ML19249B087
| ML19249B087 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Crane  |
| Issue date: | 06/27/1979 |
| From: | Essig T, Marsh R NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION III) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 7908290624 | |
| Download: ML19249B087 (33) | |
Text
b UNITED STATES OF AMERICA i.
NUCLEAR REGULATORY CCMMISSION 1l In the Ma.er of:
2 IE TMI INVESTIGATION INTERVIEW 3!
of Mr. Michael Buring 4!
5!
Si i
7!
Si Trailer 1203 91 NRC Investigation Site TMI Nuclear Power Plant 10j Middletown, Pennsylvania lli 12l (Date of Interview) 13!
June 27, 1979 (Data Transcript Typea) 141 87 15i (Tape Numcer(s))
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17; 13j 193 f
2m v'AC 21l NRC PERSONNEL:
22!
[
Mr. Robert Marsh i
23, Mr. Thomas H. Essig 1
894 02f 23 i
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1 MARSH:
One thing, let me interject if I may.
This is Marsh speaking.
I 1,
2 n tice you look up when you mentioned the one abbreviation.
For the ease f transcription where we do talk about an acronym or an abbreviatioc, if 3{
4l you would define it, I know both you and Tom are going to be deeply involved
/
in the abbreviations of your careers, but the people that bite to type this H
6 m y n t be knowledgeable so if you hear me interjecting, its just going to be asking that, if you would define it, I would ask you to define any gj acronyms or abbreviations that you use.
Excuse me, gc, ahead, Tom.
9!
ESSIG:
10!
Mike, would you state for the recor d the name of your, you indicated that your function as a corporate health physicist presently, would you 11!
state for the record the name rf your present immediate supervisor and his title?
13 14!
BURING:
Present supervisor is James Mudge, Dr. James Mudge, 5 :ction heed of the Radiation Safety and Environmental Engineering Section.
w i
17 MARSH:
Could you spell MUJge?
18{
19i BURING:
MUDGE.
20i 21l ESSIG: And his title again was section head of the 22 23 BURING: Radiation Safety and Environmental Engineering.
24l 2Si 894 022
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6 lj ESSIG:
Ok. What I'd like to do now, Mike, is to.
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i 3l MARSH:
Feel free, if there's anything you want to say, don' t worry about i
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$l BURING:
The thing is, that I had already resigned from Met Ed prior to 7j this incident, and I'm currently employed by the Pennsylvania Power and i
gi Light and I'm here alone.
So my immediate supervisor is not really James 1
Mudge, its Met Ed, I mean its, PP and L.
g I
10j MARSH:
Ok.
I 12!
BURING:
All of the time prior to and including up to the sixteenth, that's 13 true.
t 15!
ESSIG:
The sixteenth of April?
f 17!
MARSH:
As you see fit anytime you want to make an a side comment feel free 181 to speak freely and we can put any factnote you need or any explanation you 19i feel is necessary.
Just go ahead and call it out.
There's no problems I
involved at all.
Let me see your mike just a second.
21 22 MARSH:
I have the mike facing the wrong way and I don't know if I was 2 31 picked up or not but I just wanted to indicate that if Mike felt he wanted 24j to put any notes of explanation or an aside on the recora, to feel free to 25!
894 023 I
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1l speak.
Because of only two microphones I appear to be talking to the back t
2 of one of them.
Some of my comments may not be coming out clearly.
3!
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ESSIG:
Mike, would you describe first of all I'll ask you a rather general Sj question and then I have some, a few specific follow-on questions to that.
6 But I'd like you to s+, art. off by stating what your involvement in tha 7
assessment of the TMI event was during the first three days following the event, that is, Wednesday, Thursday, and Frida., March 28th, 29th, and 8
30th, and would you please state whether you were here on site or were you g
at the corporate office? What just in general, was the nature of the work that you were doing at that particular time?
12l BURING:
You said involvement in the assessment.
I don't think that we've 13l t
done an assessment yet, have we? or do you guess 14:
15i ESSIG:
Well, the assessment to the extent that you were, assessments have gone on during the first th m e days of the event, I'll give you an example 17!
what I mean by an assessment.
Let's say we have wind direction and speed data or release data which caused the types of surveys that were making to 19!
immediately emphasize something else.
So that's the, I mean that type of 20!
evaluation, just sort of in front of your nose type evaluation, not an 21 l
ove.all evaluation where you back away completely and determine the say, 22' the in detail the offsite dose consequences, that type thing.
I'm not 23 l
interested in that kind of det=il right now, and I recognize its probably 24!
not been done and I think there probably been a couple attempts made to do 25!
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II that, but I think, what I'd like to know is just sort of with all the all 2
the little details ihat were going on, what was year involvement there, I
3}
during the first three days?
41 5'
BURING:
I arrived at Met Ed that morning approximately quarter til eight g
and had been scheduled to come to TMI for a meeting of, and that's my first 7
knowledge of the incident and so from that time on the my daylight hours g
were spent in assessing the needs of the station in ceveral areas and attempting to obtain those needs.
The majority of it was in radiological g
10l waste or rad waste, such as tankage, trucks, shipping shields, stuff of that nature.
Secondly, I was turning on consultants, which we had existing, contract's list such as Pickard and Lowe for radiological data Porter and 13l Gertz for radiological environmental data, Radiation Management Corporation i
for whole body counting, and environmental sample analysis.
The mobile analysis laboratory-Teledyne Isotopes for sample analysis, radiol 3gical and
,a_
environmental sample analysis.
Eberline Instrument Company for survey im,,
i instrumentation.
1T t
1 81 ESSIG:
Now when you say Eberline Instrument Company for survey instru-mentation, you mean, advice with respect to the use and limitations of the 201 l
present Eberline survey instrumention that you had.
21; i
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BURING:
That es well as ordering additional.
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l ESSIG:
Ordering additional, ok.
1 2!
BURING:
Then supervision of my offsite environmental sample collector in 3
y the types and frequency, of radiological and er.vironmental samples o be g!
collected and shipped and methods for getting them to the respective labora-
-I I
6l tories for analysis.
Evenings were spent on t9 phone with le media answering their questions, interviews, etc.
7 l
Si Nights after that were spent brainstorming in the corporate offices there g
as to possible needs of the station and what could be procured from where, how to go about getting estimates of the overall needs.
That was for 11!
We'1esday, Thursday, and Friday.
Would you care for any more particulars?
i 131 ESSIG:
One question, you indicated early that you are now and were at the time as of after April the 16th employed by Pennsylvania Power and Light.
Would you state what relationship, if any, PP&L has to Met Ed?
17' BURING:
They are completely separate entities.
There is no relationship.
18i 19!
ESSIG:
Are they related through GPU at all?
20!
21l BURING:
General Public Utilities has three subsidiaries, Metropolitan 22{
t Edison Company, Penn Electric and Jersey Central.
Pennsylvania Power and 23j Light is a completely separate utility.
24l 894 026 25:;
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i ESSIG:
Ok, so then you were..
1!
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3f BURING:
As far as geography is concerned its the next utility north in 4f Pennsylvania.
t Si l
ESSIG:
el Then you're involvement. then was completely as a consultant without, 7
not even you were not even involved through the GPU holding company, in this case?
8 9!
10;l BURING:
No I was still employed by Met Ed at this time.
I had rasigned prior to the incident. I had not left.
11l l
12l ESSIG:
Ok. Ok, I understand.
131 14!
BURING:
The resignation was not effective until April 16th.
16i ESSIG:
Ok. I failed to pick that up earlier.
So you were still employed 17j by Met Ed but you had given them a 30.
ISI 191 BURING:
3 week notice.
O k.
20!
21i l
22l BURING:
It was supposed to have been effective the 13th of /.pril but it 23 was subsequently changed to the 16th because the 13th was Good Friday and 24!
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the 15th was Easter Sunday so we made it effective on the 16th to cover me 25!
for the weekend.
894 08 t
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ll tlj ESSIG:
Ok. You made it effective on the 16th '
I 2!
3j BURING:
April.
1 4l t
ESSIG:
Ok, let me come back a point, just a bit then.
I felt that you had c.A I
6 said you you had given notice on that date.
7l BURING:
No, I had resigned, submitted my resignation about March 20th, to 8
be effective April the 13th.
g, 10(
11,!
ESSIG:
O k. O k.
My problem is I just lost track of one month.
That's all.
i Alright.
12!
t 131 BURING:
It's now May.
15i ESSIG:
O k.
As long as we're on the subject of your resignation, was it related to the conpany's handling of environmental affairs, at that point, the health physics program, did you have some disagreements with company management or did the grass look greener over on the PPL side of the fence?
19' 20l j
BURING:
I've never had a problem with Metropolitan Edison company and I'm 21!
leaving them to go to a better position, for a supervisory position, more 22 money a good job, doing the radiological and directing the radiological and 23 l
non-radiological environmental monitoring for their Susquehanna Steam
'41 l
Electric station at Bersick.
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894 028 i
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l 12 If ESSIG:
O k.
2; 3l BURIB I have no bad things to say about Met Ed.
i 4I gl ESSIG:
O k.
During y1ur involvement in the first three days following the 6
event, were you taking directions at that time from Dr. James Mudge that you mentioned earlier?
7 I
at BURING:
It was more of a case of my supplying advice to him and h " carrying g
it out, I believe.
He was my immediate supervisor, though.
11:
ESSIG:
Ok, but did he, did he, did he ask you to be in charge of the i
specific areas that you mentioned earlier, assessing the need of the station 13) in the way of radwaste, bringing the censultants onboard, had he asked you to do that or is that something you.
15; 16:
BURING:
That's something I did on my own.
17; 18l ESSIG:
I see.
19!
20; i
BURING:
I assumed I knew the immediate needs and went looking for those 21l and then contacted the station personnel and to determine if I had forgotten 22 anything or there was something that they needed more of or things like 23, that.
24l 894 029 2s l
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- j ESSIG
Ok.
2l 6
3j BURING:
And then went ahead and procured those.
4l Sj ESSIG:
O k. I guess the next area I'd like to look into, is to, could you 6
describe the or speak to the extent to which you were involved in the 7
decision making process relative to when to collect the routine enviromental g
samples and what samples to collect following the event?
9i BURING:
I was deeply involved in that I had been the director of the 10 radiological and environmental montoring prigram almost since my arrival at 12l Met Ed in 73.
So I was very familiar with all of the existing samples I
location, and frequencies, and so it became a job of increasing the frequency 13l of analysis rather than, I mean frequency sampling rather than setting up 14:
more sampling locations or that, and the logistics involved in much more frequent sample.
17!
ESSIG:
Ok.
18!
19i i
BURING:
Yes, I made those decisions as to which samples should be collected, 20; how frequently, and, 21' 22 ESSIG:
What were some of the factors that were considered that as you made 23 the decisions as to what samples ought to be collected when, and what 24{
frequency, what were some of the factors that you considered in arriving at 25i that decision?
894 030 i
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lj BURING:
Discussions that the station personnel as to whether we were, in 2
fact, releasing noble gases or iodine, and whether there was a large potential 3
for finding anything in the environmental samples.
Was there a liquid release, for instance, should I be collecting more surface water samples, 5
was there gas or iodine release, should I be collecting the air particulate r
d or the air iodine samples more often.
Q1 7I i
ESSIG:
And were these discussions held then basically on the 28th, for the 8
most part?
g, 10i BURING:
Yes, sir.
And partly I was discussing it with the station personnel as to what was happening in the station.
12!
I 131 ESSIG:
What were they telling you was nappening as far as releases were concerned? Things that you were then subsequently factoring into your thinking with regard to what types of samples you needed to collect?
17!
BURING:
Wednesday and Thursday, the best of my recollection, releases were 18i minimal and we then collected, offsite TLDs Friday, the 29th.
19l 20l l
ESSIG:
That was Thursday. The 29th w a Thursday.
21:
22!
BURING:
We collected the environmental TLDs on Thursday, the air particulates, 23i the air iodines, surface waters and milks.
I believe were all collected 24:
that same day, Thursday, and then with reaching frequency after that it 25l 894 031 i
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15 I
1 became, it was daily for milk samples, every three days for TLDs.
But I 2
also enlisted the services of our normal consultant in radiological environ-3 mental monitoring which is Porter-Gertz Associates.
4l ESSIG:
5 And what advice did they give you specifically in this regard, for 6
example with respect to the sample frequency, the collecting the TLDs every three days and daily milk samples and I believe you said, air iodines were 7
i gl every three days, did they have any input to that?
9f BURING Yes, that's what I decided based on my discussions with them, 10!
essentially.
11.
12!
l ESSIG:
O k.
13l 14i BURINC:
The station and the consultant.
We've been following that ever since.
16!
17!
ESSIG:
Ok, is it your position that the decision that was made with respect 18l to when the samples were, when the samples were pulled and what particular 19l samples were collected and the subsequent frequency following the event, 201 21ll that was your decision then based on based on the recommendation of your consultants as well as your own knowledge?
22l 23 l
BURING:
Plus what information I had from the station.
24!
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1; ESSIG:
And were you relatively free to, once you had the advice of the 2
station people, the consultants, etc., and come to a decision.
Were you 3l relatively free to go ahead and implement that decision.
Did you have to 4
first check with your immediate supervisor, Dr. Mudge, and bounce this off Si him and see if he agreed with this particular collection frequency?
i 6i BURING:
No, I essentially told him that I felt this is what needed to be 7
gl done and 'that's why it needed to be done and this is the way I intend to handle it unless he had some concern.
g 10j i
ESSIG:
O k.
Did collection frequency, for example, for TLDs every three g
days, what what was the primary basis for that determining every three I
days?
131 14!
BURI.1G:
I la,_ :;
was thinking that the TLD normally reads somewhere in the range of 7 to 10 millirems per month.
Divide 10 by 30, 10 millirems per month by 30 days, and you're down in the.3
- 'lirem range and so you're down in the 17,:
i minimum sensivity of 'he TLDs essentially.
I also thought that we would be ISI very interested in the total exposure on the fence line, out in the environ-ment, as well as the change in exposure rates.
So those are some of the i
things I was considaring.
I wanted to be able to say when I changed a TLD 21:
this is an increase, a statistical increase above normal levels, and secondly, 22l what is the total integrated exposure.
23l l
24i 894 053 25l t
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ESSIG:
Ok.
i 2'
i 3l BURING:
So one of the things I did was on the 31st 1 guess, Saturday.
l 4!
ESSIG:
Yes.
Si 6i i
BURING:
We put out duplicates of TLDs, no, it was lunday afternoon that we 7j put out a second set which would remain there for the remainder of the 8
quarter.
Our normal frequency of change for TLDs is quarterly.
So I had a g
set that I could change at any frequency plus a set that remained in each 10l location till the remaincer of the quarter.
12f i
ESSIG:
O k.
Had you considered during the during the your sitting down and 13i analyzing the input f.om your consultants and your plant people that it might be worthwhile to put place TLDs out at locations where you presently 15,;
didn't have them, I guess what I'm getting at is, specifically is, you have an emergency plan implemeriting procedure and I'm not sure to what extent your normally involved in, in the actual implementation of those procedures, but there's one procedure No. 1670.6 having to do with offsite surveys?
19i 20!
MARSW-Before you answer that question we're running out of time on this 21l
[
tape. I'd like to take a break and turn it over.
Time is now 5:50 p.a. I'm 22' going to turn the tape over.
23 24 8Q4 ()}4 25!
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18 t
1 MARSH:
Ok. Meter reading is 462. Time is 5:51 and I'll turn the microphone 2
back over to you, Tom.
31 1
4j ESSIG:
Ok. Mike, what I was specifically interested in is, the procedure Sj that I mentioned 1670.6, one of the items in there that it speaks to, and 6
this is basically a procedure for offsite surveys and it speaks to survey, 7
types of surveys that might be considered during an emergency of this type, g
and one of the surveys or measurements that it speaks to is the, or that ought to be considered is the establishment of TLDs at maybe scme, either g
10f ru ne cadons, or maybe even some nonvadne locadons, and een f
changing these out every on a very frequent basis like maybe every four hours.
And I guess my question is..
131 BURING:
I don't recall that in the procedure.
14!
15; MIG:
Ok. Weil, it is there and it doesn't say the procedure doesn'+ say 17,'
that you have to do it, but it just sort of there, one of those things tnat ought to be considered and I just wondered if you were involved with any of the plant people in coming up with a decision whether to put additional TLDs out or don't put them out or did that not even enter into the thinking 20j at that point.
21!
22!
l BURING:
I don't believe that was discussed.
23l I
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894 0.55 25; e
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ESSIG:
Ok.
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BURING:
Either among myself in corporate offices or the station personnel.
31 I believe the agreement that I had with the station cersonnel was that I 41 would take care of the offsite environmental monitoring..
i 61 ESSIG:
The routine program?
71 t
8' BURING: Exclusive c.' the offsite monitoring teams which are conducted from 9!
l the station.
101 l
11!
ESSIG: Ok. Ok. So then to summarize then what that routine program, what 12!
happened as far as the routine program as I understand it is that on the 13 29th the sainples, a routine samn19 collection was made or a special sample 14!
i collectio.1 was. made of the routine samples that you routinely collect, a 15!
special collection was mace on the 29th.
16, 17!
BUR D,G:
Which had been scheduled for the 31st, Saturday.
181 191 ESSIG:
O k.
So in essence you were doing it two days early.
2:i i
2[
BURING: Correct.
22l t
23l ESSIG:
And tnen you went into an augmented sample collection frequency i
24I whic.5 consisted of daily milk sample collectior., every three day TLD and 25!
894 036 4
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20 air samples and what was the augmented water sample frequency or was there, g
lid that remain the same?
l 31 BURING:
4;s Surface water samples became daily samples after that.
Si j
ESSIG:
They became daily.
Ok, and these would ordinarily be a weekly oi i
composite or something on that order, or monthly composite?
8!
l BURING:
Compositors installea downstream which are continuous compositors 9l t
twenty minute frequency.
10l i
11:
l ESSIG:
Ok, but then these are, these are collected then every..
12' 13
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BURING: Collected weekly and analyzed monthly.
141 i
15j ESSIG:
Ok. Collected weekly, analyzed monthly.
Ok. I guess I'd like to 16i come back to a question that we had just, that we're touching on a few 17!
minutes ago, and that was that you indicated that you were, one of your 18l duties in the corporate office, was to sort of get a number of the consultants 191 in motion that you ordinarily have, ordinarily retain as consultants.
Did 20!
you, you. mentioned ESSIG:
Porter-Gertz by name, so I assume you interfaced 21!
with th Sid Porter and Steve Gertz end you indicated I believe that they t
22' had, you consulted with them as far as any recommendations that they might 23 i
have, for the conduct of the,any special monitoring that might be requi,ed 24 following the event?
25' i
894 U3/
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BURING That's true.
2l I
ESSIG: Sk, did vou iso, you mentioned Pickard-Love and Associates. What 3i typ of dealing did you have with them, I understand, they are Met Ed i
4j mets Jological contrarcors is that correct?
I Gl i
BURING:
That is true. We have a meteorological facility tower and a data transmitting center here, the north weather station.
The data is transmitted to Digital Graphics and analyzed by Pickett and Lowe.
10 ESSIG:
Ok, now when yoc ;ay..after computer reduction..wnen you say 11!
l transmitted to Dig tal Graphics, is that the name of a company?
i 12{
i 13j BURING:
Yes, I'm not sure what their connection with Pickard and Lowe is, 14, they are the computer center data reduction center.
t 16i ESSIG: Ok, where are they located?
17!
i 18{
BURING:
I'm not sure.
19l I
201 fSSIG:
Ok, but there is, its transmitted by telephone line from the Met 21, Tower to the Digital Graphics.
22l 23 BURING: Digital Graphics.
And, after the output after reduction its analyzed 24; l
and transmitted to us by mail or telecopy from Pickard and Lowe.
The first 25l 894 038 6
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22 thing I did in the meteorological area was, Metropolitan Edison Company has a meteorologist, Dave Carl..
2 3
ESSIG:
Could you spell his name?
5 BURING: CARL, who was in charge of the contract, the administration of the g
contract with Pickard and Lowe, and the meteorological data handling.
8l ESSIG: Is he in your, Mr. Carl, is he in your corporate office?
91 i
10l BURING: He's part of the Radiation Safety and Environmental Engineering
.. a 11 i
Grcup. He also works in the non-radiological air monitoring area.
I instructed 12[
him to make sure that Pickard and Lowe was aware of the incident and that
'f 13\\
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they were monitoring the meteorological conditions and providing us with 14!
/Qs, the weather forecast, if possible.
15; 16i X
MARSH:
Can we define /Q or least spell it out for the typist?
Its a 17l Greek letter.
18!
19!
BURING: Capital X, slash, capital Q, which is dispersion coefficient over 20j l
distance.
21l 22!
l ESSIG: Ok, so the meteorological data then, as I understand it is continuously 231 i
transmitted to.
24j 2sj 874 039 i
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I BURING: Its an hourly frequency that is g
2; ESSIG: Hourly frequency..
31 4l BURING:
5;i Its stored on Mag tape at the meteorological tower and then transmitted hourly.
Si 7
ESSIG: To Digital Graphics..
9I BURING: to Digital Graphics.
101 ESSIG: who processed the data and then in turn it goes to Pickard and Lowe.
12!
I 13l BURING: Right.
141 15i ESSIG: Ok, and as the, this Dave Carl, does he routinely oversee the cali-16i i
bration and maintenance of the Met Tower or does, is that pretty much left 17l i
up to Pickard and Lowe or..
18!
19I BURING: That is a function of Pickard and Lowe in conjunction with the 20j station personnel.
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2l ESSIG: Ok.
23 894 040 24 25!
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BURING: I'm not positive of this, but believe that the station personnel do g
the routine checks and then Pickard and Lowe are brought in on a semiannual y
frequency for complete calibrations.
~l P
4l ESSIG: Ok.
The person that you contacted at Pickard and Lowe or persons, j
was one of them Tom Potter?
of 7!
BURING: Yes, sir.
Tc..) Potter and Keith Woodward of PIckard and Lowe.
9l ESSIG:
10l Ok, and had you asked them to start making, you indicated just a few minutes ago about estimates of /Q and so forth, had you also asked them t.o 11!
start making estimates of offsite doses, did you ask them to get a hold of 12t the release data or?
'3 14t BURING:
Not at that time.
15i 16i ESSIG: Not at that time.
17!
18; BURING: Strictly turned them on as for creating 19!
20!
ESSIG: Just making sure you had )(/Q values?
21l 22 BURING: Right. And the initial weather conditions at that time were pretty 23' stable with minimal wind, very little wind speed and variable direction and 24!
l its kind of difficult.
L 25i 894 U41
i 25 ESSIG: Right.
Did you have any dealings with a Mr. Graber from Electric g
Boat?
2:
31 BURING: Not until I arrived on the site on Saturday noon, or two o'clocx I
_l guess.
6i j
ESSIG: Ok, and what.
I
/
i 81 BURING: and I'm not positive of the time I actually met him.
9!
10i ESSIG: Ok, and what were your relationships with him?
i 12!
BURING: 1 was told after I arrived on site, I'm not positive, that he would 13t j
be my supervisor.
14; 15; ESSIG: Ok, and you were told by whom?
16i 17!
BURING: By him.
18i 191 ESSIG: Oh, by him.
I see.
O k.
Do you know what his first namn is?
20:
t 21l BURING: Bill.
22' l
23l
ESSIG: Bill.
Ok. So then any recommendations that you might have, that you 24l did make then with regard to the the direction of the environmental monitoring 25I l
program were made then, through, by checking with Graber first?
894 042
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BURING: No sir.
I did not consult with him at all on environmental monitors.
2:
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ESSIG: O k.
Even though he told you that as of the time you reported on 3
site you were in effect working fcr him?
Si I
BURIt'G: My function on site was supposed to have been strictly personnel 6i dosimetry after I arrived Saturday afternoon.
i 7!
i 81 ESSIG: I see.
9l, 10 BURING: However, I kept involved to a large extent in the radiological 11; environmental monitoring.
12l I
13 ESSIG:
O k.
141 15 BURING:
But as far as Mr. Graber is concerned it was strictly personnel 16:
dosimetry.
17:
181 ESSIG: O k.
I think that we probably have covered most of the, in fact all 19i of the areas that I had some notes made for myself here, and I think we've 20t i
pretty covered everything that I wanted to cover with you.
How much, do 21!
you know how much longer you're going to continue to be onsite, now that, 22 you're here as a consultant now, so?
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f
27
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i BURING: Not as a consultant, as a loan.
1l i
2; ESSIG:
As a lean? O k.
31 l
4j BURIN 0:
From Pennsylvania Power'and Light.
Sl I
61 ESSIG:
Ok.
7) 8l BURING: At the request of Metropolitan Edison Company.
9) 10t ESSIG: Will you be around?
11!
12.
BURING:
I will be here... currently planned till the 15th of May, and 13 t
perhaps on a part-time basis after that.
14' r
15j ESSIG: Ok, one of the reasons for asking that was since you indicated that 1Si you had been involved to some extent in the solid radwaste aspects, there 171 i
may be one of the, one of the other individuals on the, our investigation 18j
'eam, that might wish to ask you a few questions along that line. And so, I t
194 don't really know, I didn't realize that you had been involved in the 20t j
radwaste, otherwise I might have, had I known that, I might have just asked 21) him if he had any questions for you and I was just going ahead and ask them
'I
'2l on his behalf, but I guess we'll just have to leave that one open for the 23!
moment and I'll just mention this to him, and see if there is something 24 l
we'll maybe just contact you again or if in my further review of what went 251 i
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28 on during the first three days if there's some other questions that come up as a result of either what you've told me here or some question I might I
have on the existing or the program that was in effect at the time.
I 31 haven't had the f~oresight to ask you here may have to get back together l
again.
I think that's about all I have for Mr. Buring.
51 61 MARSH:
Ok. Thank you.
Mike, before we wrap up, this is Marsh speaking again. As well as us asking you questions, before we finish up with the tape, if you got anything that you wanted to talk about or anything that 91 you want to discuss feel free to bring it out, make a matter of record, got 10j any feelings that we haven't given you an opportunity to express, feel free 11l to have your say.
12I 13 BURING:
I would like o state I felt that the radiological and environmental 14!
monitoring program that we had set up in operating, in my opinion turned 15(
out to be a very effective accident monitoring program, also.
The locations 16; of the air samples, milk samples, water samples, TLDs, thermoluminescent 17!
dosimeters for integrated exoosures, I think the locations were well chosen.
lSi I think the results we have gotten from our consultants were both timely 19!
and accurate in 99% of the cases.
I'm think I'm impressed with the monitoring 20' l
that we accomplished and the results that we got and the speed of the 2' 'I",
analysis.
I think that we have a very good picture of what was discharged 22lI from the station and arrived in the environment and what the offsite effect 23!
I was, I guess is what I'm trying to say.
24l 25; 894 045 l
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MARSH:
Monday morning quarterbacking is always fine, but looking back from this point now if you were able to make changes before this thing had g
occurred what improvements would you put in? What benefits have we derived 4{
from this as far as being able to improve our position for the future?
Si i
BURING: That's what I was trying to address in my initial statement, but I k
think we did a pretty good job in planning and preparation.
7!
a MARSH: Is there any, still r/en withoutstanding is there any additional lessons that you did pick up as we went along? Are there additional improve-i 10' ments that could be made that you fnund as a result of it?
If any come to mind.
6 131 BURING: I'm still considering that question and have been for the past 14!
i month.
I don't have any that I could make right now.
15i 16; MARSH: Ok. Fine.
17l 181 ESSIG: Mike, there is one area which I would like to explore just a 17ttle 19!
bit. Thought occurred to me is as we're going along here with your last 20:
question with regard to the offsite surveys that were made by others following the event, were you, when you were asked to get a hold of consultants, you 22l l
were not asked you just took it upon yourself to get ahold of consultants 23j on the 28th, were those contacts limited to consultants that you routinely 2 41' employ or had, were you involved with a a contact at DOE for radiological 25l assistance that type of thing?
894 046 i
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BURING: No, I did not contact any other federal agencies or state agencies.
l!
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ESSIG: Ok, so these were just consultants that you.
4[
[
BURING: These were consultants that I normally did business with or that I ol I
knew were available or had available things that we might need, for instance, 61 I contacted Science Applications, Incorporated for their mobile laboratory.
i 7i I
Let's see, somebody else.
aj 9j ESSIG: You indicated you contacted RMC for their laboratory.
When you 10f contacted Eberline you indicated earlier that you had asked them currently 11, if they had as I recall, you had said you were inquiring if they had additional 12 instruments that.
131 14!
BURING: Strictly in plant survey instruments.
15, 16; ESSIG: Ok. In plant survey instruments.
17 18t ESSIG: Did you make a request at that time for to have them send some out 191 or.
20:
1 I
21 !
BURING:..of the Teletector type 22!
i 23l i
BURING: I asked Eberline to send me all the instruments they had.
24l 2si 894 047
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31 ESSIG:
All of the instruments they had?
11 i
2!
BURING:Yes.
2!
4!
i ESSIG: Did you have any idea how much you were ordering?
Si 6i BURING: Yes.
7 SI ESSIG: How many?
91 101 BURING: Well, they were in the 10 to 20 range of each type of instrument.
i 12!
j ESSIG: I see.
131
+
14i BURING: available.
15j 16i ESSIG: I see.
17 18l BURING: I knew approximetely how much money and much instruments.
19j 20!
ESSIG: O k.
21{
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22l i4ARSH: May I ask when this was done? This is Marsh speaking.
23l 24 894 IJ 48 25!
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BURING: I'm sorry I can't answer that.
2' i
MARSH: I mean first day, second day, do you have any feel for it at all?
3 4'
BURING:I believe it was into the late part of the first day or early second 5
day.
61 1
7 ESSIG: What kind of, when you were talking with Eberline, and I think you indicated earlier, that one of the reasons for contacting was not only to 9!
get the,... to order some instruments from them, but also to have them give 10t you any advice with regard to limitations of the,..on the use of instruments 11; used during the offsite surveys.
12 I
13l BURING:Not true.
You said that, I didn't it.
14!
I 15i ESSIG: Ok.
I was reading something into what you said then.
Your contact 16i with Eberline was strictly to order more instruments and not to ask tnem 17; I
about what special precautions or limitations ought to be put into effect 18i for measuring those 81 Kev gamma.
19I 20r l
BURING: The only specifications I made was that when the instruments were 21l shipped to us that they had certifications with them of calibration.
t 22l l
23l ESSIG: Ok.
24j 8 ') 4
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25 l
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7l BURING: Because I assumed that our onsite personnel would not have time to 2
perf rm complete the calibration and that Eberline Instrument people had the people and the time to do it.
3 4j ESSIG: O k.
5 Well, I think once again thats, I think includes all the questions I had for you, Mike, and I appreciate time you've taken to come over and 6,!
help us out with the investigation and certainly consider your input as I
valuable.
8l 9l BURING:
Thank you, sir.
10' h
MARSH: Time is now 6:14 p.m. and we are going to terminate the tape at this 12',
I time and Mike I'll indicate if you have a minute or two I'll take this 13) cassette out, duplicate it, give you a copy right at this time.
14!
e 15; BURING: Thank you.
16i 17!
ftARSH:
Alright. Time is 6:14. Reading is 820 on the meter tape recorder, 10 and I am terminating at this time.
19!
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