ML19308B672

Forwards Revisions & Grammatical Corrections to 790919 Transcript

ML19308B672
Person / Time
Site:	Crane
Issue date:	10/10/1979
From:	Wilburn R PENNSYLVANIA, COMMONWEALTH OF
To:	Ernst M NRC - NRC THREE MILE ISLAND TASK FORCE
References
TASK-TF, TASK-TMR NUDOCS 8001160633
Download: ML19308B672 (37)

Text

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Date ROUTING AND TRANSMITTAL SUP TO: (Name. omce symbot, room number, initials Date building, Agency / Post) 1.

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3.

4.

5.

Mion File INote and Retum Approval For Clearance Per Conversation As Requested For Correction Prepare Reply

[ Circulate for Your Information See Me

_ _ _ bomment l investigate Signature ICoordination l Justify RDAARKS

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DO NOT use this form as a RECORD of approvals, concurrences, disposals, clearances, and similar actions FROM: (Name, org. symbol, Agency / Post)

Room No.-Bidg.

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A n-102 OPTIONAL FORM 41 (Rev. 7-76)

Prescribed by GSA N L.s G o 1979-0-761-647 3354 FPMR (41 CFh) 203-11.206 t

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.y COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA GOVERNOR S OFFICE H ARRISBURG RC B c A? C wlLE LRt.

scenctaar er eucort 4No acmNisraatios October 10, 1979 Mr. Malcolm L.

Ernst NRC/TMI Special Inquiry Group Nuclear Regulatory Commission Washington, D.C.

20555

Dear Mr. Ernst:

Thank you for giving me an opportunity to review the transcript taken on September 19, 1979.

As you will note, I have made some mi~.or revisions and grammatical corrections in the text.

Sinegrely, e IL CbJ Ro dft C. Wilburn

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1 drafted by the countics.

In addition A., at that point

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l the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency was in 7wA.

2 in time, i$~

i the process of developing a 20-mile plan -- both a 10 and 20-kf 3

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mile plan.

So, they were all in h process as of that

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' morning.

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What deficiencies did you find in the original five-Q

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l 7 I mile plans?

a The original five-mile plans by county differed l

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g knile the t

greatly in the level of specificity.

By. th _ b m.c,

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wert, I think that the 10 ', written plans did not nfi m -a completenese, l

Tu weve actual plans that people were dealing wj.M.d.- had come jj

_ the prior three days.

a 1 ng way# cacr t 1;;t

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i My role was one of doing, I suppose, what the y

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Q d;.:n and ask questions I Governor would do he+ hegthe time to 90 9

answers and-m W to get a degree of con 6 an ge M

15 v/c_ wakd W' = comfortable

• d d i with the plans.

dence in the plans,---

g lI I tried to cross-examine the plans and poke holes in them to p

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w w tkt 4a address all the questions.

i they voresE-y -.3 l

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l I asked questions like, "Well, who is going to drive j

39 In some cases, the

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the school buses now that we have them?"

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answers were not as good as I would have liked,te i_ m th: ght 21 e

of course, as soon as the question was p

% w uki-bg.

But, 22

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Weer it w checked and double checked in gcia; at te

' raised, i,

23 Anh=c ho, respenee--would he

• bet 4ar

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the counties.

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thair-ethc. s.

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1 The questions -- I tried to question each aspect of i

2 the plan concerning -- questions like, "Who would drive the 3 l school buses?

Are there any difficulties in the transit routes?

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4 Are they sure that thc;, uuw u_"

th:t they don't have t'

h, i N y

5j any count y being evacuated in one direction and another p,.

6 county going in the other direction?" t thid $6gical ques-f j

to W g

7 i tions

~~ %.3 au.c-- that they were looking at the forest and lnotjustthetrees.

r 8

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My initial reaction J ' "

ernin d = - Saturday u

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l morning was that the plans were reasonably good, that there 10 v

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l were a lot of answers that people in the Emergency Management L

i jj l, Agency did not have,sme I had some concerns about the traffic 12 4

fflowsandgissues,li._

.h 5 13 l

Subsequently, during the day I continually called 14 various people to try to.mmt crosschecksmen what was being

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done.

I had discussions with General Scott who is the g

16 6

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l Adjutant General of the Pennsylvania National Guard,4s g

@no~ 1 i x W e cf-A Sa w...l - zd; discussions with l

jg i Dan Dunn, who is the Commissioner of the State Police; dis-19

! cussions with Gordon MacLeod, who is the Health Secretary,in 20

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I attemptinsf to $F crosscheckJM evacuation plans to make sure 21

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that they were comfortable with their functional areas and 22

%g4W ; handled in the plans.

g 23 i

l I f und in that process that the questions that f'

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, p m was n t able e answer ops being addressed very carefully

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wowc= svi~oca..mc si...ca i.o o6e wa6.o.e w,ou.s sisc..

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by cach of these cabinet secretaries, ztst d felt

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l evening much more comfortable,than I cid in the

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This is on Saturday?

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A On Saturday.

And by Saturday night, I felt reason-k 4

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,p-5 ! ably comfortable that we could conduct certainly a five-mile Mj,.

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l evacuation, and M a 10-mile evacuation with a reasonable 6

7 degree of success and minimal amount of loss as far as injuries, 8

property damages, personal damage of all kinds, i.

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-y" ? ~..rst was a gradual process through the day of asking f9(

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10 questions and making sure that at least somebody was in W

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,ps charge of that particular area and that we were not going to JET 33 k.

run afoul.

' M j2 ppy Jerm specific example would be ws:n-the f[r[{

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Transportation Department,in-th; fact @a'*^

"'" nsportation kl j

y i-Am g.

gthsRar.,

ile many f the questions could not be answered g

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' by P MA in the morning, as the day progressed, I found outfithe 16 Transportation Department was running simulated models of

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traffic flows l that they knew what the traffic would likely 18 u

e beinalldirectionsl[thattheyhadactuallystationedbarriars

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i 20. and roadblocks & maintenance sheds 2nf c cught th=. % from lk surrounding areas to make sure that they would have the i

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21 1

equipment available.

They had placed the maintenance people 22 V

n standby sett so that they could be called.im.to rearrange gg, 23 Jj 24 barriers if massive trafficAchanges were required.

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wovem s e r ~ e c.=a e.e s r =v.c c msete=% aoao.vo.ssiso.., sio

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I found the same kinds of rosponse with the National 2

Guard' the same kind of response with the state police.

i 3 l As the day went along, I was giving more positive responses I

4 i to the Governor.

I also gave an evaluation of our evacuation l

M 5

plans to h m.1 Eidenberg at the White House and also to i

6 lJackWatsonwhoisMr.Eidenberg'sboss.

All of this was done, i

q 7 l unfortunately, orally.

We weren' t thinking of rei+ece reports at that particular point in time.

And other than the plans s

9 j that we were working on, there is very little documentation ;

il h E --

10 11 0

So, you went from agency to agency then, or did the lagenciescommunicatewitheachother?

Like the State Police 12 13 and the National Guard, did they talk to each othcr?

ow A

Yes, we have what is called a PDIA Council s which ja i

e allthekffectedcabinetmemberssit.

There h a meeting of 15 I

i 16 i that group that I attended the previous day on Friday at --

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N I believe it was 1:30 cr 2:00 o' clock in the afternoon.

17 q

Although I am not a member of that council, the Governor asked 18 me to go as his personal representative to that council.

39 The role that I played from Saturday and subsequently 20 4p Q Q h &,f e =

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through this incident -- -I u n the pieces [were falling in 21 e f'11 4" plare:

The protocol place,ar they "cre ruppoeM g

i was being followed.

There was coordination among the depart-23 ments.

But the Governor, recogni::ing his

"A cf unique 24 1

48 M r sp nsibility ~.

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that everything comes together 25 wo

.c. st r ~oc...e.

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lasitissupposedtocometogether,didnotwanttoleaveany-

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thing to chance,awd asked that I go in and A r cf make sure i

e l that all these pieces were coming together in the ways they 3

Iweresupposedtobecomingtogether.

And t was a lly a 4

n 5

double checking of everything.

F 6

We were v.ery careful that in no way would we inter-hb 7, fere with thepEmergency Management Agency and very careful to i

so 8

be as invisible as possible ae-see-as not to in any way weaken j

9 l the authority of the director of the Pennsylvania Emergency I

I 10 i Management Agency or.4'^"lr.=r the counties ewJ w be-z i

11

!JS -.tnu+si4rle.# sche uwmiy ste scur e itrhn I think we t

I MW Iwere successful.

I don't think they really knew that was i

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Q Do you happen to know the responsibilities that were I

w-15 delegated from the Council to the PEMA director?

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A The responsibilities that were delegated?

l 0

I think the state law, if you don't know it -- we U

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fwill--butIthinkthestatelawtalksaboutresponsibilities 18 i

19 of PEMA, which is the Council, and then also it says the 20 Council shall delegate whatever authority -- not the delegation 21

of responsibility but the delegatio.n of authority as appro-i.

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22 i priate to the director.

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l Q

I really can't answer those questions.

I didn't de li 1 23 24jamanagementreview.

I was just there trying to say, "Are we 23 missing anything?

Are there big holes in this plan?"

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And frankly, as far as the Pennsylvania system is i

2 concerned, I had very little involvement before that point and i

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probably voetd have littic involvement afterwards unless --

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O Pine.

You mentioned PEMA could not answer some 1

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5, questions.

Do you have a specific on -- of the kinds of ques-1 tions that you found most difficult to work out or find

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f' 7 f answers to?

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Most of them were traffic related questions, traffic j

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lflowquestions.

I mentioned the one about the bus drivers, l

9 and it was one simply that the answer was in the counties.

It 10 t

, wasn't that the answer wasn't available.

They just didn't 11 t

12 l have it centrally.

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W At that time there was--- Iguf concerns that was-13 i besstej overlaid on the wn@e plans because of the uncertainty 14 i

N l about the radius of evacuatione 2xt-that was causing great

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concern LetHEak on everybody's part about whether we were 16 f

going to be asked to do a five or 10-mile evacuation. Jedr kt

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iW l tbst h ae there was even speculation about a 20-mile evacuation, t

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WM l which was heightened thatsiity by WashingtonA that there could 39 s

be a 20-mile evacuation.

Yru krau, 's spent a considerable 20 1 amount of time asking questions about the interaction of a i

i 21 1

five, 10 and 20-mile evacuation.

If we had a five-mile 22 i

evacuation, could we then go to a 20-mile evacuation, or will 23 ili we have evacuated everybody from the five miles into a 10-mile 24 t

l 25 ;{ radius?

Those kinds of sequential questions.

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l wo er s,s eca...c stav;:c i.n om =:u acae wro-rss. o na insic r

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1 l I don't know if they had been addressed i--, 2 ~_ o r

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l had been raised before or if that was the initiation of t= tr G

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3 Obeing addressed.

It is difficult for me to cssess.

But h

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4 certainly, during the day we became very attuned to these g

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Q Is it fair to characterire then that the existing 7F 7, emergency plans were rather general in nature, did not have

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l too many specifics as to people and exact routes and --

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Yes.

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-- and detailed responsibilities, and this was the

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Yes.

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PEMA didn't have those details either, and you had y&J 13 t

ing 14 to --

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I think it is important to keep in mind that there

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l were two sets of emergency plans.

There if the c c-

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{ developed by the Radiation Bureau and the Department of

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' Environmental Resources, which 14> a protocol for calling jg evacuation.

PEMA has the execution phase, if you will, of g

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that evacuation.

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The degree of specificity, I think, was fairly good j.

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in terms of the Department of Environmental Resources' k-.as 22 23

1. response to levels of radiation and so forth, w

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'The counties are charged with -- the principal N

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3 responsibility in evacuations, as I understand it, and PEMA b

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QS.l u c %ic e s? t soem s.wic'st a v.et 543 3 ose w.6L moac e v ow e s s ia.s

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13 servesasthecoordinatoroveral1} agencies.

The level of 1

2 detail varied considerably by county, and u 4*

to a large LZ 3

extent it depended upon the individuals that were in those if i

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! counties.

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Jend I would hasten to add that I don't think that Eb i

those plans. % y -- the written plans {~re reflective of the

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lcapabilitiesoftheindividualsandwhatcanbedoneina y

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l b Icrisis.

L this L you looked at the plans or if you looked E

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.tt the counties, you might find little c h g in that

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But nevertheless, I think it is fair to say that

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. certain counties are very vague in exactly how they would h

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I evacuate and in what direction and --

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Q Did you talk to the coordinators of each of the 1

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i-ja counties in this review process, or did you have big meetings, A

r how --

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N what was done with the counties was really done g;g 16 l

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through the National Guard.

I requested that the National W

17 EI 18 Guard be sure that they had at least one representative in

' Mp 19 each county that would at 1cnct serve as + u r-e? an independent f

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d %'n inde-k' G

l check a.a&-t: hat-would report back to General Scott a

20 21 Pendent assessment of how well the county i

22 gwasbeingdoneinamannernot to interfere or in any way i

l question the authority of the ti..i of people who have the E

p IW p<msd h 2 p *'ih^;ity'to evacuate.

And we relied on that information flow; g,

3 and that s' s through General Scott to me as M an indep'endent E-d k

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1 i crosscheck on th ir plans.

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Those reports were coming in late Saturday and l

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i through -- well," through the remainder of the incident and b

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4

' were generally very positive as far as thei2 capability c4-whn 1

%t tM-l$.

S vorh=wae-be.i W e.

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0 You mentioned the 10-mile and 20-mile plans.

6 y

7 A

Yes, gy 8

0 Did you review this as time went on and these plans 9

were developed, or did you stay in this review process for pf m

V' 10 the next several days and get familiar with the 10 and 20-mile

>41 11 Plans?

4 j-A Yes, in fact on Saturdcy we were reviewing the five, 12 m

10 and 20-mile plans all day long.

It wasn't just focusing

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$'e on the five and 10.

We were looking at the 10 and 20-mile j

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• I would say, culminating gf.

g ll plans through Saturday and Sunday, W tL,1 %,

5-cm l ay Sunday afternoonr3we reached the conclusion that there was g{

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du little use in planning for a 20-mile evacuation because we 37 f

' were unable to determine scenarios under which a 20-mile 18 x

n i evacuation would be required.

c' 19 i

l We then focused all of our attention on the five b

20 21

! and 10-mile plans and dismissed the 20-mile plan.

I shouldn't h

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22 l use the term dismissed because what we found in this process y

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23 l was that it made no sense to talk about a five and 10-mile 6

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24

! plan without recognizing the consequences beyond -that radius.

W Ue becian to focus on what we called a 10-mile clan with 20-mile

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$W SN wo% ca svrscenseme scaviec 5.it oso we moao avow tsisc., ma, e, c.

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consequences.

2 I think I could explain that very easily.

One of p

3 the problems that we were hm.; concerngabout ----ma fing w..-

t 4

1._co m to 14er4.trin w.

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-- was checking on the institutions I

5 in the area to make sure they were continually being ffed.

6 There were a lot of rumors--- the rumors were incredible about f

7

'. institutions being without staff and getting calls from i

8 i various responsible people saying that we had to close certain l

e 9 l hospitals because there was no stafff\\t4+eee.

One example --

1 i

Wm 10 l and I do not remember the name of the hospital -- M they ~

i@" ^ck M

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2r only a third of the staff had showed up --

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{wd v.of WA i

professional staff sk :f r,~ to take care of the patients, A

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' a J e had to close the hospital.

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After doing an investigation of J

, we found that litwastrue, tis F M w p --

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that " ; :2r down by two-thirds w far as.nc 15 l

n, 16 l st2ff 'm e m u d, but they also had released patients so

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7 l that a third of the patients wTM -h. -and

't was notan I

is ! imminent problem but one that h.

') be watM d monitored I

19 l Very closely.

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20 Q

How did the chicken and egg work on this?

Did they i

21 reduce staff because the patients were reduced because they 22 were going elsewhere, or did they have to release the patients 23 lbecausethestaffwasnotavailable?

i 2.:

i A

No, this was a decision made early e to reduce dewa CQh ftoonlythosepatientsthatcouldnotbereleased.

And I 25 i

M OhiC m $7(%QCRapwig g g n yeC g 1413 CLC W%L WOa0 vs *OMi s si%c ea testo

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think that was a very wise decision because that meant if you l

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2 ' had an evacuation, it would proceed more smoothly.

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i ehtnitu 2 problems.r I can't respond to e; thc; I

4 occurred.

You can speculate as well as I.

Me hat I em 4 defr d-I i

5 ; started to talk about, tha:s radius and the consequences m...e p

Q ww.

O f

6 ' the 20 miles,e the nospitals happermd Lv 1;e located oL, I

• h between 10 and 20 miles ausd h were having problems e

NMbk i

l 8, prior y an evacuation in that 10 to 15-mile area.

We were f

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9 convinced /ifweordereda10-mileevacuationwewouldalso 10,have to evacuate those hospitals, even though they were 11

, technically outside that 10-mile radius.

l~

i 12 So, we began to talk about a new concept, a radius 4

j of evacuation with consequences going out considerably further 13 i

14 than that radius.

And I think that is something that is going i

f 15 j to be very important for future planning, n-th^ m evenes.

One!

n mw.

w 16 lesson iE-4.idd that was learned is that it is important to pM

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17.; establish diffcrent satkuses and dee4 change them during the

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18 l process.

And it is-c *M, a very inexacg science, *nti-M T

I eM#'D yM W is hard to argue theAdiffereneg between a 10 and 15-mile j9 And b would be better to stick with a 10-mile radius 20 radius.

21

-- or whatever the radius is that the c xperts decide 4e-f l

F 22 appropriate.

23 M

• ba cacciad thing is, ce,that radius is deter-

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0$ W 6Q mined, you had better prepare forAthe per.imeter.

Jind If you 24 u

25 g have major installations on the perimeter, you had better be k

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prepared to evacuate those.

2 Q

You mentioned criteria or scenarios of consequences.

3 A

Yes.

4 O

Where did you get these scenarios or types of i

e 6

5 l consequences?

What was your source of information?

l 6

i Well, a principal source of information Was Mr.

A 7 facr R e Harold Denton.

We met with him at least once a day i

l 6AA i

8 l and talked with him on the phone periodically an-in w ho days.

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9 i We relied on him to give us those scenarios.

10 We also had input from &.= n=cd Doctor Wald, who I

11 is, as I understand, a leading expert in nuclear medicine.

i M

And he worked with us on what thegeffects_ond.= ; t ing:

12 are c

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13 l--bew--whatthoseradi9= ear radii oen be.

ja

@4 ten on-stmth*-+ "t -- M Sunday we had 15 determined, largely through input from Mr. Denton and Doctor M

Wald, that the 10-mile radius was the worst possible case that 16 I

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I 17 we could logically plan for.

And it was confirmed Sunday I

i l

l evening in a meetinJ with h Doctor Hendrie' M M 33 came and met I

f Asti. Nis conclusion was-IC -

'with the Governor t4=>

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20 ad =mi-b 10-mile radius of evacuation.

% h,e did talk lI 21 - about, again, consequences beyond a 10-mile radius, but he I

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was talking aboutjm ? g 4 a warning to stay indoors or some-23 thing to that effect.

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'Be4 ere was no scenario that he presented or dis-H

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cussed at that meeting which would have e The worst case i

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i uo% c= s?t%ocea emc'st avict sets ose ust soac wrou ss.wo ya vesio 4

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1 plan called for a 10-mile evacuation.

2 So, we were very pleased that at least we were 2 ' coming together on what the appropriate ' rad-iusesN radaii t

a were :or consideration.

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'You mentioned a good deal of coordination with the 6

Ilational Guard.

i 7

A Yes.

O A couple of things.

11 umber one, in the meeting that 8

we had in Harrisburg,a few months ago with General Carroll, 9

l 10 I believe his name was, he indicated some concern I think on i

1 his part as to whether guardsmen would easily go into areas jj l of high radiation because of the lack of equipment to monitor 12 33 ' radiation.

(

ja I also understand that sometime back there was i

15 l another review of General Scott, I think, where there was some h

i statement that guardsmen will never go into areas of dangerous di 16 E :-

y 17 radiation.

18 Do you have any observations on whether or not the L

l 39 ! Guard -- what kind of consequences might be -- exist and would

, still have a Guard that would be willing to go in and perform l

20 21 cmergency services?

Is that a problem?

l 22.

A I really have no way of answering that.

W' t I

23

"'ke

I can make a few comments about my feelings with the MM do i

24 total population Onet we were dealing w.i.2, and b the extent 25 that spills over in the liational Guard.

When people make k'n

'i uovc= st r a.co.a.mc stnvie r i4 n c6o u 6. noac *

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t t

I 1 q flippant comparisons between something like this occurring and1

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' floods and other kinds of national disasters,

<I= text:r. they f.

3 really do not understand the degree of fear that existed in I!, the general population and how that had to impact.on everything 4

5 ! that we did, everything from whether or not deciding to close 7s 6

. additional schools or to open additional schools.

Thc-t ica L

! N4_

7 i wanhe *. in no way to communicate that anything was not correct

!Wt 8

-as-far--as whether cz si the degree of crisis had heightenedf i

9 l osfstayed the same or lessened.

And we tried to make sure i

ed 10 i that all of our act4 ons wete portraymee; the fsa 2-

_ =at i aM A

11 ! WasM level ofperisis at that particular point in time.

/1 12 It is difficult to pinpoint specific things that M

13 occurred that gave one thess sense that the people were in such e

14 a state of emotional frenzy. but re were little things I

that happened throughout that kept reminding you.

15 I

..m 16 There was a news story that came out on Saturday S

F As--

.-M V

t 17

, night aseet the bubble might explode # it was flashed across I

sm.

[

1B ! tsar TV/) Jusf.It uas only a matter of minutes thw we were t

l

\\

4 l

19 getting reports of some traffic jams on a Saturday night in g

I 20 yen *swey, a portion of the greater metropolitan area.

And you l

A 21 had those kinds of indications from time to time that people 22 really were frightened,u w m --

l

~Tk 23 i So r Ym'?'nw km -that spills amar into the National r

MNN 24 r Guard, L think -- Ly$has to be a concern i sause these people i

25 are human beings.

But whether or not they would perform their; I,

g i

+

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nae v c e t*t%ocesome st av et 1453 c6t w% aca; w w one ; u % c es insio i

b-o t

Y a

---

_._-m._,

T -. m; n,m

u 20 1

1 mission, I hava no way of answcring that.

2 O

Your comments are enlightening.

Thank you.

3 This may be related to the first question, but maybe 4

not.

On August 31st, Governor Thornburg testified before the 5

President's Commission that he had requested you to monitor l.

j 6

the performance of PEMA.

Is this a separate action from the t

l review of plans or an additional responsibility?

7

=

i i

8 A

No, this was referring to the review of the plans,-~~

I t

9 youyncy, how they were being carried out at that particular i

3 10 point in time.

11 O

I see.

I 12 A

It was not a long-term charge.

L i

13 0

You did mention one council meeting,I believe you i

l t

ja

said --

l 1

I i

15 A

Yes.

..3 W

16 0

-- on Friday afternoon.

4:h -

7,. 7 17l A

That's right.

[

l O

Was that the first council meeting, or can you is i

1 ldescribetometheactivitiesoractionsoftheCouncilitself 19 i

f I

l 1

20 during this time period.

A 21 l

A Okay.

Tha-only_

pil that I am aware of is the i

22 l meeting that I attended.

I do not know if there had been a i

23 ouncil meetin. prior +^ -

=ime, It was clear at that I.

24 meeting there had, at least, been prior discussions among 23 [" individual members.

h. ether they had met as a group, I am nc:

n

!,I

.o~.c.

se r oca..- e e r av.c a.. 3 oto-u.o.e

..o-....sc

...io

-p.s

5 r

21 i

I

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..awara l

e o

l At that meering, it s.as principally gcing through each department and discussing what their particular responses l W-U w 7 ;-d planned to be fw%tfie incident.

l had been and were 4

t 5

It was very clear at that meeting that this was not h

f 6

the first informrtional meeting.

I don't know if they had f

i

}

met as a group or if they had been contacted individually.

7 e

i h

6 But they were at that meeting prepared to respond to what was t

i l being done in each department. and Sheryone seemed to be; =r 9

i i

10 W M MF7 reasonably well aware of the consequences cE their r

cdl ldepartmentandwhathadhappened.

ij i

I j

12 i

0 Were there any subsequent meetings to your knowledge i

13 of the Council?

I l

i 14 A

Not that I am aware of.

I a

.~

l Q

You say there is no written report.

And you men-hf v

15 b-l' tioned some actions you were taking.

Did you have any overall at 16 17 recommendations to the Governor or anyone else regarding prep-1 I

i 18 : aration for emergency as a result of your work?

t.

l 19 !

A Yes, we did come up with recommendations for t

l i

t 20 ; executive orders that would have to be promulgated in the I

t' 21 event that an evacuation occurred.

Some of these are quite 22j minor but were details to be covered.

23 These included such things as taking over the turn-t W

Y

~

tNU 24 pike, for example. j$1norg thqny to make sure that no one triec j

d W A TM 25 [ to collect tollsf Taking over the gas stations to make sure i

n l i

won'Cm Si t % D a n a

• m t 's t a v 'C f 1413 OLD M iL moae wvow.fte%c Pa tesic c

b p4 T

• N '

+

lthatyAWeassumedthatwewouldhavetohavetheNational 1

) Guard actually operate many of the gas stations and be pre-2 s

to i

! pared to make sure that the National Guard had equipment 2

i I

i 4 ! cut off locks d the pumps _aI=a A d w i and actually get the h b bda s

cars moving b;;;u;e b would be the principal means of 5

6 i evacuation.

I We had coordinated with the oil companies to-awsm 7

I r-6 l sure that they were moving in extra reserves.

TE u;

ang 9

g e m :.d r u p ?

There was at least an energy shortage at I

r

! that time, if you remember.

We were moving -ser tanker trucks' d I

10 i

! t%. W a_

11 at this par %r-poinhiw time.

I had t h series of I

l i executive orders that would have to be promulgated simultan-12 13 eously with a declaration of emergency.

We communicated those i

la to the Attorney General.

I assume that they were drafted.

I g

i L

never saw them.

But I assume that they were drafted in 15 i

16 preparation for evacuation, g

g.

17 Q

Did you determine the consequences of an evacuation

, from a liability standpoint or maybe a health and safety stand-i is l

19 Point might be a significant problem or --

l A

I never heard anyone address really the liability 20 l t

The health and safety were paramount I think to 21 ! concerns.

1 c

t 1

22 everything that we did.

u j

23 The great concern about an evacuation as far as i

health and safety is the --if-you7hink about -it -for-a_ moment _

2: i ttt w

t) -the-hospitris vefic down to a drrrd -- the populationgwas MM

f k

t

. ~.... _..-... _,.,, m. ~......... ~..

...e V

g ' _ ___

___ _ L_.. ; r_ q.

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i.,

r

w u^>

M &

C^' %,

C;a M%%M{ 3Q i ocw j to simost a-third-to what-they-had-been imd,kheonlypatients l

}

C

.- ! that were lef t were the ones that it would be dif ficult f or bW 7

them to go home on their own.

You have a large number of I people on life-support systems.

You have people that have t

w 3e undergone surgery recently and some in intensive care.

([r f

n; i

You have children, he babies in incubators.

These 6

C T.y are things that I never thought of before, the potential loss E

7

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of life in ordering an evacuation that isn't necessary.

7:

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i, y

I Md i;1 ou can't contain the evacuation when we p

O 9

l

. ggW lwere convincedf-- It is one thing to -- if wc h il tese

]i 10 4

ord^*^#

'i e e N W -- 2 r _" Governor would have order-4 g

R i

ed a five or 10-mile evacuation at sc--'

r^i"*, -thet would have g;

12 I

I immediately heightened tLas.-concernL We already had people i

3 leaving within considerable distances because of this fear of k

L l the unknown.

p

3 Thert-a.s just dif ficult to anticipath nat would have s

16 kw

p

happened in the hospitals V( Could we have kept th< a?

Would we ip 17 I

y have been forced to continue the evacuation out some distance?

)g i! Would we have lost lives in moving these people?

Those are 39

&WW-And we discussed them eemsiStr m 20 ; great concerns.

o 1

We tried to maxe sure 2.f an evacuation became 3

21 e

I 1

22, necessary that we would have the ambulances available, the 23 litters e were working very closely with Mr. Adamcik to i

I 24 j get federal assistance.

25 d Q

Would it have required a substantial federal response bONaC m 51t NC oma p.eec st ewiC E 9 413 O L D an g L neat wron asseNo pa tesio l

Law i

^ ^ ^

0,,,

24 t

from a resource standpoint to evacuate 10 miles or more?

I 2

I, The 10-mile evacuation, if I remember correctly, did not require a substantial amount of resources in the near term.

3 :

b

! In the long term, of course,.is thes people would be at the

{

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. evacuation centers, the more difficulty wejhave.

l 5l k

i The biggest requirement was for ambulances, and those 6 :

l i

7. were being moved into position, as I understand it, by the l

i i

I

'I federal government.

8 I

A 20-mile radius, of course, would have required a I

9

~

l W

t-lconsiderableameentofblanketsandbedsandsoforthpbeyond 10 J

! what we could get from the American Red Cross and other P l

i l

11 W

l q~he Red Crosd was abke to supply most of the agencies.

Beer t 12 i

equipment that was required, with the exception of the 13

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i

! ambulances.

14 I assume you were at most if not all of the press 13 O

lconferencesandmajormeetingsandsoforthheld.bythe e,

16 e

! Governor, at least from Friday on if not before?

I.

t 17 i

i Prior to Friday I had intentionally stayed A

Right.

18 away from the Governor's office.

I thought at that point 19 there were enough resources involved.

N.iak e magni-20

&Wo l

tude of the crisis cm al;' ese,alated between Wednesday and I

i A 1k<w % J 21 I am relatively anaware of what happened Priday morning A S.sq I

22 e

{otherthanwhatIreadonWednesdayandThursday.

23 l

(

From Friday morning hrough the following Wednesday l

a y 6 tiu hb$

t, or ThursdayA}I was, with a few notable exceptions, present at F

i 23 li i,.ie wes e. stre.oc...e sr...cc

..is eso

.u no.o

.,o....,~a 4

.)

7 c,r.w 79

hi-;n giv i

l! those m stings.

rr*e 1

At these meetings, was Colonel Henderson or his f

O N

for most of them?

p 3 b representative present

,rdi Most of the meetings, he was present.

k:

j.i a'

A r

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3; O

He was present?

dy 951 2

% ?.c A

SCS-gs; 6

PT[E the Governor decided at some time early O

Apparently, 7

I guess, to rely primarily on his press conferences to WN 3

on, And there was some na i disseminate information to the public.

wr;t

+

9 I

Q l concern, apparently, at the county level and even at PDIA, NX 4

p}

i jo g.

apparently, that they were getting information late or after

,y l

33 m

l W.

> the press and public,

,.e p'

W We were wondering why there was not maybe a simul-ypr 3

WU l taneous information release to the counties or PDIA or other 9

l m

) ~.

q-state agencies at or about the same time as the press con-w-

M 15 I

un

9. a,.i; j

lferences, WM

-u 16 L, W; If you look at press conferences for what M A

17 i

f i they were wee a public statement of exactly what the p^rit on-j ut E'

jg

-nad _,1f you look at the time lapse

{

19 ' was at that point,in time.

ob to n

, between the caum...eut-ef the information and the statement s

3 F-the press, you will find in almost every case it was a matter

.s i,-

7; 9

s.-

I of minutes.

.2 L

6d One thing that impressed me throughout this wneie i

23]

P series of' meetings was the fact that virtually everything was n

?.:

released to the preds and everything was released publicly h

hh b h 4

O f dh?#::?

l

.7 1"

f

U hio 1

.very shortly after it was received by the Governor, a N.

~,

2 Mr. Denton certatFry maintained a complete flow of information y) hW' O Ap.#

t4.s b 3

both to us /\\ Nd_rm;tily Ne would hear -i-t> and hy would walk I

4 ; out and give it to the press.

[-

h;.y k

w=q 5

The same tSag was true w.1.-die-Gov.esnor%s -f m.

a w

6 ;all the information that we had.

I suppose if we would have y*

I' addressed those releases perhaps differently, it would have 7

t E lmadepeoplefeeldifferently.

I am not sure it would have 1

jchangedtheflowofinformation.

9 E

I think the'information was there as soon as it to

\\>.-

!possibly could have been there.

It was maybe the means of 11 t

t I dd.uk it

as---

12 icommunication that bothered people ac-f ;.

m.

i 13

.almost e rc -- I don't iant to cay it -- hnu 60 I

'? ant to say b

% jt t had no su$ N l

-b bstantiation,. m here was 14 'it?-- W feelingAthat NDY 15 /)more information than they were getting.

It just wasn't true.

AE;

/

• I y;

16 ! Maybe that feeling could be ameliorated by taking some other i

1 17 ! action.

V 18 Q

I was wondering about the timing of what one might.

'b a

u 19 l call a normal official established means of communication i

r l! through PDIA and the counties, if that could have been done l

?

20 E

l y,l simultaneously,oriftherewasadecisiontodoit--

l A

It was being done simultaneously, but it was being

(

22 l

23 i done through the vehicle of a press statement.

And, you know 24 l--

under normal times, one would tell all concerned parties

3 ;' dore the press statement was mede, but there really wasn't

!i t

na o ve m si t =oc a s e- : =s s avie r m z oto u L$ ooap wwow tsi%s pa testo l 7 t.

Ytl,

g

~_

x

,Yw

~w Pt g w ;gry; g y g g..., Qr%Q f

- gi

- ~ j%' p w= a <za

~~

t y

1 h thatJW2 time brpm.

,.4 2

Q Was PD1A and the other state agencies -- maybe 3

Dauphin County -- advised as to the time of the press confer-i e

s

.: ! ences ahead of time?

t A

5 A

PRIA certainly would have been.

-At-4^r

' I ;;y-theyi

[ji g.:

im.

To the best of my knowledge they were.

y 6

N.

i O

Apparently, the Governor established what one might 7

I a

I, call a command center to collect and evaluate information.

(

g

+.

9 j I guess it was staffed by.Mr. Waldman, yourself and several

[

lothers.

Could you identify the others that were customarily 10 s;

i involved in this process.

j; l

e.

l A

Yes.

I am not sure the term command center -- I 12 don' t know if that is the right terminology m--"%.

Some of 33 1 us were in the presence of the Governor more than others. -Ans, _

1 j ~,

15 Ina.1W I don't think there was any kind of designation as FEk

!such.

16 I

k'X The people that were present most of the time were, gy g7 wn s

p;A

c '_ l_miy, the Lieutenant Governor, myself, Mr. Waldman, Paul 7;~

18 W

I Critchlow and Jim Seif.

mhws k

~b%

j af centact "hich ::: maybe ThenextlevegerAvaa 3

' tyh wrwM

.W not there quite all the time but almost4WEk Gordon Macleod, t

21 d

J

/

Secretary of Health cretary of Environmental Resourcesp g

lAnd-whuu I ay thcoc pcepic, ey would bring different aides p~ ! wdA $4.

[

f ef Juuu 5;.afft 3,,an6-b'"e different 'idoc..; J4 d i v...

u.au u m.iu 4

Bitt bey were sort c f the focal points.

3 L

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...... m...=......

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28 I

l l

And not quite as often as those two, but tv -

[

1 4

2 {astheincidentbegantodevelop,Mr.PenroseHolowell, L

i 1

3

, Secretary of Agriculture.

Gestainl; h e MecLeod-ans-Cli'#

j Jones _wae-involved.

The Secretary of Environmental Resources 7.

4 a

e 5

and Secretary of Health from the very beginning were present, e-I w uld say, at almost all major meetings.

f 6

.1 b

7 l

Q Did you mention a Mr. Seif?

l i

8 A

Yes, he is Special Assistant to the Governor.

He L.

i u,

i.-

l was present at a lot of meetings.

Mr. Henderson was present 9

e y-10 at almost all the early meetings.

He was present at most of

[

t

\\u 11 ; the meetings.

'f i

L i

12 Q

When did this group sort of come into being?

1w

~

A There was no specific time.

It evolved.

When I j3 t

ja j became involved on Friday morning, cer'=in'y it 'ee

---#n ml 'O I

e.

l

%e l.pr-ga tica-1-purposes. it had already come together.

15 d

I Q

What were the basic sources of information supplied 16 G

to this group?

On whom were you basically relying?

j7 A

It really depended on the issue.

Th+=-

-- - - Lhe h

18 u

n j9,; Lieutenant Governor was clearly responsible for the 111 -e f e

pe a ns,m N does repon to de Menenant

[

20 j

n lGvernor.

All the information on radiation levels, on the 21 i

?

22 ; environment, of course, was coming through Secretary Jones.

f l

L l

When we got into the problems -- M 1 potential

[3, 23 i

i

[ problems with water and milk and so forth, the Secretary of

!l r

25 [ Agriculture also became involved, particularly with the milk, g

y il I$f sM was.c. sv e.contem: 4c.v.:e u n cto w-u.n.e w v w.s s.~ s.. nee

&.b.

29 I

\\

/

The-info 24.. diva palacp5Lly "are - khe technical

[

i 2

inf ormation came f rom Mr. Denton.onee--he-was

?.nf 4* mn11y

}L 2 ;_bcanma n i mmst-a-sounding weid Iva M&. Ucu to r.,

Believe me L

nothing he said was accepted at face value.

It was examined R

4 b

l 5

and cross-examined and turned inside out, upside-down, until k!

@R I 6 ! we believed -- first that we understood what he was saying,

$}

1 w.

and secondly, that there was some faith in what he was saying.

{

7 :

Secondly, we relied in the early stages on Chairman

[

e i

9 ' Hendrie. ircrEninsI1 Tim-I.believe if you 1 the iti:4erary,

{

"W weprobablyhadthreephonecalls/--threeverylongphone

{

10 P.

11

. calls.

And most of them were on the speaker phones with most I

i 12 of the people I have mentioned in the room.

f.+

12 i

Q Friday morning --

.r-i 14 A

There was one, I believe, Friday morning at 10:00 ll 15 lo' clock.

There was one at 11:45,and one later in the after-

[

=

$s We had a call with Mr. Denton on the speaker phone in Q

16 noon.

17 lthe afternoon, a meeting with Mr. Denton that evening, f

i is l

s You=know e==-== he information was coming in, f

18 l

r i

?

!and it was a question of filtering the information, of making L

19 20 lsurethatyoubelievetheinformationandmakingsurethat

,you are asking the right questions so that you are getting i

?1 i

lfullinformation.

And not even necessarily that these people 22 I

L 23 l are trying to keep information from you, but it i jurt what I

k g is important to yotr, ~the may no% appreciated. And so that was wi.-.

24 i

d 25 g the role played by this group, if you call it a group, to

+r he Oh'C r S T t N C G h a.w' C.5 t a v 'C t s e i 3 O L D en. L 5 moso. wvows tr%G Pa 19ete

,3 p.LW

+

f*

.c-1 1

servo that function, i

is it fair to say that basically the cognicant f

O So, 2

state agencies you were relying on was the NRC?

3 e

4 i A

For substantive information.

i 5l Q

You did mention Doctor Wald.

Were there any other y

consultants,so to speak, or outside --

i 6

I And Doctor Wald was brought in at the suggestion 7

A No.

he was of the Secretary of Health, and, as I understand it, 8 ;

4

!i largely responsible for drafing the guidelines for the NRC.

4 9

l lSo,hewasaverycrediblesource.

10 i

You mentioned one lesson that might be learned from

j O

a namely that while one might plan for a specified, such 12 lTMI, i as a 10-milo radius of evacuation, one should also plan for a 13 i

!rippleeffect.

Are there any other lessons that you think --

ta Another lesson A

Well, that is certainly one lesson.

15 l

rr i! is the need for NRC or the appropriate agencies to re-think 16 M

~

,2 M % " " % prior to an accident and develop some

. b what those madasees are 17

_--you=k%A you read the guidelines as I understand they ja It t

it wasn't even really a five-mile radius.

existed before, 39 l

i I believe, a radius of low population density, which in I

\\

(W

was, 20 thecaseofThreeMileIslandwas/twoandahalfmiles.

21 t

l So, you have all these conflicting kinds of numbers.

l i

22 You have a two and a half mile-radius, you have a five-mile 23

[

Then, we get into the discussion of this crisis and 4

radius.

74 i

numbers were flippantly thrown around.

There was a press

3 l

II 4

f' t

_.-..~.........~...,m..._.._......

r l' I

M s

h N

31 r,,

e,-

p 1

l interview i%.

- Saturday in Washington in which Chairman

[

[

j. Hendrie said it might be 10 to 20 miles.

And that one small

(

l I

i

l statement and the problem that it caused in trying to put the ;

l i

i

{!lidbackonthepopulationinPennsylvania, it is hard to t

p' 4

l f

l lr

'o 5

exaggerate.

7, 3,

.y

>l I

It seems to me if we had some reasonable basis for 6

i 7

wha _ W if4a"ane >

? nose secJ3N owndestablishe-scme-2 f

E hi"# of radidises and then stuck with them when we get into a j

f 9 l problem,wewouldbealotbetteroff.

Plus'the fact that you

{

h j

k 10 l can't draw the line clearly and you have to be prepared for

+

g 11 the consequences, I think is important.

f

[

12 The-otner.* 4nc T _ i-h 4 n i-4e imnn""t emergency l

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l M

preparedness,for people te address is the. hole mouvus v0 13

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., fatigue and what it means to geu into a crisis which is now g

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ja I

i

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lofalimitedduration.

They all approached this as they do

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15 j

M i-

! a hurricane in which the t-htng is over in 24 or 48 hours5.555556e-4 days <br />0.0133 hours <br />7.936508e-5 weeks <br />1.8264e-5 months <br />.

,1 16 Qh h

t 17 i-And I have been on the periphery of sone of these operations p;

l l

M 18 I at least have observed eeme-l in the Defense Department.

ij !previously in long-term vigils, if you will, incidences that i' were occurring around the world.aedTe discipline that is i

20 l

21

required in situations like this to make sure that you get a f<

certain amount of sleep every day.c..J ChE I portant decisions 22 4

f 23 may not occur in the first 48 hours5.555556e-4 days <br />0.0133 hours <br />7.936508e-5 weeks <br />1.8264e-5 months <br /> but may occur three or W

{4 four days av..m me road.

-I-+h ir t-th_ W ren't prepared to 2

t t

g d

g.

25 ; deal with that kind of a situation, and that is something that v

1 c

9 ues.c. s? g Ne t.n apeise s t a v ic e i4ip occ u,t g acac w,ow6gs.go e.

,,sio t.

r, f

r

i_

f it is 1 l as we train people to deal in emergenet' preparedness, l

W0 3 i very important that people fw% p@ looked very shell shocked i g

j

~

urday.

3

2 It was a discipline that we established in the e

There was always some-

...y Governor's office almost immediately.

3 Z[h N.

But they made sure that we 3

F body around that was responsible.

w f.f[y 6

the point that we became disfunc-didn't extend ourselves t-w 7

same principle was being applied

[~

Itional.

I don't think that Ts 3

4

! in the emergency management center.

By Saturday the people f

n,y 9

looked overfatigued.

Ject e tvW insist that schedules t

9 10

't know when the impor-T

!! be established L W because you dr M

P n

T' And 'ou had,to have.

tant decisions were going to be made.

3 uve# ec Peci %

h:

i

'- r", @ose are V

G some reasonable degree of performanceA m kmf.

13 liad we had an evacua-the kinds of lessons that I -suppc;;

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more effective?

16 r-A Yes.

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0 Pragmatically effective?

od Mr. Denton's arrival on Friday af ternoon./hes 21 l

A Yes.

.Lvi 22 i he/ arrived -- a person of that level and that credibilityr -

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ad=he ar-r-wed two days earlier /would have made a f airly h

23 Second, had we had the same response 24 ! important difference.

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25 [ as visibly on the evacuation saee would have helped.

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It took a little longer for Mr. Adamcik.

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20 d think he was given as clear a mandate as he could have been e

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24.know, are prepa$is:. -- not that that was a problem here, but

! 14, _ o it-could have been.

That they know each other and are prepar'ed y

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l Are you asking the questior.s as f ar as response to 3

4 an incident?

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I think the same question might be asked t

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' the scene and that the Governor is in charge.

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Everybody was cooperating L

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I don't think we had that problem.

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Q You mentioned a difference between the response

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Do you have any observation or more

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federal government that has that responsibility.

And I think, 9

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t jthe y firs _t day.

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14 everybody else -- but the capabilit from my observation just 13

' simply wasn' t there.

Again, I am not an expert.

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0 That is Met-Edison at the plant?

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As far as early response, the technical expertise i

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So, I think -- that is very important.

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Apart from that, one could talk about having much i

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. better, more detailed plans.

I think it is an important I

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In your judgment -- and it is a judgment question, 6

I recognize -- but since you were rather heavily involved in 6

7 the plans themselves, and pragmatically involved rather than i

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a paper exercise, as you say, how long do you think that it I

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Let me work back-j 11 wards.

On Saturday I think tha could have been done in two 12 ive-mile evacuati h All I could say, to three hours.

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You had more people in the area.

You had institu-15 tions -- at least a very large nursing home that had not been 16 1

17 l evacuated.

It had been by Sunday.

You also did not have the f

psychological preparation for 4t.."

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It is very difficult for me to answer it other than 19 t

' saying what it was by Saturday.

And Saturday, I think two to 20 i

l; three hours is a reasonable estimate.

So, we are talking about, 21 l

i oh, pick a number as far as what it might be on Wednesday.

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Q To your knowledge, did anyone look at the cost of f

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I don't really mean just the financial institu-f i

23 I tional cost but all the other kinds of costs, too, and maybe i

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the cost to society, loss of business and things like that.

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Were there any estimates made of the balance on I

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A You know, it is interesting.

We kept looking at the 1 I health and safety costs of an evacuation.

I don't think we

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7 W Q Ut 8 l remember it being aAdiscussion, but we continually talked i

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Q Were there any documents that you are aware of givingi estimates of this nature, perhaps from some of t'he hurricane l

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evacuation or statistics of that nature?

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A No.

No, but you know, in a hurricane evacuation, 1

lifIunderstandcorrectly,usuallyalotofpeoplearenot 15

,3 evacuated from the hospitals.

And the reason they are not 16 i.

ij evacuated from the hospitals is the risk of moving them is

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, greater than the risk of, leaving them there.

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We did have considerable discussions with the j9

! Secretary of Health and others as to whether we could have

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that kind of a situation.

I was no.t convinced you could.

21 I really am not sure people would have stayed behind.

22 People are very neroic and -, Nurses and lab technicians in

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And it is interesting -- it I

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is like the question with the National Guard.

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' would be in this kind of situation is very difficult to say I

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hospitalsf,in a hurricane evacuation. sin.pl; he n ;._ arc i

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The state law of 1978 -- I believe it was passed M

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i last year -- on emergency response appears to hinge emergency 14 l response on the Governor's declaration of a disaster emergency.

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{Didthelackofsuchadeclarationhaveanysubstantialeffect L

16 37 on state agencies and their ability to respond or react or e

I whatever is necessary?

18 f

A Not that I am aware of.

I think everybody responded jg i

20, with the utmost capability to respond.

Certainly nobody held i

i back.

This was discussed.co Mw '.

l 21 i

I Again you have to remember the population was one 22 lthatwasconsumedwithfear,atleastfrommyinterpretation, 23 i

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! during that period of time.

Anything that heightened that

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l 25 ' f ear caused a response that was dif ficult to control.

And that t

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1 was always in the back of our minds.

1 The same thing with declaring k a state of n;;i==+1 f

2 It was We discussed that with President' Carter.

3 emergency.

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steady as you go and try to be able to control

!sion.

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l; response of individuals to the extent that we er 20 to what I?

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reason why the emergency disaster was not declared by the 7

9 10 i Governor?

l That and the assurances that were received from Mr.

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11

- Watson that we would receive an identical degree of federal 12 assistance if it were not declared.

And statewise, we really 13 I had the capability, I believe, to do everything we could do.

14 l There was nothing to be gained, anc there was a risk.

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15 Anything else at this time that you would like to Br 0

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i state personally for the record that would e. lighten us as to

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b jTMI incident?

j9 I t.hink we pretty well covered l

I don' t think so.

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my limited involvement.

21 MR. ERNST:

Any questions from the Board?

b 22 MR. HERR:

No.

23 i

MR. SCHAMBERGER:

No.

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MR. CHIN:

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