ML20132F221
| ML20132F221 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Issue date: | 07/11/1984 |
| From: | NRC |
| To: | |
| Shared Package | |
| ML20132F201 | List: |
| References | |
| FOIA-85-303, FOIA-85-A-30 NUDOCS 8510010272 | |
| Download: ML20132F221 (29) | |
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10 This is why it wfil have a bearing on
=pe.d.up, charges of where I deliberately 11 the tr 12 con.taminate.d -
I don't know whether we want to go 13 into that or not as yet.
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1 22 23
- Now, I have my area to be responsible i
24 for in cleaning up spills and all.
It's not my
,25 job to be following b e h i nd the other men who also lj
e L
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1 are. responsible for their cleaned up spills who
'l 2
were negligent, and can age = e nt saw this and it had 3
be en-b r o ugh t to their attention, not only.by me 4
but.by other technicians that would ignore it.
I 5
don't think these men were even documented.
I come behind one and supervisor 6
have never seen a 7
say, hey, if I were you I'd take a little time and' 8
clean up here, you've le f t a mess here.
For this 9
went on day after day a f ter day.
I had to use
~~~
10 those steel carts; before I could use those steel 11 c a r t s,' I h.a d. t o clean up their mess.
And I felt i
12 this was very unfair for me to be responsible.
, 13 k'h e n I talked o f this to Mr. Lees and in the
~
Mr. Long I told them 14 presence of Fawcette and even 15 that I got tired of the housewife syndrome or 16 being a mother to grown men who were being paid a
17 much higher wage than what I was and who were
'18 doing the spilling but not cleaning up behind.
19 Now, we could live that in that environment and 20 accosphere if we wanted to.
I could shut my mouth 21 and not become un po pul a r and just go on day after 22 day.
23 24 25
220 3
2 3
After we talked 4
a b o u~t that I presented the letter of where on that 5
very weekend prior to the Monday that he got there 6
they h 'a d pulled me out on t r umped-up charges of 7
deliberate contamination.
Stripped me of my badge, 8
escorted me here, e sco r t ed me and wanted to escott' I
9 me back to FMO building to pick up my permanent I
[.
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10 effects Which I ref us ed to do.
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 i
22 1
l 23 1
25 I
93I
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Q'.
Yes.I On March 15th of
'84, that's 1
2 when Sheely calls you and tells you not to come in 3
but to come in the f ollowing morning and to meet 4
y o u,7 5
A.
March 16th, that's right.
6 Q.
For you to-meet h im. a t 8:00 o' clock in 7
the' lobby of'the machine building.
You go in that, 8
morning and meet with Sheely and Thurston Davis, 9
who is the shop rep?
10 A.
Yes.
11
,Q.
,And.Sheely tells you that you have 12 deliberately cont aminat ed a table in your work 13 area?
14 A.
Yes.
That's it.
15 Q.
And that you refused to clean it up.
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16 Then 17 A.
And I denied it.
18 Q.
Then the me e ting coves to Davis's' 19 office and Sheely tells you that you were being 20 charged with con t amina t i ng an area and he asked 21 you if it was true.
22 A.
I tried to reason with Mr. Sheely, f
23 explaining to h!m that he had two incidents one to a frisker.
And I told him in '
24 pertaining 25 relationship what had h a ppe n ed, that Sunday n ight
25A I
when'I had asked Bill for the frisker to check 2
what I thought was contamination on an electrical 3
switch box panel, which is at least as long as period of 4
that file.
I had been noticing over a 5
time that the nice shine on the b 'r i g h t paint had 6
become dull, and rust s pots were appearing.on it.
.7 Just sitting in front o f this panel were these 8
m e t al holders that had shelves that the' men were 9
removing hot trays o f c r uc ibles. f rom the m'icrowave 10 and setting here to cool, which I had brought to
~T 11 management's attention more than once, that it was 12 a safety hazard, because the air-condit' ion l
13 currents were forcing those fumes out where we i
14 were i n h a l.ing it in our atmosphere wher'e we were 15 working.
Plus I suspected,-and only at that time
- 16 did I s us pec t, maybe that's why that door is f
17 beg inn ing to look like it's contaminated.,
is it 18 possible?
li So I asked him for'the f r isker and I
20 reached in behind as far as I could in different 21 areas with the frisker.
And e v er ywh e r e l' held the
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22 frisker close it alarmed showing that it was' 23 contaminated.
24 Now, this holder had been there over a 25 y e ar.
I had complained a bo ut this.
.Another
I M
i I
supervisor who at the t'i m e was a technician with 2
me had also approached management at the same time, 3
and be tried to get him to realize, Coke Mc Lam b to 4
realize, that this was a safety nazard, that the 5
cooling' shelves should be under the vented hood, 6
which Oas right next to it, to permit this to cool 7
off.
8
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9 10 11 e
12 13 i
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t e 14 l
15 16 17 -
l 18 Q.-
(BY MR. URYC)
You had asked 19 permission to take the frisker to that area?
l 20 A.
Right.
To check it out.
And then 1 21 came back and told Bill what I suspected and 1 22 requested him to go over there and to verify what 23
'I had found.
But instead he called Rad Safety.
24 He wanted them to come down and to smear it and 25 tell him how much radiation or how m uc h d am ag e had
231_
1 been done.
Because you could see the r us t forming
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2 on the bottom part of the panel where there was 3
contamination.
There had to be.
4 So Rad Safety never came in that night 5
on the shift.
And I inquired about it.
And Bill 6
would inquire of me when I'd come in off my break 7
and he had been out.
He said, "Vera, has Rad 8
Safety been in?"
I said not to my knowledge.
9 This is un us us _.
And I thought to myself
~~
10 somethihg is wrong in this picture.
I did not 11 know what,_ but I felt I had not done anything 12 wrong.
I decontaminated the table those shelves, 13 as far as I.could reach.
I could not move these
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14 shelves.
They wer e mad e of stainless steel.
1 15 could not lift them off, but I could push them a 16 bit away from the panel so I c o uld reach in a bit.
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17 But I d id not wipe off the panel because Rad 18 Safety -- Bill told me he wanted Rad Safety to 19 come in and do a swatch on it and find out what 20 content of uranium so possibly they would have had 21 to have changed that switch box or j us t could they l
22 clean it up and paint it.
That's what they do, l
23 you know, decontaminate and repaint.
24 So I never gave no more thought to it.
25 You want me to tell you what happened on that
$3$
1 i n e,i d e n t and then come back to the letter on the 2
charges sgain, since we're r igh t in that area?
3 4
5 6
7 8
9 1o 11 12
.13 -
14 15 16 17 18 Then the nex t thing,they noticed,' Rad 19 Safety came in and chec k ed the door.
They found 20 nothin5-21
-Q.
(BY MR. PEERY)
Now, what door are you 22 referring to?
23 A.
This panel, switch box panel door.
24 They found nothing on it.
25 The next. thing found behind that, they i
e
s..
'GG 1
saw'the duor being pa i n t ed so it blends right into 2
the wall.
It's light on the top and a deeper 3
brown on the bottom.
So when I come in I'say 4
that well, what happened here, all the fellows 5
are a l l' l i n e d up and still you c o ul d hear a' pin 6
drop on the floor.
I notice thh reactions of the 7
. people.
And o f c our se,
I'm coming in lighthearted;
.8 because I usually kid with the f ello ws anyway.
We 9
have a good rapport among o ur s elves.
It was just 10 w i t h = a,n a g e = e n t the problem lay.
And I said you
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11 mean t'o tell me they finally took care of that 12 safety. hazard, and pr oc e ed ed on around, got my lab
, 13 coat and glasses, came back to where they.were 14 t al k i ng.
1 tried to find o ut what happened, and i
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15 everybody was evasive.
I approached John Monroe, i
16 who had done it, and he did not want to talk to me.
17 So something was cooking up.
That happened on 18 Monday n ig ht.
19 Thur sd ay n ight,
15th, I'm out of the 20 lab.
I s a id to Mr. Sh e ely,
I s a id that's 21
'significant, something was wrong.
But I will tell 22 you I'll d eny it to oy dying day that I purposely 23 contaminated and refused to clean up.
Now 24 Q.
That was on.a lab bench top?
25 A.
The holders sat on the lab bench, but j
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'.lM I
t a e, other was on the wall.
2 Q.
What were they accusing you of 3
c on tam in a t ing?
4 A.
It states t hat it had to do with 5
t a b.l e s.
All right.
Pr ior to this ti=e I had been 6
washing of f the legs many t imes of contamination
.7 on the left-hand side.
I am predominantly 8
right-handed.
Have you noticed that everything I 9
- grab, 1 grab.right.
I am completely deaf in this..
10 ear and its made me super s e n,s i t iv e to the the 11 r ight,s id e.
Wh'en I cannot hear I protect myself.
j 12 I make surelI reach.
It affects my equilibrium.
13 This pos'sibly had to do with the head-on collis. ion 14 I had many y e a'r s ago when I was about 16, because 15 I've s uf f er ed the a i lm e n t s since then.
But it was-i 16 always on the left side.
And I couldn't figur e it 17 o ut.
Even sometimes there was spill back 18 und er neath the plexi tabletop that the balance sat l '9 on on the left side.
And I would try to lift this 20 up.
I couldn't.
It wa s v er y he avy.
I tried to 21 get under it so I could. flush it with nitric acid 22 and water and get it out, and use decontamination soap 23 wash down the sides, wash this d o,< n.
Wash the q
24 floor, because many a times I've had to wash the 1
1 25 floor.
But I couldn't f ig ur e out all these spots t
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1 lik.'e this spillis s out on the left side.
I knew 2
it wasn't me.
Because I Ind iv id ually used a clean 3
pipe.tip and I would t a ke it off with my hands and 4
r e a,c h over and drop it in the waste basket.
And 5
the waste basket is r ig ht here.
And it puzzled 6
me.
I t '. h a d been going on and going on and.go ing on.
7 It almost looked like it wa s being done on p u r p o s e,.
8 So I d ec id ed I was not going to do it 9
anymore.
I am going to hav e to handle it like I 10 d id bac{in the gad area.
I used paper towels t,$ e r e. a'n d m a r k e d 11 back when it was hot and walk o f f 12 and leave.
It did me no good to go to a 13 s u p e r v'i s o r and tell them.
The supervisors knew 14 the c o n t am in a t ion was t her e.
I had brought it to 15 their attention before.
Bill Lacewell's attention' 16 definitely.
They had s e en.
The supervisors 17 c o.u l d n ' t help but walk in the area and see it.
,18 Because it literally was po ur ing down.
So I took 19 red caution tape and I put it on those table legs.
20 And I told Bill Lacewell I r ef us ed to be a mother 21 any longer.
I refused to b e and have to act out 22 the ho us e wi f e syndrome anymore.
And I meant it.
23 I meant it.
Because I knew now when I would wash 24 it up and I would leave off from my shift and 1 25 come back and find it I was not doing it.
I knew
esu W\\
1 that somebody was doing it.
And they were my 2
co-workers.
Now, whether they were doing it 3
deliberately I have no way of knowing.
I can only 4
quote to you what technicians, level nine 5
technicians have told me.
They knew who was doing 6
the contaminating.
They knew that it was Steve 7
Sloan or Ron Brown.
Bo th o f them we r e using 8
sloppy technique.
Carl Rochelle had noticed how 9
Steve Sloan had been doing this.
And in so, 10 somehow hitting his pipette, that would force a
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11 conta$inated t'i p o f f a n d it would miss the basket I
12 and whe r e v e'r it hit that droplet that was still in 13 there would spread.
I d on' t know wh e t her
- see, 14' I had never seen that, because we wor ked one to a
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15 shift, and I could not answer for that.
All I
t 16 know is what I saw and what I cleaned up, which 17 w a 's not done by me.
But also the level nine had' 18 seen and known deliberate c o n t am'i n a t i o n of the 19 table.
20 As an ex am pl e :
March 16th I was not 21 in the lab.
. March 15th, that night, I had not 22 been in the lab.
So I could not have done it.
23 But on March 16th, on that day shift, Rad Safety 24 came in and did find now wait a m in ut e.
I 25 can't recall whethet it was the afternoon shift
i Sytu
{
I thah th'ey found the contamination or the d ay shi f t.
t 2
They f o und it hot.
I c anno t remember.
It was on 3
one shift anyway that I was not It happened 4
t w i c,e the month of March with the same man-on, 5
with the same supervisor being on the same shift 6
that Rad Safety found t h em hot.
7-Anyway, that incidebt where they found 8
it hot, I had not been in the night before, so 9
they couldn't blame it on Ve r a.
And it was found
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i -
10 done by these men.
.But any way,
that was one 11 i n c i d e,p t w h e.n it was hot.
12
,'The other i n c id ent was when I was not 13 on the' shift and the men kn ew that they had
~i 14 cleaned up. and t her e was s up po s ed to ha've~been no 4
15 contamination on those l eg s.
Ron is working again.
16 And Bob Hudson and Car p ent er and Buddy Lewis are i
j l
17 on,the same shi f t.
And the lev el nine man, Bob 18 Mudson, turns to these men when he saw Ron and 19 Coke leave.out of the lab on a break and he said 20 I'll. bet you anything that if you go down there.
l 21 you will find contamina t ion again on those legs.
22 The three of them walked ov e r there, and s ur e 23 enough, on the left-hand side it was contaminated 24 again.
Bob Hudson this time called Rad Safety and 25 Rad-Safety c am e in and checked it out and.it was
I 1
so hot, and the f'l o o r was so hot, that he told 2
them they should have b e en wearing r ubber shoes or 3
r ub b'e r s over their shoes.
4 Abo ut that t ire Coke and Ron comes in 5
and they're very angry and Coke is v ery v ind ic t iv e 6
over w h'a t has happened.
So after they had pulled 7
the tables apart and cleaned up all the 8
contamination, he made the technicians go to their 9
own areas and clean up there, also.
10 Now re= ember, Vera was not in there to 11 do it-And these level nine m'e n know who is doing 12 it.
They know that I n ev er,
I never take from the 13 tray.
I put it out h e r e' i n the open after it is
' 14 cooled.
- 1. don't put it near my face.
And I reach 15 for the crucible, bringing it around, and I put it 16 into the balance and close the door and do the i
17 automatic we ig h ing, take it out and set it here
'o n 18 the ledge.
I'm r ight-h and ed.
I, pipette l
19 right-handed.
My t ub e s are sitting there right-hanced,i 20 And I put it in and instantly put the crucible 21 back out o f the weight, and I have instantly 22 capped my test tube.
So that these fumes under a
23 bood that's not vented is coming back in my face.
24 Everybody knows that is the way I have done i t-25 since I have worked there.
-.4 4--
42 4 '/
1 that well, Vera,'something has happened.
'We must 2
get yo ur side of~the story, so on and so forth.
3 Q.-
What was the contamination issue?
A.
The c on t am i n a t i o n issue was 4
5 JQ.
The charge against you?
6
'A.
That I had deliberately contaminated 7
tables, my area, and had r e f used to clean it up.
8 Q.
Now, when t hey say you d eliber a t ely 9
contaminated it they ar e ac c using yo u o f r unning
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10 in, sprinkling powder all over ev er y t hing, or what?
11 A.
'That's wh a t Le e s said.
This is what
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12 was astonishing to me at the end of the hearing.
13 Lees said,,"And I was told that she pour ed powder i
i and rubbed her fingers in it."
I was 14 on the table
'15 flipped.
I have not f o r -- now, let.me back up -
16 and.tell you exactly what was happening when the 17 a ud i t o r came in and did check my area.
"This lbu'a t'. 49J 18 morning,,l'm working, we igh i ng o ul i s o t o p i c s.
19 Remember, we're r eceiv ing v ials heavily 20 contaminated many times with po wd er that even when 21
.you open a vial -- and I d on' t care who opens a 22 vial in that lab -- air currents and static 23 electricity starts that powder moving.
So we have 24 to be presumptuous and assume that when I get 25 ready and I'm opening it up under the hood here
J24 f?
1 o v e.t my bench.
Because I d on' t want it on my lab 2
coat or in my lap, many times I have towels there
.3 ff I. work with green pellets or somehow I.know 4
thac it's really going to be dirty.
But I try to 5
w a t.c h, m y technique that I d u not d um p any.
But 6
sometimes when you turn that vi al ov er if the byrc e.e.t.:.:..
t-7 powder had been picked up incorrectly powder had,
g 8
got down around the l ab el a nd ip
'uld drop onto 9
the counter top.
10 I had w2fghed two trays prior to the
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=
11 time che auditor came into my area.
I haf brushed cc m y uA hl).1& 4;Ju.d r*f<:. g/sss (w Be:! anw p.M uL, 1.2 away the poyder and had wi p e d it before 1 o v e r,% cash E.4 tajp.
g 3
.e l'3
. asked h,im to come to me.
B ut I!m in the process i
i 14 ac t ually o.f d oing my wo rk when he walks in that 15 lab.
He sees I'm wor k i ng,
doing this, one vial 16 after another, tr ay a f t er tray is what you're
)
17 doing.
So.you have to be p r e s um pt uo us and say 18 there's contamination there.
I
,reat it as s6ch.
t a
19 He epme over.
I c a lled him over in my l
20 area, because I had seen he had gone through the' l
21 fluoride area and ther e was no r e ac t ion coming, 22 supposedly, or an alarm, that it was hot.
Prior 23 in the morning I had been over under the hood, the j
24 fluoride hood, and it has a led ge that sticks out 25 and the doors come down like this, but there's i
q
Pil9 1
s o m e. l e'd g e s t i c k i'n g out here.
The po wd e r had been 2
spilled so much in that area and over this that 1
3 had even glanced down at the floor and I suspected 4
poss.ibly po wd e r could be there on,that floor.
S,o 4"
ok n
5 I was very c ar e f ul not to walk inte the front de 6
the hood, a f r a id I would be stepping in a
.7 contaminated area.
I watched him.
I knew this, 8
see.
But that was out of my area.
I watched him 9
as he was t her e and he was going over f.t.
And 10 apparently it d id n ' t s e em l i k,e the frisker was 11 working, c.h o.u g h I noticed he was t ur n ing the twNA er db '-
12 button f r om.. on e angle to another.
And I'm sure t
13 they abst have a certain parameter that may be 14 acceptable..
15 And then he enecks the counter where 16 they're working, and I had already seen powder on 17 th,at counter.
But I had never seen anybody e l s e' -
18 go back there into that ar ea and clean it up.
The
.1 9 reason why, the lev el n ine man that was supposed 20 to have been on that shif t d id not come in that 21 morning.
So it was a prior shift that had walked 22 off and left t hat hood and ledge and that on the 23 floor and that on the c oun t e r like that.
There 24 was no other way to explain it, because Bill 25 Mathewson was not on the shift that day.
So I
3W1.
M
.4 1
amy cd over to him and-I said beyf,end the reason c
2 why is because it was so rare they came into that 3
area.
I wanted him to c hec k o ut my area, and if 4
he found some'contaaination let's cleag it up.
p.) dur.Q -G Qx b& si c.o chszi o 04.
5 But also I want to know how careful I was bein ff 6
P.'. 247, line 7, insert "My technique, which was canon practice of all Level 8 and 9 tecnnicians, was that when I was testing trays of visibly 7
contaminated vials, af ter doing two or three trays, cepending on hos heavi1 3 contaminated on the outsioe the vials were, I would trush the acct:mulated g
creppings to the rear of the t.able, and wipe the first six inches or so witt a _ Kim wipe, which I would drop intb'the waste basket.
None of us had time, 9
when we were required to weigh five or nere trays, to step and co a real -
clean up between each sagle, or even eacn tray. We were under tre:nenoaus pressure to prcduce and release results. Pere trequent clean up wald
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10 cestroy our prcduction recore.", after "tecnnique."
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11 back l i'k e t h i~s,: and I'm holding the vial here, anc 1 m cbd44.M AM c r u,c i ble already in the b a l,a n c e.
And when 12 1 had a i closed the door, because I w a r, in the 13 he cam'e I
14 process o f -we ig h i ng and it,wa sn' t c om ple ted.
- Now pull back like that.
He 15 I@
, I e+
16 checked the, side.
All r ight.
He checked this 17 side.
Fine.
And I'm amazed.
I'm t h r i l l'e d in 18 myself.
These ar e my feelings.
l'm telling.you 19 the truth as l' felt that morning.
Because 1 20 thought my. technique is good, =eaning 1 was being 21 careful.
Because if I am d um pi n g powder here Elef FV W 22 e-1-O p p i-l y, my technique, I'm the one that's going 23 to suffer from it.
Because the air currents are 24 moving and you can see this, many times a pan will 25 become so contaminated you have to remove your 9
b n
e~e 1
i g
1 vial and not the vial but the crucible and re-weigh 4
2 with a clean one to get acc ur a t e we ig ht.
So I was 3
pleased.
He said it's fine.
I went back to work.
4 And I'm working.
And the only thing that's wrong 5
about.it in the whole set up as I told Bill maybe I s ho uldn' t h.a v e done.
But yet 6
Lacewell 7
this is something else that I think needs to be s P.a Q.Q ovu hr:e re.i rec. cw eLa e 'n >,ta qu).c.a l
a S
brought out.4 I h:d u"
-ed c:ut:;n ;c r" I;;; 01 5.vh abyJ.L whiL &n c h.BA legs c{uy 6L4. tv: /4<by Un TuH E'**
wer:
-'m
~^'e I'm not to d o.h i s job.
It~is his job 9
10 to watch f.o rf c o n t a= in a t i o n as Rad Safety 11 r e pr e s ent a tiv e and to be on the alert for.it.
-de-And he walked 12 444 r S "
ee
- 'r r ed :c u t I;a te m.
r and' I mad e' up my m i nd I was not going to bring
_ l'3 out t
c 14 it to his attention.
M a y b e~
I was wrong.
Maybe I
\\
e 15 was wrong.
But I had got fed up, clear up to here
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16 of, cleaning up behind babies who have no business.
17.
to work in.thq lab if t his is what they,have bee'n q.-':t m 7 ;.c o pa - r. p.u<.
- r. s w -. u e:te. :qs.J rr.y 41:f<..~.. rtWn e..,
. i. < f u s aN.1n.L 4,ts.
- a.,
18 doing on priot shifts.,, When I go out on my shift 19 I have cleaned up behind myself, my area, and 1 20 clean up as soon as I get done with my weighing.
21 Because I presume in my mind the possibility of 22 someone coming over and wanting to use that 23 balance.
And they hav e.
And I don't want them to 24 contaminate their items o themselves.
This is 25 logic.
This is being c onc er ned for other people.
][9%
1 2
3 4
5 6
7 8
9 1.0 (BY.MR. URYC)
What was the issue, now, 11 that you were r epr imand ed f or?
l'2
,A.
That I had d elib er a t ely contaminated 13 tables.
And this is the only table that I know of.
14 Q.
But you wer en' t given any specifics as i
15 to what exactly?
16 A.
No.
Not a c t ually in the letter does 17 it specify what table or what area that supposedly 18 I had c on t am in a t ed.
When I asked who my accu $ers 19 were, they refused to tell me who had made the 20 accusations.
And I don't know who made such an 21 accusation and why they would make accusations 22 like that.
But I do know I showed Bill Lacewell l
23 Sunday night where I put the caution tape.
Then I i
24 cold him the motive, the pur po s e why I've done it.
25 Because I had brought it to the attention of
2 953 1
ranagement enough.
And as I said to Bill, later, 2
maybe I should have cl e aned it up.
Later I got to 3
talking to Bill concerning this letter, and I 4
c alled him at his home.
I s a id, " Bill, do you 5
know why they have pulled me out of the lab?"
He 6
said no.
He. s a id no.
I s a id, ',' Y o u haven't heard 7
of the letter o f t he t r umpe d -up charge against me 8
that I have deliberately contaminated."
He said 9
no.
I said, "Wo ul d you like for me to read the 10 letter 'to yo.u?"
He said yes.
11 I read the whole letter to him.
And' 12 he wa s. j u s t-as shocked about it, because he knew 13 that I had requested the frisker from him.
He 14 gave me permission to use it.
He also knew I had i
15 put caution tape there; that I had refused to 16 clean up b.ehind these men; cnat it was an issue 17 and the supervisor should have contacted those 18 people and documented for d elib er at ely leaving 19 such there.
20 Q.
(BY MR. PEERY)
So it is a practice to 21 use the r ed tape to mark off contaminated areas, 22 or 23 A.
Wh en ev e r it should be.
But red tape 24 is used very little in that lab for cautioning.
25 Another thing I had noticed was safety hazards.
A
7g I
1 If*there were spills, s pill s were not marked o.ff 2
to caution ot h er p eo pl e.-
Red tape or caution tape 3
was'not put on containers o f acid and marked with 4
what kind of acid was in those containers.
This 5
was' C I noticed under t hi s-man ag em en t a defense 6
let down to good lab pr act ices in preventing 7
hazards from happening.
~
8 9
10 11 12 13 14 I
15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 l
25'
33 1
2 3
4 5
6 7
8 9
10 11 12 l
13 14 t
t 15 16
'Q.
(BY MR. WILLIAMSON)
You mentioned 17 that even though you d id n' t con s id er you had 18.
deliber ately contaminat ed your table, you were fed 19 up with c l'e an i ng it up?
20
~A.
Cleaning up the area;_cnat 21 con t am in a t ion on the legs t hat w'a s being done by a 22 prior shift.
See, when I wo uld leave out after 1
23 wo uld clean up, clean up these legs and clean up 24 the floor and all, and 1 knew there was no I
25 contamination there when I left out of the shift.
,q55 g 1
I w.o u l d come baek in and here it would be there 2
again.
I knew that it appeared to
=e like 3
somebody d eliber atly wa s doing it, or being sloppy, 4
o r,d i d n ' t care, and that =anagement was condoning 5
thi.s.. Jor why didn't the supervisors who at a 6
prior round table meeting said they were clamping 7
done on thi.s and that t hey were' going to be c
8 looking around in the areas to see that these 9
areas were cleaned up--
and I really feel that 10 something was going on, either it was to harass e
11 and Irficate.me and to g et.me angry, because that 12 was the one thing the s uperv i sor at the time was 13 trying to pinpoint on m e, that she gets upset and 14 angry and hollers out.
15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
2N 1
2 3
4 5
~
That day there was no such inter f acing 6
with the supervisor with me saying Vera, your area 7
is hot, you got to shut down, you got to clean up.'
8 There was no calling of other technicians to come.
9 into that area and help me do it.
Neither was 1 10 intetfaced by a supervisor.
I worked my full 11 eight 'h o ur s.
I've got paperwork printout that 12 actual 1y s h'o w e d that I wor k ed d ur ing the time
. 13 supposedly there was contamination.
Now, somebody 1
14 is lying.
And'I've got to exonerate those charges.
l 15 16 i
17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 1
25 l
QgO 1
2 3
4 5
A.
Right.
The deliberate c ont am in a t ion 6
of a table.
What table are they t al k ing of?
For 7
I had cleaned up that n ight,
I had time t o d econ.
8 And Bill knew I was cleaning up, doing some 9
housecleaning over and a bov e what I wo ul d 10 ordinarily do.
But it also was that same night 11 that T had put the caution tape on those legs.
12 And I told him, Bill, I don ' t intend to clean this 13 up anymore.
c 14 For you see, pr'i o r to that time,
- sir, 15 when I had been in on the shif t before, I cleaned 16 it up.
Twenty-four hours later I c c.e back in and 17 I f ind 'it again.
I told them.
'18 Q.
(BY HR. PEERY)
You're talking about 19' what you see visibly?
20 A.
Visibly.
And it was visibly.
In the 21 telephone conversation 22 Q.
What was it you were seeing exactly 23 that tells you it was c ont am ina t ed?
24 A.
It was uranyl l i o, u i d.
25 Q.
Yellow?
ava a
1 A.
Yellow liquid that appeared to be 2
poured down the legs and s pa t t e r ed on the in s id e 3
of the marble table:
Those tables weigh about 2,00 4
pounds, or each slab a b o ut 200 pounds, and it 5
takes the men working together to clean up that 6
area.
And it was on the inside,of the area on 7
those legs.
8 Q.
How do you think It got there?
9 From what you're d e scr ibing, doesn't sound as 10 though that it could 11
'A.
Run off of the top?
12 Q.
Run off of the table and get back on 13 the l e g '.
Sounds like the leg is back a ways.
14 A.
Yeah.
That's rfght.
I haven't
^
15 t ho ug h t about that.
Thank you, sir.
I don't ~know 16 how it got there, but it looked to me like it was I
17 d e l i b e r a t e l.y poured there or squirted there.
1 18-dun't know which.
I have no way of knowing.
Only 19 it was there and I brought it to his attention.
20 And I told Bill in that t el e phone conversation I'm i
21 sorry now that I didn't go ahead and clean it up l
22 and then just tell you I was never going to do it 23 again.
But if I had not s ho wn h im he wo uld not 24 have known what It looked like, what I was talking 25 abo ut.
And that tape meant this:
It was caution
.p g a 1
to, company wor.kers'this is hut, it's contaminated.
2 Q.
Did he acknowledge that it looked like 3
to him it was contaminated, too?
4 A.
Yes.
Number three was. failure to 5
clean up the contamination knowing that it existed.
6 Q.
(BY MR. URYC)
And that's when you put 7
the tape on the leg?
8 A.
No.
9 Q.
Is that what they're r e f er r.ing to 10 maybe?
11 4.
I would a s s ume.t ha t 's what they are.
12 Q.
.And you don' t know?
13 No.
I d on' t' know anything about this.
' 14 1 don't even know who my acc user s are.
B'ut I can
~
15 tell you this one thing:
There's only one person 16 I talked to in that lab conc ern ing the 17 contamination on the leg, and that was with Bill' 18 L a'c e w e ll.
19 20 1
21 22 23 24 25 i
FRcQ 1829
's3.sa.33 llel?
r I
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C NERAth ELECTRIC wa_
Gf NM E.ICTR>~ CCMMw e 175 Cutw.t AWN.4
- san JOSE. CA "CRA 9M25 i
April 25, 1985 1
'3 FREW Of INfDRMATON ACT REQUEST i
Mr Josep M.Th1 ton hh@
Dihector, Rules & Rec rds Diviskctn U.fl.' Nuclear Echulato y Cota=isslin m.[ QQ(ih5 WasIhington, D. C. 205L5 l
il
' Das Mr.
elton!
l Pursuant to the reedo of nfornation Act 5 USC 552 and 10 DR Part 9. I hereMy req:uest' dhe following:
j'StatementsbyVetaM.Engl l
t h regarding particular events whichoccurredijtheChemical-MetallurgicalLaboratoryat General Electric Ceepany's Wilmington, N. C. Fuel Manufacturing PlantbetweenMaeh9andfirch 11, 1984, inclusive, including,
~j but not 11hited o, all sta emente concerning spills or alleged spills a o any acti ns by her, if any, that were
]
taken regarding ny spille' er alleged spills. These i
statements appes in a 495 page transcript of an NRC intsrview with 'Vera k Eng ich dated ' July 11, 1984.
i Ceneral Electric requires is information to enable it to prareit,selfproperfyinaDehdrtmentofLaborproceeding.
Gener'al El' ctric believen thlat responding to this request will l
I l
+
o not' in any way interf re with any of the NRC's regulatory responsi-bil'ities dr ongbing a tivities.'
t If you hav'e any uestionskneerningthismatter,pleasecontact Joh'n K. Raatrick, Cou sel, Nucledt Energy Business Operations, t
, (4C 8) 925 3103.
6
.p Yery truly yours, l
l' l
g nw
- /A 6 ~[i ]
ward A. Firestone
-c,gn. '/../ '"f
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/ d-Counsel - Litigation g
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(
wasm%cto%.o c rom T-NUCLE AR REGUL ATORY COMMISSION M ] 4 EB5 Edward A. Firestone, Esquire General Electric Company 175 Curtner Avenue IN RESPONSE REFER San Jose, CA 95125 TO F01A-85-303
Dear Mr. Firestone:
This is in response to your letter dated April 25, 1985, in which you requested, pursuant to the Freedor. of Information Act (FOIA), copies of staterents by Vera English regarding events at the General Electric facility in North Carolina in March 1984 which are contained in a transcript of an NRC interview with Ms. English which was held on July 11 and 12, 1984.
The subject transcript is an investigatory record compiled for law enforcenent purposes and is being withheld from public disclosure pursuant to Exemption 7(A) of the FOIA (5 U.S.C. 552(b)(7)(A)) and 10 CFR 9.5(a)(7)(i) of the Comission's regulations, because disclosure of the information would interfere with an ongoing investigation.
Pursuant to 10 CFR 9.15 of the Comission's regulations, it has been deterrined that the inforFation withheld is exempt from production or disclosure and that its production or disclosure is contrary to the public interest. - The person responsible for this denial is Mr. Ben B. Hayes, Director, Office of Investigations.
This denial may be appealed to the Corrission within 30 ~ days froe the receipt of this letter. Any.suc~h appeal must be in writing, addressed to the Secretary of the Comission, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Cocrission, Washingtor, DC 20555, and shoulc clearly state or, the envelope and in thE letter that it is an "Appeel from an Initial FOIA Decision."
Sincerely,
\\
J. PC. Felton, Director Division of Rules and Records Office of Administration Q.!Y
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