
and all I needed at that point was the tritium value.
So I got back on 5
the phone and called Tom Mulleavy and said I need a tritium value, who 6l can analyze it he said we cannot do it here.
I said how about Hershey i
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he said well they don't have efficiency made up for our geometries set 0
up anymore for our coun'.ing.
He said well why not and I said he doesn't 9!
know for sure it can not be sent to Hershey.
I said well you are not 10 going to authorize this release. He said yes I authorize the release to 1
justify the tritium at a later date, so the water went out.
What did 12{
you put on that release form?
I had put on the release, form we had l$
1ever had a release flow restrictions based on tritium.
It was always 1
based on some isotopo for us, based on the secnsitivity of the monitor 15 and what I did I processed it out and his name was put on for the 16!
initial authorization, pump that out and from there after Mulleavy or I i
i 17 needed the HP foreman, the three prerequisites for authorizing them.
18!
It is the health physics foremen, or supervisor and then it goes to the 19!
section head which is Dick Dubiel and now I guess Lenny Landry is his 2bj subordinate.
He also has authorization at that point who is the shift 21l supervisor.
Normally, the shift supervisor they put their names on 2
everything around here.
Evernthing has to be authorized by the shift 23 supervisor.
Even things of that sort and he has final authorization on 24l it although I don't think those guys have as much insight on release as 25l l
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we do and there they are authorizing it as somebody to take responsibility i
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l when it gets out.
I probably could sit here all night and draw a lurid 3l
(
picture but that is just the way things operate around here.
4l 5
YUHAS:
What does that waste concentrate, that is a waste concentrate 6l tank?
7' 0
00NNACHIE:
That is a waste evap concentration storage tank.
9' 10' YUHAS:
Waste Evaporator Concentration Storage Tank.
What does it 11l normally run?
12t 13 DONNACHIE:
It varies, it usually uns to the minus 2 microcuries per 14!
ml. Sometimes it may even run as much as the minus one.
Probably about 15 average.
16; I
17f YUHAS:
I don't have any more specific questions at this time.
I do i
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want to make clear to you that we will be on site for quite a while'and 19l if any more specific examples of flagrant nonccmpliance either with t
20!
Part 20, 19, tech specifications or procedures come to mind, we would 21f appreciate you advising us, in addition we appreciate you advising us 22 of those instances which you have previously have brought to the at-23 tention of management as being in noncompliance with some license 24 condition or regulatory requirement and that management has not resporded 25j l
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64 11 to.
We consider those to be the most severe.
I do have one additional 2!
question at this time.
That question is do you have any reason to 31 l
believe an individual may have deliberately precipitated or may have 4j aggravated the incident that occurred in Unit 2 on March 28?
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61 DONNACHIE:
To my knowledge no.
I don't feel there was any type of 7
sabotage involved in the whole thing.
I just think that what happened, happened something was overlooked this part of the surveillance matter do to the stress and strain of the foreman probably was overlooked on 10' the check off list.
I don't have, I am 100 percent it is my personal 11 opinion that there was no sabotage involved.
12!
13 YUHAS:
Fine thank you it is pretty late in the evening and I think it J
14 has been a very fruitful discussion.
I certainly appreciate ycur 15; candid responses.
We would like to advise you that we are aware that l$
the licensee has requested to hear your copy of the tape or any interview 17 or tape that you may have made with the Commission.
The copy that we 18[
provide you is your personal property it is entirely up to you whether l$!
or not you surrender that copy to anyone for review.
That is your 20!
property and it is up to you.
If you are harrassed or intimidated in 21{
any way please inform us.
I would like to express our thanks for l
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coming.
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DONNACHIE:
Appreciate it.
2.
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3l RESNER:
We are concluding this interview the time is 1:07 a.m.
May 4!
l 18, 1979.
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