ML20147E561

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Transcript of 850425 Investigative Interview of Js Wetmore in Parsippany,Nj.Pp 1-17
ML20147E561
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Site: 05000000
Issue date: 04/25/1985
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NRC COMMISSION (OCM)
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FOIA-87-696 NUDOCS 8801210155
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  • * '"**-* Y N 8801210155 880106 -

PDR FOIA NATIONWTDE COVERACE WEISSO7-696 PDR Ej(// "2Y

CR22862.2 1 BRT/dnw I

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 2

NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION 3

OFFICE OF INVESTIGATION 4

5 GPUN Headquarters 100 Interpace Parkway 0

Parsipanny, New Jersey 7

The Investigative Interview convened at 3:20 p.m.,

8I Richard A. :Tatakas , presiding.

9 PRESENT:

10 JACK SHERWIN WETMORE, Interviewee Manager of Plant Analysis RICHARD A. MATAKAS, Investigator I2 Region I Nuclear Regulatory Commission I3 King of Prussia, Pennsylvania ROBERT C. LA GRANGE 4

Section Leader 15 I EQ Branch

, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation 16 1!'

17 '

18 19 ,

li 20 I 21 22 23 I l

24 l 4., d Reponees, lm.

25 t

22862.2 2 BRT 1 PROCEEDINGS -

! 2 MR. MATAKAS: The date is April 25, 1985. The 3 time is 15:23. Present for this interview is myself, 4 Richard A. Matakas, investigator, U.S. hRC; Bob LaGrange, I

5 section leader of '"RC EQ branch, NRR; and Mr. Jack Sherwin  !

6 W etmor e , whose title is --

t 7 THE WITNESS: Manager of plant analysis.

8 MR. MATAKAS: The purpose of this interviews is 9 to discuss facts and circumstances leading to GPUN's ,

10 submittals to the NRC involving the environmental 11 qualification of electrical equipment at TMI Unit 1.

12 Mr. Wetmor e, do you have any objection to providing this 13 information under oath?

( 14 THE WITNESS: No.

15 Wharsupon, 16 JACK SHERWI.N WETMORE 17 was called as a witness and, having been first duly sworn, 18 was examined and testified as follows:

19 EXAMINATION 20 BY MR. MATAKAS:

21 O For the recora, would you provide us with your 22 business address and telephone number, please?

23 A GPU Nuclear Corporation, 100 Interpace Parkway, 24 Parsippany, N ew J ers ey . The phone number is area code 25 201-299-2317.

i

2286202 3 BRT 1 O If you would, just a general overview of your 2 education and work history?

3 A I have a degree in physics from Lowell 4 Technological Institute in Massachusetts. I had the Navy 5 nuclear power training, I worked for about a year and a 6 half to two years for Southerr. California Edison company 7 in California; 6-1/2 years wtth the Nuclear Regulatory 8 Commission in Bethesda; and I have been with GPU Nuclear 9 here since July of 1981.

10 0 Specifically, during which time periods were you 11 involved in licensing with GPUN?

12 A Yes, I was assigned to be the PWR -- manager of 13 PWR licensing, February 15th, '83.

14 O And how long did you maintain that position?

15 A I got my new assignment on S ept emb er 4, 1984.

16 Q During that time did Mr. Roy Harding work 17 directly under you?

18 A Yes, he did.

19 0 What was his position at that time?

20 A He was a senior er.7i neer, senior 2, which is the 21 high es t working level engineering position that we have.

22 O What I would like to show you is two documents 23 that were submitted to NRR during the time period that you 24 worked in licensing.

25 The first document is dated May 20, 1983. It has a

22862.2 4 BRT 1 letter, GPUN letter control number of 5211-83-157.

2 The second letter is dated February 10, 1984, has a 3 GPUN letter number of 5211-84-2038, and it is also to NRR.

4 Some of these letters, you'll note some notes on the 5 side. If you'll ignore those, those are my scribbles.

6 A Okay.

7 O First of all, do you recall the May 20, 1983 8 document?

9 A Yes.

10 0 What do you remember of it? Did you have any 11 input into it or just generally discuss your recollection 12 of it?

13 A As I recall, this was the lett.er that was 14 required to be filed by the regulations by this date, the 15 50.49 r egulation. It has, I see, th e thr ee pi ec es that i

16 w er e required to be in that l ett er .

! 17 I r ememb er - I can remember us discussing this - th e 18 approach, and the general s t ra t egy .

19 Q When you say "us" are you talking about yourself 20 and Mr. Harding?

l 21 A I can't remember specifically disc. ing this 22 with Roy. I can remember specifically discussing it with

( 23 Courtney Smyth, at th e site, Dick Chisholm, and Gerry Maus .

24 As I recall we had a meeting sometime before this May 20th 25 letter. I can't remember exactly when it war. As I l

i 1

1 i

22862.2 5 BRT 1 recall it was in Dick Chisholm's office, and we talked 1

2 about where we stood on the EQ issue and how we would go 3

about, you know, putting this letter together to comply 4 with the rule. I can ' t remember exactly when that was but, 5 you know, some weeks , I would imagine, before this May 20th 6 date.

7 Q Were you familiar with the DOR guidelines?

8 A Not intimately. I had been over them before and 9 I was aware generally of what the requirements were; yes.

10 Q The one statement in this May 20th letter under 11 s ection 1, "Saf ety Relat ed Electrical Equipment, " th e 12 second sentence states:

13 "The additional information we submitted in our 1stters 14 dated May 3, 1982 and May 16, 1983, support our l 15 conclusions that ec., W nents listed are qualified in l 16 accordance with DOR guidelines dated November 1979. " And i 17 thos e emnponents listed are the SCEW sheets tha t identify 18 components; there are two volumes of them, in the August

( 19 28, 1981 letter.

l 20 A Right.

l 21 O Ess entially thos e components are qualified in 22 accordance with DOR guidelines dated November 9, 1979.

23 At that meeting or any other time did anyone at least 24 give you the impression that the EQ program had satisfied 25 those requirements with regard to those component s?

22862.2 6 BRT 1 A Did they give me indication that they did not?

I' 2 O That they did? In other words, that that was a 3 true statement, either at that meeting or any subsequent 4 meeting?

5 A As I recall the discussion, the sense that I 6 recall was that what had been submitted before -- and 7 apparently these are the two letters when that information 8 was submitted -- contained all of the information that was 9 needed to support qualification for those components.

10 Okay? What was brought up in that meeting was the fact 11 that th e -- wa s it Franklin Research Corporation?

12 O TDR.

13 A -- had done a review of some of the information 14 that had been submitted and had some questions and some 15 discrepancies hed been identified. And the EQ people, as 16 I recall, were not clear on what those discrepancies meant 17 or exactly what --

you know, what could be done to correct 18 any deficiencies that they might have, you know, 19 id entifi ed ; and had asked for a meeting with the Staf f to l 30 get clarification on those points. And then to, you know, 21 ,rresumably after getting clarification, go off and fix 22 what it was we needed to fix.

l 23 As I recall, that was brought up in the meeting that we 24 had on this letter.

25 0 okay. Well, then, that would leave some doubt 1

22862.2 7 BRT 1 that, at least it sounds to me that that left some doubt I

2 in people's minds that the equipment was, in fact, 3 qualified in accordance with DOR guidelines. Is that true 4 or not?

5 A As I recall this was -- the way this came out, 6 at least f rom the EO people, was that they felt everything 7 was qualified. The discrepancies that they said had been 8 identified were along the lines of recordkeeping or 9 file-type problems, and they maintained that from a 10 technical standpoint they felt that everything was 11 qualifi ed .

12 O But part of DOR guidelines say that documented, 13 auditable records must be maintained. I don't know if you 14 are that intimately familiar with it, but section 8.0 15 states exactly that.

16 A Yes .

17 0 I don't know -- did that come to your mind when 18 this was being discussed? Were they essentially saying 19 that they lacked some documentation?

20 A No. Not as I recall.

21 0 Well, that was my understanding of what you were 22 just saying, that the problems identified were in the area 23 of documentation.

24 A Yes. But there was no admission, if you will, 25 on their part, that those discrepane: es were, in fact,

22862.2 8 BRT 1 real. Okay? That I can recall.

i 2 You know, the premise was that Franklin had looked at 3 this stuff, had some trouble understanding what our EQ 4 people had put together, and that what we had was a 5 misunderstanding between the two. They still maintained 6 that, you know, from a technical sta ndpoint our stuff was 7 qualified and they felt that the documentation was 8 ad equat e .

9 Q Was that Mr. Maus?

10 A Yes .

11 O Mr. Chisholm was also at the meeting?

12 A Yes.

13 Q Was he speaking in that context? or are we 14 talking about Mr. Maus?

15 A I don't r em ember . I don't think that 16 Mr. chisholm spoke to that issue.

17 Q Do you recall Mr. Maus speaking to that issue?

18 A That's what I was going over in my mind.

19 Q Okay.

20 A I can't remember him specifically speaking to

'l that issue at that meeting; okay? I may be recalling, you

_2 know, other conversations that we may have had over the 23 course of some weeks, and I can't say for sure that he, in 24 fact, said that at that meeting.

25 0 Okay. That meeting was specifically with regard

2286.2.2 9 BRT 1 to this response?

I Yes, it was.

2 A Yes.

3 O At other meetings or other contacts you had with 4 him, he did address the issue that we've just talked about?

5 Documentation in fact supporting that conclusion in the 6 May 20th lettar?

7 A I believe so; y es .

8 Q okay.

9 BY MR. LA GRANGY:

10 Q Yhis meeting took place prior to --

11 A To sending in this.

12 0 -- to sending in the response?

13 A Y es .

la Q Did Mr. Chisholm and Mr. Maus understand that 15 that meeting was to discuss the contents of this May 20, '83 16 1etter to be subumitted in response to 50.497 17 A At that time I don't think I had a letter 18 dra f t ed . What we got together -- was Courtney and I and 19 Chisholm and Maus, as I recall, sitting down talking about 20 how a response was to be developed. You know, what had l 21 been done in the past in way of EQ, and what type of a 22 letter we needed to put together. I don't think we had a 23 draft yet.

24 Q But they understood the discussion was about a 25 response to 50.49?

(

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22862.2 10 BRT 1 A Yes. We talked about the requirements of the

{ 2 rule and, you know, what we felt from a licensing 3 standpoint we needed to address in the letter.

4 BY MR. MATAKAS:

5 0 This particular letter, was it drafted by 6 Mr. Harding?

7 A To the best of my knowledge he probably did the 8 first draft; yes.

9 Q You mentioned that at least during some contacts 10 prior to this May 20th letter, that Mr. Maus gave you --

11 left you with the impression that the components within 12 the scope of 50.49 were qualified in accordance with DOR 13 guidelines?

14 A That's certainly the impression I had. I can't 15 pin it down to a specific time when he may have said that.

16 Q okay. I'm not asking for a specific time, but 17 was it prior to this May 20th submittal?

18 A G e e -- I don't know. I just can't recall.

19 0 Do you recall attending any other meetings 20 regarding this submittal?

21 A No. I don't.

22 0 Do you recall any other centacts with anfone in 23 EQ or Tech Functions, with regard to the environmental 24 qualification issue, of qualification?

25 A Prior to this letter?

22862.2 11 BRT 1 Q At any time.

2 A W ell , yes, we had other contacts. I believe, 3 you know, they would have been after this letter.

4 You know, there are contacts from time to time with the 5 technical organization. I'm sure I must have talked to 6 Boucher, or Roy Harding must have talked to Boucher --

7 trying to get the EQ issue addressed. I can't recall 8 specifically talking with anyone in EQ beyond Mr. Maus.

9 Q During the meeting that you do recall, prior to 10 the May 20th submittal, with regard to the May 20th 11 submittal, was it clear in your mind that the 12 understanding of this letter would be -- to answer this 13 letter was or was not the components listed in this 14 August 28, 1981 letter that those components would have to 15 be qualified? or were they not qualified? And tha t ' s 16 what we had to respond to? And "we" meaning GPUN, on May 17 20, 1983?

18 A Would you repeat that?

19 0 What I don't understand is, at first you left me 20 with the impression that Maus said: Yes, we have some 21 prob *1 ems . We believe that we are in compliance with DDR 22 guidelines. Our components are qualified within dor 23 guidelines.

24 A Y es .

25 0 And then later on you s* at ed that, well, ycu

22862.2 12 BRT 1 couldn't remember if it was that meeting or if it was

( 2 other contacts that he left you with that impression.

3 A Yes.

4 Q And, so, I'm going back to this meeting: What 5 input did he have? Do you recall specifically what input 6 he did have? May he have left you with that impression?

7 or are you telling me that you may be 5etting that 8 confused with later contacts with him?

9 A That's possible. As I said, I can't 10 specifically recall him saying anything to that effect in 11 that meeting.

12 O Okay. But later on you have a sense that he 13 lef t you with that impression?

I' 14 A, Yes.

15 0 Are you familiar with licensing procedure 0027 16 A Y es .

17 O Should there be something in the file, in this 18 case signed by Mr. Maus, indicating that he reviewed and 19 approved that document? I ' m not trying to trick you or 20 ask you f rom memory, but I thought you may k-ow off the 21 op of your head. In -'e licensing procedur :02 it has, 22 "A completed action item includes all of the following:

23 The assigned section has developed a full response or 24 taken all of the action required to fulfill the commitment 25 or requirement." And the assigned section would have been c

l 22862.2 13 .

BRT l

1 Mr. Maus' section. -

I f 2 A Yes.

3 O So what I'm asking, is there -- should there 4 have been something in the file to show that Mr. Maus had 5 reviewed and approved the May 20th letter, as well as th e 6 February 10, 1984 letter?

7 A W ell , the record that we used in licensing at 8 the time to signify who had concurred and who had signed 9 of f on letters is this sheet here which is atta ch ed .

10 Q This, for the record, is the "Project 11 Accountability Check Sheet"?

12 A Yes. And I see that Mr. Maus' name is not on 13' this check sheet.

14 o Well, there's two of them.

15 A oh. There 's one here. It looks like he is on 16 this one.

17 Q Righ t . It's my understanding in talking to 18 Mr. Harding that this second one that we are looking at 19 right now wa s pr epar ed by Mr . Harding. There were two of 20 them. One was prepared by Mr. Smyth be. use the signatures 21 were required out at th e s i t e .

22 A Yes.

l 23 O The only signature, under "Input" --

24 A Yes.

25 0 -- Maus --

is that Wetmore?

i

22862.2 14 BRT 1 A It looks like Wetmore to me.

i 2 O I'm looking upside-down, I think tha t 's Boucher.

3 A Boucher, and Smyth?

4 A And Smyth.

5 0 That's all the same handwriting, and I believe 6 it's the handwriting of Mr. Harding. But should there 7

have been something on this check sheet acknowl edged by 8 Mr. Maus that he had reviewed the document? Would that 9 have been normal procedure?

10 A Not n ec es sarily . The way we are set up with 11 this form, someone usually in a -- you know, at the 12 director level or perhaps below, would sign in the Tech 13 Punctions block here.

14 I see in this particular case it was Mr. Crcnenberger.

15 He would be relying on input from his organization, in 16 this case Chisholm and Haus, to support his signature on 17 here.

18 O That's what I wanted to know because it's not 19 clear to me reading over 002, it says "Licensing is 20 responsible for .ataining final approvals on c.  ::ng 1 regulatory correspondence. " And it says, "Reft o 22 appendix E," and I don't have appendix E.

23 I take that back. I do have it.

24 This, appendix E is a licensing correspondence check 25 sheet which is a little different than what we .re 1 coking l

2286202 15 BRT 1 at. It's a different sheet.

[ 2 A Yes. I think that 's a sample check sheet.

3 0 Number 7 says "Enter the names of the 4 individuals who of f ered significant input." It doesn't 5 say "signatures."

6 A Yes.

7 Q Final letter approvals are just noted by a 8 representative, a manager, operations --

9 A Right.

10 Q It is clear to me now.

11 Do you recall reviewing or having any input into the 12 February 10 letter 7 13 A I don't remember any specific input. I was

, 14 generally aware that this thing was being developed. I 15 was on a -- through the period of when this was done -- I 16 was on a special assignment to the of fice of the president.

17 So I didn't have, you know, as much oversight of section 18 activities that I normally had.

19 O Okay.

20 A From about th e first w eek in December of '83 21 until at:at mid-March of '84, I was out of the office a 22 good percentage of the time, probably over half of the 23 time.

24 Q Prior to that time were you involved in any 25 interaction or any meetings between QA and Tech Functions k

l l

l t

22862.2 16 i BRT 1 regarding environmental qualification?

f 2 A Prior to what time?

3 O Prior to December 1, l'J 8 3 .

4 A I can't remember. I don't thin). I was.

5 0 Are you familiar with any internal audits that 6 were conducted by GPUN on the environmental qualification 7 program?

8 A I am aware that an audit was conduct ed . I can't 9 recall when that was done.

10 Q Bow are you aware of it? What is your knowledge 11 of that?

12 A It seems to me in one of the meetings that we 13 had with NRC when they came up to audit the EQ files and

14 so forth, and uncovered some discrepancies in the files i 15 and so forth, and pointed those out, as I ressenber 16 Mr. Wilson decided at that point that he wanted to have l 17 the QA people look at the files and do a full QA audit.

18 And, as I recall, that was ordered and was complet ed and 19 there was a report. But I don't believe I ever saw the 20 report.

21 MR. MATAKAS: Do you have any other questions, 22 Bob?

23 MR. LA GRANGE: No. I don't think so.

24 BY MR. MATAKAS:

25 O Mr. Wetmore, did you appear here today of your i

i 228G2.2 17 I BRT l l

l 1 own free will? l f 2 A Yes.

3 0 Have any promises been made to you?

4 A No.

5 Q Have any threats been directed towards you?

6 A No.

7 Q Do you have anything you'd like to say or any 8 other comments?

9 A No.

10 MR. NATAKAS: The time is 16tSO. This will 11 conclude the interview.

12 (wher eupon, at 3:50 p.m., the interview was 13 concluded.)

14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 i

(

CERTIFICATE OF OFFICIAL REPORTER kk

~

This is to certify that the attached proceedings before the UNITED STATES NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION in the matter of:

NAME OF PROCEEDING: Investigative Interview of :

JACK SHERWIN WETMORE DOCKET NO.:

PLACE: Parsipanny, New Jersey DATE: Thursd'ay, April 25, 1985 ,

were held as herein appears, and that this is the original transcript thereof for the file of the~ United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

(siqt (TYPEDh [

l .Joel Breitner Official Reporter Repo!te EAhfk$$atkon#

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