ML19308C404
| ML19308C404 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Crane  |
| Issue date: | 10/09/1979 |
| From: | William R GENERAL PUBLIC UTILITIES CORP., NRC - NRC THREE MILE ISLAND TASK FORCE |
| To: | |
| References | |
| TASK-TF, TASK-TMR NUDOCS 8001230379 | |
| Download: ML19308C404 (29) | |
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lO NUCLE AR REGULATORY COMMISSION
'O IN THE MATTER OF:
THREE MILE ISLAND SPECIAL INQUIRY DEPOSITION DEPOSITION OP:
RONALD L. WILLIAMS 0
P00R~0RGINil Place.
MIDDLETOWN, PA.
Date -
N Pages 1 -29 OCT S1979 T.I.chen.:
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.1, UNITED STATES' F AMERICA 2-NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3
4 IN THE MATTER 0F:.
,5-THREE MILE ISLAND SPECIAL INTER JiEd 6
7 8'
9 Interview of:
RONALD L. WILLIAFE f
10 Place Trailer 109 Three Mile Island l
11 Middletown, Pennsylvania L
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, f; Date'-
- ' Tues' day, October 9, 1979
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4 16 APPEARANCES:
17 JAMES SNELL 18 BARRY HORVICK.
19 20 21 22 23
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- 24 Brenda S. Hamilton;1RPR Stenographic. Reporter 25
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.MR.JSNELL:
This:.is:an' interview being conducted 1.2 byJthe.U.S.. Nuclear _ Regulatory Commission,cSpe'cial Inquiry-
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Group on Threel Mile' Island on 0ctobe'r 9th,.1979'at-Three: Mile
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Island, Pennsylvania,_ofJMr.;R.lL.-Williams of; General Public:
5-Utilities: Service Corporation.c 4
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.Present'in,additionSto Mr. Williams'is Mr..Horvick
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. 8 3-9 1 RONALD-L. WILLIAMS, called as a witness', testified
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10 as follows:
i 11-DIRECT _ EXAMINATION l 7
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1 13 r Q' ~ Mr. Williams.,nI previously.gave-you'a one-page L
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11 statement " called' WitnessJNotification, which explains the a
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- 15 purpose'of this depositioniand your rights.
Do'you have..any 16 questions on that?
E, 17 LA
'No,-I-do not.
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18 "Q
Do-you-understand it?
19 A
'I do understand it.
20
-Q
'You previously were talking to us about'the 21 G'.0.R.3.
on Oyster Creek, and I'was asking.you about the
'r, 22 dissemination of.information.between the operating: companies
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[ -Q 1-N 24 A
Yes.. The:0yster Creek General, Office Rsview Board L.
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'has a: member'on the committeeifrom; Met-Ed,-and tiiis is'-Sandy-l
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Lawyer.
He attends the meetings and receives copies of all 2
official G.O.R.B. minutes'and reports, matters"of that sort.
O A/
-3 In addition we try to create continuity between the
-4 two General Office Review Boards by having at one point a 5
secretary who was common'to both b.ards and a chairman who 6
worka.with the secretaries to try to ensure that activities 7
that may have happened.at Three Mile are brought to the 8
attention of the Oyster Creek G.O.R.B. as part of their 9
meeting agenda and so forth.
10 If there wereLectivities that happened at Three Mile, 11 we would generally.,try,.to ensure that those were discussed to someexten.jbf,theytwee.rglevantto.0ysterCreek,they 12 wouldbediscussed,;theg,,attheOysterCreekG.O.R.B. meeting; 13 g,s and I'm sure'that"it:woEked:the other way around, that 'hree 14 T
MiletG.'O'.R.B.-.would discus's Oyster Creek matters if they wore 3
15 16 pertinent and would be --- would have a meaningful bearing on 17 Three Mile operations or design activities'.
I 8
Q So it was by design that' people from the various-19 operating companies participated in each other's boards, but m
that there were no formal procedures such that when these 21 people came back to their respective positions from the 22 G.O.R.3. meeting that they had to formally disseminate this 23 information?
It was left up to the. individual, then,'to
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21 handle the information as he saw fit?
m A
That's true.
But, of course, we selected responsible -
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people in.responsib1'e positions.to'be the. cross fertilization I2~
mem'ers so that they would --- you could' count.on them(to b
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hat. appropriate people.
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within the company would be appraised-of whatever happen'ed 5
or.whatever they;1 earned at --
at thefopposite G.O.R.B.
6 meeting.
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Q" I)id; you participate 'in any of Three. Mile Island',aJ
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8 2 G.O.R.'B'. me'etings?
9
.A' I never did.
However, the chairman of the Three.
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10 Mile Island G.O.R.B. and myself frequently. discussed matters
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12 functioned.' add'.the! type-df' activities that we were performing,
' 13 as well;asithe' general direction that we were trying to-take 4'-
.y; 11 the G.O.R.B.las far..as being a review committee.-
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So I didn't attend their. meetings, but we: did inter-f 16
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change information fairly frequently-as to>what was going on f
17 and the intent of the Three Mile:G.O.R.B. chairman so-that'I
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would:be aware of what-they were doing.-
18 19 -
As I. mentioned, we also at.one point had a secretary i
- 20 who was common to both G.O.R.B.'s,.and that-helped with the-21-
' continuity between the two organizations as well We don't 4
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. have that?now.
We have separate G.O.R.B. secretaries.. But 22 -
i 23 these two fellows are in;the same group, and they generally n-n N:
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discuss matters,with one another also.
l25 Q'
Prior to'the accident, can you recall any;information.
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I that was relayed from operating experience at Three Mile 2
Island that was reviewed at the Oyster Creek G.O.R.B. meetings 1 3
A I can't think of any specific operating instances 4
or experiences that were discussed per se.
We did discuss on 5
a number of occasions staffing, training, things of that 6
nature that were common between the two.
7 Personnel matters, administrative functions, manage-8 ment approaches are all the kind of things that are common to 9
both of these plants, regardless of whether they are B.W.R. or 10 P.W.R.
There weren't too many cases --- and I can't think of 11 any of them right now --- that would have been a specific 12 Three Mile occasion that would have been meaningful or useful 13 g7 or brought back to. rest at Oyster Creek.
14
.There probably were some.
I can't think of any 15 right offhand, though.
16 Q
At any time in the meetings of the G.0 R.B. for 17 either Three Mile Island or Oyster Creek, did any of the plant 18 staff people from either of those two units participate in the 19 opposite G.O.R.B. meeting?
m A
I don't recall any occasion when Three Mile staff 21 attended a G.O.R.B. --- Oyster Creek G.O.R.B. meeting.
I know ZZ there were occasions, though, and I can't cite exact cases Z3 where we did have some Three Mile Island operating people i
i 24 participate in some task force or subcommittee work for the 25 Oyster Creek G.O.R.B.
- GEORGE GElGER REPORTING SERVICE,118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234 2109 -
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And these were occasions when we were specifically thinking about personnel operating problems or administrative 2
3 matters and things of that sort where the Three Mile staff 4
could get in and make an evaluation of what was going on at 5
Oyster Creek.
We did use some of their people that way.
6 Q
Okay.
Let's change the subject.
I want to go back 7
to when you were, I believe it was, manager of engineering.
8 A
Yes.
9 Q
Prior to your position as a senior consultant, can 10 you briefly explain the duties and responsibilities you had 11 in that positio'n as related'to the design and construction of 12 Three Mile Island 2?
13 A
Sure.
This was an evolving situation.
When I first 14 became manager of engineering --- you will have to forgive my 15 memory, but I think it was 1971 when that happened --- we had 16 a very small group.
The engineering department at that time 17 was probably on the order of fifteen or twenty people.
And 18 so our function was very much restricted.
19 What we tried to do was pretty much review what was a) being developed by both Burns and Roe and B and W and critique 21 that and try to inject things that we felt would improve those 22 designs or raise questions if we had any doubts about the 23 adequacy of what was being offered by either of those two 24 organizations.
25 As time went on, the staff, the engineering staff,
- GEORGE GEIGER REPORTING SERVICE.118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234 2109 -
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I developed to about fifty people, and we had an-opportunity to 2
try to get in and influence the design before it was
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4 So in.that sense we were attempting to define ground 5
rules and inject our. philosophy and thinking into the Three 6:
Mile Island design before it was created',.rather than after-7 the-fact review.as we had'had to do earlier because of the 8
small staff.
9 That was our mode of operation --- our mode of 10 operation was still very much a review function, but we were 11 ableJto startito inject;our'--- let's say to get our input u
intoswhat wasigoing:on o,n the Three Mile Island design.
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13 The' ' more '
thEnk'about it, however, I suspect that V
14 we.didn't do 'much inputting to Three Mile because the design 15 was pretty well completed by'the time our staff started to le build to any appreciable staff size..
17
. h1 the Forked River plant we really started to get
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B-ourselves'into the --- before-the-fact mode of_ operation.
19 On'Three Mile I think our review was pretty,much after the m
fact.
Looking at what had been offered by either Burns and 21 Roe or B and W.
m Q
Who did the purchasing of equipment for Three Mile 23 Island 2?-
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'The equipment purchases were arranged --- the actual
.f' lm purchasing was by. Jersey Central, but the real technical 0l
- GEORGE GEIGER' REPORTING SERVICE. l1' 8 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE 017) 234 2109 -
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I aspects of the purchasing actions were developed by Burns and 2
Roe.
That is for the equipment that they provided in the 7_1 3
balance of the plant.
1 B and W did their own purchasing of equipment; and, 5
of course, United Engineers purchased a lot of stuff for the G
construction activity on site.
7 Q
Who signed off on the final purchase specification 8
for the unit?
Wedidn'tactuallysignthehurchasespecifications.
9 A
Burns add Roe developed the equipment specifications, and they 10 11 were responsible for the technical adequacy of that spec.
12 We did review'those, and we frequently offered 13 comments.and suggestions that would result in revision of the 11 specification.
And, of course, it would never be considered 15 final until we agreed that the specification met our require-16 ments.
17 Bat we didn't actually sign the specs, but we did 18 put into writing by way of letters to Burns and Roe that we 1
1 19 were now satisfied with the spec and they could develop it m
into the bid stage.
21 MR. SNELL:
Okay.
Off the record.
21
( At this time a discussion was held off the record. )
z3 BY MR. SNELL:
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21 Q
I'd like to ask you, Ron, about dissemination of 15 information within the Service Corporation and from the Service
- GEORGE GEIGER REPORTING SERVICE 118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234-2109 -
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Corporation to the utilities of experience from the nuclear 2
field, whether it be operating or construction experience i
3 that GPU Service might have obtained, in two time frames.
- One, 4
as your position as an engineering manager; and, secondly, 5
then, when you became the consultant to Bob Arnold.
6 A
In a personal sense I participated in the Nuclear 7
Power Task Force of E.E.I., and I was fairly faithful in being 8
able to attend most of their meetings.
As I had explained 9
earlier, this was an information exchange group involving udilities Yrom all over the; country who were operating and 10 11 designing nuclear power _ plants.
U The meetings would discuss on a very informal basis 3
problems th~atl people were having, successes that they had 13 11 obtained in operation.
And also it ranged from design through 15 administration, personnel, operator performance, and actual 16 plant operations themselves.
17 I felt a personal responsibility to bring that 18 information back home and generally would take fairly complete 19 notes at those meetings and then send those to the operating m
companies, as well as to our own Service Corporation people, 21 to ensure that anything that I had found at the meeting or 22 felt was important was brought to their attention.
Some of these, of course, I would leave up to their m
31 discretion whether they did anything about it or not, and 25 others that we felt were important we would pursue to make surc
- GEORGE GEIGER REPORTING SERVICE.118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (7t h 234-2109 -
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I that, in fact, they were being incorporated or, at least, 2
being addressed to ensure that we were aware of problems that A-kJ 3
other people were having and be sure1that we didn't have the 8
same problems or recreate those same' problems.
5 One thing that we did as part of the E.E.I. activity, 6
too, was to get a collection of experienced -- -pardon me ---
7 not experienced reports,1but incident reports from operating 8
power plants..These reports were those that were sent to the 9
Commis'sion,: but E.E.I. - collected them together and then sent
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10 them out:asN packetslofiincident reports.
11
.I received-these-because I was a member of the Task m
u Force; and then I would review them and send them off to the
.t 13 appropriate people withinIthe company to ensure that they were O
is aware of experiences that other people may have had that were 15 worth our attention and worth some time on our part.
16 When I became the senior consultant, I just 17 continued the same activities.
That didn't really change.
18 My reporting function was pretty much the same.
19 I was not the only one who was part of this report-20 ing function.
I think most of our people were pretty aware 21 of the need. to disseminate whatever information they may have 22 learned from the outside and bring it-back to our company.
23 We had some of our staff who were members of B and W owners' g
AJ 24 groups, for example.
I 25 And, again, participating in those meetings resulted
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in a lot of good information that was brought back and 2
exchanged with both Service Corporation and operating company 3
people.
4 We were a member, and I think still are, of the 5
L.I.S.,
the Licensing Information Service, that N.U.S. con-6 ducts, and we received quite a bit of other information about 7
other plant experiences through the L.I.S. function as well.
8 There were a lot of other informal kinds of communications 9
that were brought back.
10 Then in addition we did utilize a number of 11 consultants who had exposure to a lot of other utilities and 12 their problems and their~ operating experiences, and they 13 would frequently bring matters to our attention that were 7-
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11 encountered on other plants throughout the country.
So that 15 we had a reasonably good purview of what kind of experiences 16 other people were having.
17 Q
Again, I take it, though, that the dissemination of 18 the information, except for maybe your own case, was more 19 left to the individual and there were no formal procedures?
3)
I say that because of hindsight now.
21 Would you say that a more formal procedure would be 22 beneficial for the dissemination of this type of information, Z1 rather than leaving it to a number of individuals?
21 A
I guess I'd have to say yes.
I don't know that it 25 would have made a great difference, though.
We tried to
- GEORGE GZlGER REPORTING SERVICE.118 M ARKET STREET. H ARRISBURG PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234 2109 -
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insist that any person who went to a meeting produced some 2
kind of a report of that meeting.
3 Now, that always didn't happen, of course.
Bat it 4
was our intent that if a person went somewhere at the expense 5
of the company, that he would bring back a report that could 6
be disseminated for other people within the company.
And I 7
say that didn't always happen, but I think in the majority of r
8 the cases it actually went that way.
9 Q
Do you recall if either the G.O.R.B. for ".M.I.
or 10 Oyster Creek ever independently discussed some of this 11 external information that the companies received in relation U
to their individual' plants?
13 A
I know we discussed it informally.
I don' t know
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18 that we went into it in a very formal fashion or had any kind 15 of an audit made or anything of that sort.
16 Within the G.O.R.B. itself, we were often very 17 concerned that we as G.O.R.B. members were really aware of 18 what was going on on the outside.
And within the Oyster Creek 19 G.O.R.B., for example, we assigned areas of responsibility to 30 the different members, and we assigned reading matters to each 21 individual G.O.R.B. member.
And we had a little slip made up 22 that if somebody came across something in his reading, he Z1 would make a copy of it and send it to the G.O.R.B. secretary 21 and at least one other member of the G.O.R.B.,
if it was 25 outside of his own area of expertise.
- GEORGE GElGER REPORTING SERVICE 118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (7t h 234-2109 -
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So that we tried to keep within the G.O.R.B. itself 2
an awareness of what was going on on the outside so that we fs
'3 could bring this information back and discuss it as it would 4
affect, in my case, Oyster Creek.
5 And I suspect that the same kind of function was 6
performed within the Three Mile G.O.R.B. as well.
7 Q
Did you in either of the two positions, manager of 8-engineering or consultant to Bob Arnold, receive any of the
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NRC. disseminated 'information 'directly, like ' the Current Events orL.E.R.'b?
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10 11 A :.
I recei,ved.a'lotLof the L.E.R. reports, and.I think 12 I received those because I.got my name on the --- well, what r
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is it --- N.T.I.S. or whoever distributes those for the G'.
14 Commission.
And I used'those also as a feedback vehicle for 15 people within our company as well.
16 Q
Are you familiar with the Current Events, which is 17 a little bit more detailed summary that's put out quarterly?
j B~
A Our library receives that.and distributes those m
Current Events.
And I,.among others,-am on the distribution 30 list for those.
21 Q
But you-didn't. receive a direct copy of those?
22 A
No.
I got mine through the library, 23 Q
E.E.I. also disseminated information which they j
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received from operating utilities who were members.
They
- 21 5
received _the Davis-Besse,.a fifty-some-odd-page report, in the O
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fall'of '77 after the incident and then updated it, I believe, 2
in February of '78.
O 3
D'id you' receive those copies that they sent to.
4 GPU' Service Corporation?
5 A
I. don't recall.
I can't' tell you that I did.
I 6
may have, but I sure don't recall the exact submittal that 7
they made at that time.
8 Q
,You.,cwould..have,been the~only one, though, that would have-received!th[s,[Owoulksithavegonetosomeoneother 0
10 than yourself?s l l A '.,,
11
-A E.E.I. distributes information in a lot of different ways', and 1t1would'dejend.v'ery much on who generated that 1
~
12 13 report au to where it may have gone.
If that report was one 11 of the incident reports that they distributed, then it would 15 have come to me.
And, in turn,LI probably would have sent it 16 off to someon'e else seithin the company.
17 I could not possibly review all of that information.
18 I.would generally review it just to understand what it was 19 saying, how important it was, and'then send it off to the 20 person that I felt was appropriate.
21 Q
But you don't recall getting the fifty-page detailed 22 in'cident report?
Zl.
A Not at all.
24.
Q I'd like to go into the control room design procure-25 ment and some questions in that area.
Can'we go off the
- GEORGE GEIGER REPORTING SERvlCE. I18 MARKET STREET. HARRIS 8URG. PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234-2109 -
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record for a minute?-
2
'(At this time a discussion was held off the record.)
3 BY MR.-SNELL:
4 Q
I'm going to ask you a few questions here on the 5'
control room design, and to the best of your ability,.because 0
I understand that the design as early as 1970 was basically-7 fixed because of the change of site location of the two. units.
Whed did[the1 Service Corpora, tion'or Met-Ed become involved in 8
.?'
' ;t : 1-1 thefcontrolrobm'designiasitstandsforThreeMileIsland?'
9 10 AL
!BeforeLthe unit yas moved to Three Mile Island,-
.,1 y. 7 4 r:
11-Burns and Roe had had'some' discussions with Jersey Central 1
?
operasing pelo:ple"at' Oyster Creek to try to get some feedback 12 la into the design.
The Service Corporation was really --- did f_s
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14 not get involved in the Three Mile 2 design until we actually 15
_ decided to transfer 'that plant from:0yster Creek to Three Mile is Island.
17 And at that time the involvement on our part was to s
fairly much resolve the situation of whether we should 19 continue with the design of1that control room as Burns and 20
_ Roe had prepared it or whether we shotild change 'that to be' a 21 design that would be very. similar to the Three Mile Island 1 22
' design.
23 Met-Ed had expressed some interest in knowing
.o k_f whether thuy;would be better off.with a single control room a
25 design for both' units.or whether we should continue with the 2
Q
- GEORGE GEIGER REPORTING SERVICE.118 MARKET STREET. HARRISFURG. PA. t 7101 PHONE (7t h 234 2109 -
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1 rathe'r.different designs that were prepared for Unit 1 at 2
Three, Mile ~and Unit 2 at Oyster Creek.
3-Some of our people did getsinvolved-in this dis-4 cussion~.
I personally lwas involved in a coordinating sense
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5 between Met-Ed and Burns and Roe.
And the decision was 6
finally made.that we should retain the Burns and Roe' design
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7 as it had~ been presented to us.
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'sNowf. i;atithat(~ time ssome Met-Ed people did get
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'9 inv,olved in reviewing the control room' design with Burns and i 7 t.
10 Roo people. abut', againi:this was' limited -to looking at the 11 arrangement.a.ndclooking atethe equipment basically that was s
wr 12 being provided for the. control room-panels.
13 Now, there were some accommodations that were made O
' in the design'to satisfy the requests and comments that. were 14
~
15 raised by'the Met-Ed'. people.
4 16 Q
.Would it.be a fair assessmentLto say that the bas'ic 17 design and. layout was frozen as much as' ten years ago and:the 18 '
only changes' that took place were those.because of either 19 ;
different equipment'or. regulatory requirements that were 20
- imposed upon.the unit for the control-room?
-21 A
That's pretty:true.
There were a few rearrangements 1 22 or; changes in: grouping of panels' that was made ~at the instiga-
~
23 tion of,the' Met-Ed people who looked'into'.it.. But the'b'asic L1 24
~ control' room d'esign is.very much as it7was prepared by Burns-
~
25 -
~ and Ro'e..
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'l Q
Do you know if anyc expressed concern was ever o ;,
raised by either Met-Ed or the people who were going to 2
3 operate T.M.I.12 as to preference in changes that.they would 4
like to have had but maybe couldn't accomplish.because the~
~
5' design was "frocen"?
6 A
There were a: number.of changes that were suggested, 7
but these 'were all very e'arly at the time when we did switch tbM'uilr'ombyster; dred!hThresMileIsland.
8 t
To the best
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of my knowledge, many of those' points that were raised'at
.+_
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10
.thdt tim.,'were'taken into~ac.coun.t.
e
+?Now, the. broader,. question.of complete revision'of 11' i
"1 s
u-the-control room was not accomplished; that-is, we_left the J
~
13 control room as it was.
But tof the extent that our people
.O 14 were able to get involved, I think-they were fairly;well i
15 satisfied that their comments!were taken into account.
16 Now, this,was, as I say,-very early on, and the
~
1 17 people who were reviewing it at that time, even-though~.they 18
^were operating people,;probably had very limited nuclear r9 plant operating experience.
Very;few people did have'much
~
'm
. operating experience back then.:
j' 21 I'm'not aware of any. concerns or requests for-22 :
chang'es;that were made subsequent.to that.that were.not.
)-
If
. granted or!not.followed.because of-press;of~ time or. schedule 2'
21
,or, let's say,'a desire not to'make changes to the plant at
}
s-such a late. design period.-
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18 Q-1 There may have bee some.
I'n personally not aware-2 of those.
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3 Q
- Do you know when the panels were physica11yffinished
~
4 and ready to be installed?
Do you have any idea of~the time 5
frame?
6 A
Oh, that varied all over the map.
Some of the 7 --
panels were completed,,I;would have to judge, maybe74 to
-w
'75;and$somelof;the'1 panels.were completed later than-that 8
9 even.
There weressome of these panels that were --- that were
< 4
- )
10 some 'of' the :last' things 'that went into the -plant.
'll
'Q.
'So'that.iflth'chpanels, scme of them were finished a
before, say, Unit 1 had any' operating experience, then any 13 desired changes or modifications that the utility would:have 14 gathered from operating,that would have been very difficult 15 to install into Unit 2?
But, then, again, there were some i
16 panels, you say, that were finished, let's say, afternthe1 17 operating experience had been gained on Unit 1 and it might B-have been<possible to change some, but genera 11y'the overall i
19 layoutL and arrangement was fixed-before ' Unit lihad any m
operating. experience at all?
21 A
That's: generally true.
There-were some last minute 22 changes-that were made to the panels.
Primarilylbecause'of~
m' regulatory requirements which were-coming on very, very O.
~.
21
. frequently at that time.
And I would think that if.we^had had s-any' serious concerns over operating limitations.that resulted
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- from Unit 1 experience,Lthat we.could have incorporated those, 2
at the same time we were. making last minute changes for
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3 regulatory requirements.
4 But I don't know that we did that.
I was not 5
actively functioning in,that specific area at the time.
6 Q
Was a mock-up ever made by either the manufacturer 7
of the controllroom'orithe) architect / engineer for the. utility in
i r..!j'_,.:(
8 o'r GPU-Service to have-a' walk through comment time period for
~
9
' the' control ro'om?'.
. 7.
u:.
10 A
I'm not awa're o?'any mock-up that was'made.
11 Q..
_ Then theoperat' ors' first look at _ the completed u
control room would have been-when it was finally installed in-
'13 the present' configuration in Unit 2?
i - ()
11 A
jus far as looking at a specific piece of equipment, 15 that must be true, yes.
Now, they had drawings, of course, 16
. and things to work from in their training program.
But I'm 17 not aware of any mock-up that they would have practiced on or a
critiqued or reviewed prior to the actual equipment.
19 Q
Are you aware of any critique that the cperators 20 that were going to operate Unit 2 made of the control room 21 design at any stage?
m
~A I'm not personally aware of that.
23 MR. SNELL:
Off the record.
j zi (At this time a discussion was held off the record.)
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1 BY MR. SNELL:
2 Q
I'd like to turn now to some of your activities 3
af ter the accident, and what I'd like to know is if you can 4
tell us for the first few days your sequence of events, how 5
you found out about the accident, and what your role was after 6
you found out.
7 A
'Oi the day of the accident, I was at Oyster Creek 8
and we were reviewing'the-report that had been presented by 9
Jersey Central'for the pre ~vious refueling outage We got a 10 phone call down there.
Some of the people who were in the 11 meeting received 'a' c' ll that there had been some sort of a a
e problem at Three Mile Island.
13 Bill Potts from Three Mile was at this meeting, and 11 he tried during the day to get better information as to wh t a
15 was going on, what had really happened.
And because of the 16 phone situation, he wasn't able to get a very good description 17 I think the majority of us left Oyster Creek feeling 18 that there had been some kind of a problem but that it 19 apparently hadn't been all that serious.
The next morning 90 before I came to work I got a call from Bob Arnold, and it 21 indicated that he wanted to have a meeting of some of his 22 staff first thing in the morning to discuss the Three Mile 23 Island situation and that I should pack my bag and come pre 21 pared to go to the island.
Which I did.
25 O
When we got to work, we convened in Bob's office and
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1 reviewed pretty much where-he felt the_ plant stood.and what 2
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had happened. 'But even at that timeLI don't think weareally 3-had a very good feeling for how serious the accident had been.
4 We sort of decided to: form two groups'of: people-to l
5.
come out to the island and get ourselves involved'with the-6 situation. Eick Wilson was going to head up a group of ' people tryi'ng Lto[inve' tigate ',thell.r>
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transient or the incident, as we-
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8 called,itlat that t,ime, and to.more or less get at the root-of whatdiad h'appe$e~djadd why and get a better understanding
~
i 9
to of the:situat, ion so:that we could take appropriate steps"in-3 11 the future.to keep it from happening again.
12 And I was picked to head up a group of people to 13 take a look at'the plant and figure out how we could recover 14 from the situation and get the plant back on the line.
15 I think we-all packed abouttwo'or three days' worth
, 16 of clothea and didn't expect.to'be involved in very much~more
- 17 than that.
Nhen we got'out here, though, of course,-the' 18 situation was quite different.
And.throughout the course _of.
19 that day,' which was the.29th whdn we came out, we all began N
to get a much better comprehension of what had happened and
~
21
-where the pla'nt stood.
I 22
--I got here about one o' clock in-the afternoon and
' 23 attended a-meeting to;get an update.on where the-plant stocd 24 and what.was going'on'over in the observation center.
And we 25 at that time had got our first reall indication of what had:
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. happened land.what kind of activity. levels we were talking about
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2 and what the general situation was with regard to;the plant-k-)
3 and its shutdown mode.
4 So we, then, came over to the plant-and spent a 5
little bit of time in the control room area trying to get a 6
better :feelofor what was. going.on and.to-get a feeling as to
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y whe're we! co' ld ist' rt doing 'our 'different functions that we had 7
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8 been:sent out:,to* accomplish.
9 //f
,We'went ba$k t5 the hotel-and had a'little. meeting 9
e
<..c to t'ry;~to discuss (the various. areas in.the recovery situation 10 11-that we would be working in.
And I' guess about. eleven o' clock 12 that evening we got a call from the plant indicating that they 13 wanted some help, that they were not quite sure what was going
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14 on within the plant itself and wanted.some of our people to
- 15 come over.
We dispatched-two or_three of the guys who were 16 with our group back to the plant, and they. spent that whole 17 night, then, in the control room, again,-trying to get a l-
~18 better understanding of what was-going on.and to helpitbe 19.
plant operating staff decide what steps-to take next.
20 We got out here early again the next morning, and
~
21 at that time:it was very clear that recovery was something 21 we weren't really worried about.
It'was plant' shutdown we 23 were really concerned aboUt.
-(~Y k/
3 So I: spent the next couple of days in the control-25 -
room working with our people and the plant. operating' staff and.
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'l trying to assess whatever evolutionsEwe should be taking and 2
where.we should be going.
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3 (At this. time a' discussion'was held off the' r'ecord.)
4 A
'After.probEbly the second day or so of being in the 5
control room,'I, then, started to spend more of my time over 6
onlthelobservation-center. site.
And, again, part of the time I : spen't= theret}was assimilating people into the organization i
i[ ~,
7 8
whoihad'.come here. to help,- primarily outside people.
Wehad'dontrketors,personnelwhowereherefrom 9
Wesiingbou'se,' Cbmbd5t' ion ? Engineering, Electric Boat, a lot of
~
~
10 11 the architect / engineers, and a lot of the other utilities.
12 And part of our function was to try to find out what 13 their experiences were'and to.try to figure out how we could-fs
-(_).
11 work them into the organization and then get them off with the 15 right people so that they could start contrib' ting to the u
16 function, rather than sitting around being part of tae problem, 17 We spent several days working in 'that area.
And then 18 I got involved also in some of the health / physics activities 19 here on site.
I worked and introduced Tom Murphy and Bill ---
30
-and another:NRC --- I'm embarrassed I can't think~of his~name 21
--- and these'were.two NRC experienced. people in the health /
N physics area.
And I worked with them as a liaison between 23 them and the plant staff on health / physics matters.
21 We attended meetings and tried to get a better-
. 25
' handle on what some of the H/P problems were and worked.with
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the. staff' to ' try to get some of:those resolved.-
After that I was really assigned to the wa'ste manage-.
9-
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ment group and worked'with th'e people in that group, as well.
.4 as a number ofiutility people from'other companies, in trying 5
to get,on7 top:of the water situation'and on top of the radio-
- - i;. vj <!)
7.i l
active-l gas situat' ion (her'eiat the island.
6 3
- e t
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7 I basically spent the next three months inLthe.
8
. waiNe(ma/
)
nagement" group.t.j Part of that-function was, a.t the
}
9 veryjbeginning,ttrying to3 cope with the water situation and,
~
i l
10
- then, subsequent 1ys trying-to do Jome thinking ahead, planning 11 on how we would dispose of.the water and try to clean up the-s plant.
Particularly the auxiliary building.-
)
13 BY MR. SNELL:
O 11-Q How were you first appraised of the supposed damage i
15 to the core?
16 A
I was not really appraised of that, other than by a-
-17 growing understanding, perhaps like everyone else, as. to how 18 severely the core may have been damaged,- or at least.how 19 severely the peop1'e thought the core may have-been damaged.
m But I actually didn't get involved pretty much.in j.
21 that aspect of it.
I,'again, was pretty much involved'in 22 waste management.
23 MR. SNELL: -Barry, do;you have any questions.for n
c.(_).
m Mr. Williams?
j 2r, MR. HORVICK:
Yes, I think just one.
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1 BY MR. HORVICK-
'2 Q
.In the deposition that you gave'before the-
,, O 3
President's Commission, there was some discussion about the-4 l control-room panels, ar.d apparently there.were two very_
5
. opposite;,po.ints of,ylew about whether the control rooms should
.. (: /.
'oon ve~ry.mulc'La'.'ike or whether they should be different., And h
~
6 1
~.
7 I was.jgst, won /. erin,g if,you could expand a little on how that j
's
.<:.,9 8
discussion tient and maybe what your personal. views are as to 9
that ilhd ob; thing.
- [ _
t 10 Because I know during the accident there were some 11 problems.
George Kunder is a' good example.- He was.in Unit 1.
12 I think.he was working on his license for. Unit 2, but he did t
13 not understand the control panel at all'inLUnit-2.
So he had 14 to kind of wait for data to' get to him..He couldn't go right 15 to the panel to observe some of'the. things that were going on.
16 So I was just wondering what your feeling is about 17 the. advantages and disadvantages of. uniform panels throughout 18 an island li'ce this.
i B
A-
~-The original question came up because Met-Ed was 2
going to operate both units and they felt.that perhaps: there t['
21 could be'an advantage to them if the control room designs were 22 very similar.
Part of.their' thinking behind this was at that l.
23 time'they did intend to use operators interchangeably between 24 Unit?1 and' Unit 2.
r 25 -
.They1hadEintended to have almost a single license 10
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for their operators so :they could work on. either unit and 2
maybe would work a. week about or something of that sort on 3
one unit-and then operate th'e other unit for the next week or
'4 1something of that sort.
Their feeling, therefore, was that 5
it would"be: advantageous,1fsthe units were very similar in 2
0 4.
- :)'
6 their -control ~r' 'oinidesi'gn~.'
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'However,jvery similar is hard to accomplish because t'
~
8 these two plants, even though they both had B and W nuclear
( :)
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.9
- steam' systems, were really not very similar.
The B.and'W
- 10 panels naturally would be very similar, but that was going to 11 happen regardless because B and W was responsible;for the 12 designs of the panels associated with the N.S.S.S. portionnof 13 the plant and'had more or less a standard. design for that
- O 11 equipmerit.
3 15 The thing that --- the point that was raised was 1
l
- 16 that since the plants were different,. there 'would be ' differ-l 17
-ences that would be essential between the two' units for the 18 operator to. understand.
And there was a real concern that if l
19 you had two units that-were similar but not identical that the i-
. 20 operator would have a'better chance of making an-error in that
]
i 21
- situation than he would:if the two plants were completely i
L E
. different.-
j y..
~
In~ fact, we talked about painting.the_ control-rooms j
L F
~
tt' different colors
'-- one green;~one brown -- :to ensure that-5' the operators would sense'and know that,they.were in;one unit
~
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-GEORGE GEIGER REPORTING SERVICE.118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234 2109 -
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as compare'd.to the other and that their responses would be 2
appropriate,.because they would.be aware of which plant they
~
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3 were operating on rather than taking a reflex reaction, 4'
because they were maybe more familiar with Unit.1.than Unit 2
"~C i e '
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5 and'may bh ma.. king',a ' mis take, ~ because what they should. have i.
6 done on Unit 1, should have been done a little differently on c
3 7
Unit 2.l>;
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~
l-
, T:I; personally: felt t' hat the --- having the control 81 9
rooms quite different was more appropriate than having them-10 similar-but not the same.. This is actually the way it did 11 turn out.
And I think the final decision, which was not a E
forced de' cision at.all; it was a very agreed upon resolution
,e 13 between' Met-Ed and ourselves and Burns and hoe, was predicated 4
14 to some extent on the fac't that we didn't really think we 15.
would have interchangeability of operators to the same degree IG that Met-Ed was conceiving it at that time.
17 We really felt we would have dedicated operators 18 for Unit 1 and dedicated-operators for Unit 2, and that the 19 Lsimilarity didn't really mean all that much.
30 MR. HORVICK:
I guess that's all I have then, Mr.
^
21 Williams.
That's-it.
22 BY MR. SNELL:
23 Q
Ron, you have been talked to by any number of people p/
Ns at
.and: deposed by the President's Commission.
In any of these 25' previous discussions, and including the one today, are there
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1 any areas or instances that have not been brought up that you 2
would like to talk about or discuss?
3 A
I can't think of any.
1 MR. SNELL:
All right.
Thank you, very much.
(At{thistimetheinterviewwasconcluded.)
5 G
7 8
9 10 11 12 13
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- GEORGE GElGER REPORTING SERVICE.118 MARKET STREET. HARRISBURG. PA.17101 PHONE (717) 234 2109 -
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1 I hereby certi fy thn t the proceedings and evidence 2
are contained fully and accurately in the notes takeit by mo 3
in this proceeding and that this copy is a correct transcript 4
of the same.
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