ML101550546

TMI Typical Letter to Contaminated Individual

ML101550546
Person / Time
Site:	Three Mile Island
Issue date:	12/03/2009
From:	Dougherty T Exelon Nuclear
To:	NRC Region 1
References
FOIA/PA-2010-0118
Download: ML101550546 (3)

Text

coo~" E~xeo Nuclear December 3, 2009 Tom Dougherty Plant Manager Three Mile Island Unit 1 Route 441 South Middletown, PA 17057...owould firs-t-like-to express my appreciation for the work you are doing at Three Mile Island. Your efforts during this outagewill help us operate TMI Unit I safely and reliably throughout our, next operating cycle and well into the future.I sincerely appreciate your patience on the evening of Saturday, November 21. We take our commitment to radiological and industrial safety very seriously at TMI. Although time consuming, the follow-up actions we employed that night were necessary to provide us all with a clear and accurate assessment of the results. The events that evening resulted in l0 you and other workers. Accordingly, you may have questions and I hope to answer many of them in the enclosed document.The TMI team is committed to fully understanding why this occurred.

To support this eflort, a Root Cause team was formed to. identify all contributing factors, and corrective actions are in place to ensure this event does not reoccur. If you should have any questions now-or in the future, please contact the TMI Radiation Protection Department at 717-948-8190.

Thank you again for the work that you are performing at, Three Mile Island.Sincerely, Tom Dougherty Enclosure tma~n in Vthi morld was deleted in acO-OFc w~ *vtho rdWom of nfomiAfLo Reference Document for Employee Questions Re: 1R18 Outage Q. Why did I receive a whole body count?A. It is standard industry practice to use whole body counting to evaluate internal dosp to workers.

a whole body count to detect the amount of internal dose you may have received.

We monitor all workers that leave containment with a PM-7 M aui=.Because you alarmed that monitor, we had reason to believe that you may have received internal dose and required a whole body count. The whole body count instrumentation used to detect internal dose is very sensitive so that it can detect the yenrydlpifeels:,of radioactiye.material that may have been in your body.Q. Does the dose that I received pose any short or long term risks to me or my family?A. No. No workers initially exceeded even 1% of the allowed yearly NRC dose limit. (5.o w.f)The amount of internal dose received was very low, and less than what is typically received for a chest x-ray. Dose calculations following completion of whole body counting will be used as the basis for determining final total internal dose.Internal dose receivedis measured in units of millirem, the same as the external dose tl~at you receive while working inside a nuclear power plant. Please review the table below for the amount of dose that is received naturally from many activities, such as cross-, country flights or living in a brick house. If you had any internal contamination, the dose rates would be so low that it would notspose a risk to your familiy.Q. Can I transfer radioactive material to my- family members?A. The levels of contamination in your body are extremely low and will not result in dose to your family. It is highly improbable that you would transfer any of this internal contamination to youi"amiily members.Q. How long will the radioactive material stay in my body?A. The contamination is eliminated from the body via decay, digestion, respiration, and even perspiration.

The time it takes to remove the material depends on a number of factors including metabolism and where the material was deposited and may require from several days to weeks to be eliminated from your body.Q. How can I find out more about the amount of dose that I received?A. You can obtain an estimate of the dose you received while working at TMI by calling the Radiation Protection department at (717) 948-8597.Q. Isn't internal contamination more hazardous than external contamination/dose?

A. No, internal dose and external dose pose the sam 1r, adMogicalxriskto you.: Both are measured in terms of mrem therefore, internal dose is the same as external dose.

Q.Putting it in perspective, how much dose did I receive compared to other activities?

A. The chart below shows common sources of radiation and how many millirems (tmrem)are received from each activity.Natural Radiation 300 mrem per year Cross-Country Flight 5 mrem roundtrip Chest X-Ray 2-10 mrem Living in a Brick House 7 mrem per year Eating Potatoes 4-6 mrem per year Living Near a Nuclear Energy Plant < 1 mrem per year Dental X-Ray 2-3 mrem Chest X-Ray 2-10 mrem Head-Neck X-Ray 20 mrem CT Scan (full body) 1,000-2,000 mrem GI Series or Heart Catheterization 2,000-10,000 mrem You may find the following Website helpful in answering additional questions you may have: http://www.radiationanswers.org If you have any additional questions or concerns, please contact any of the following individuals:

Richard Davis, Site Radiation Protection Manager -(717)*948-8190 Willie Harris, Corporate Radiation Protection manager -(610) 765- 5350 Dave Ethridge, Site Technical Support Manager -(717) 948- 8875