STEVEN RAY GREEN AND ASSOCIATES 

NATIONALLY CERTIFIED COURT REPORTERS 

404/733-6070 

THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES 

PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE 

CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION 

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY AND HEALTH 

convenes the 

WORKING GROUP MEETING 

ADVISORY BOARD ON 

 

RADIATION AND WORKER HEALTH 

CHAPMAN VALVE

 

The verbatim transcript of the Working 

Group Meeting of the Advisory Board on Radiation and 

Worker Health held in Cincinnati, Ohio, on May 1, 

2008. 
2

C O N T E N T S

May 1, 2008 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS 6 

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, DFO 

INTRODUCTION BY CHAIR 10 

DR. JOHN POSTON 

DEAN STREET FACILITY 11 

INDIAN ORCHARD SITE 20 

ELEVATED SOIL SAMPLE RESULTS 34 

DISCUSSION OF DOE FOLLOW-UP INVESTIGATION 72 

RECOMMENDATION TO THE ABRWH 95 

COURT REPORTER’S CERTIFICATE 108 
3

TRANSCRIPT LEGEND

The following transcript contains quoted material. Such 

material is reproduced as read or spoken. 

In the following transcript: a dash (--) indicates 

an unintentional or purposeful interruption of a 

sentence. An ellipsis (. . .) indicates halting speech 

or an unfinished sentence in dialogue or omission(s) of 

word(s) when reading written material. 

-- (sic) denotes an incorrect usage or pronunciation 

of a word which is transcribed in its original form as 

reported. 

-- (phonetically) indicates a phonetic spelling of 

the word if no confirmation of the correct spelling is 

available. 

-- "uh-huh" represents an affirmative response, and 

"uh-uh" represents a negative response. 

 -- "*" denotes a spelling based on phonetics, 

without reference available. 

-- (inaudible)/ (unintelligible) signifies speaker 

failure, usually failure to use a microphone. 
4

 P A R T I C I P A N T S 

(By Group, in Alphabetical Order) 

DESIGNATED FEDERAL OFFICIAL

BRANCHE, Christine, Ph.D. 

Principal Associate Director 

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health 

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 

Washington, DC 

 

BOARD MEMBERSHIP

1 CLAWSON, Bradley 

2 Senior Operator, Nuclear Fuel Handling 

3 Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Laboratory 

GIBSON, Michael H. 

President 

Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical, and Energy Union 

Local 5-4200 

Miamisburg, Ohio 

GRIFFON, Mark A. 

President 

Creative Pollution Solutions, Inc. 

Salem, New Hampshire 

POSTON, John W., Sr., B.S., M.S., Ph.D. 

Professor, Texas A&M University 

College Station, Texas 

ROESSLER, Genevieve S., Ph.D. 

Professor Emeritus 

University of Florida 

Elysian, Minnesota 
5

IDENTIFIED PARTICIPANTS

ADAMS, NANCY, NIOSH 

BURGOS, ZAIDA, NIOSH 

HOWELL, EMILY, HHS 

KATZ, TED, NIOSH 

KOTSCH, JEFF, DOL 

MAKHIJANI, ARJUN, SC&A 

MAURO, JOHN, SC&A 

NETON, JIM, NIOSH 

ROLFES, MARK, NIOSH 
6

P R O C E E D I N G S

1 (10:00 a.m.) 

2 

WELCOME AND OPENING COMMENTS

DR. CHRISTINE BRANCHE, DFO

3 DR. BRANCHE: Good morning, and welcome to 

4 the working group meeting on Chapman Valve. I 

5 just want to make certain that I’ve got the 

6 right people for the right call. So this is 

7 the work group meeting for Chapman Valve. It 

is Thursday, May 1st 8 . I am Christine Branche. 

9 I’m the Designated Federal Official from 

10 NIOSH. 

11 And, Ray, you’re up? 

12 (affirmative response) 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Would the Board members in the 

14 room please announce your names please for the 

15 record? 

16 DR. POSTON: John Poston. 

17 DR. ROESSLER: Gen Roessler. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: Mark Griffon. 

19 MR. GIBSON: Mike Gibson. 

20 DR. BRANCHE: Are there any Board members 

21 participating by phone? 

22 (no response) 
7

1 DR. BRANCHE: Is there anybody on the line? 

2 If you could just please announce so I can 

3 make sure the line is working. 

4 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Yes, Christine, 

5 this is John. The line’s working fine. 

6 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you very much. 

7 Are there any Board members who’ve 

8 announced who have any conflict with Chapman 

9 Valve? 

10 (no response) 

11 DR. BRANCHE: We do not have a quorum of the 

12 Board so we can go on. NIOSH staff in the 

13 room, would you please announce your names? 

14 MR. ROLFES: Mark Rolfes, NIOSH, no 

15 conflicts. 

16 DR. NETON: Jim Neton, NIOSH, no conflicts. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Are there any Oak Ridge staff 

18 on the line? I’m sorry, any NIOSH staff on 

19 the phone would you please announce your names 

20 and say whether or not you have a conflict 

21 with Chapman Valve? 

22 MR. KATZ (by Telephone): Yes, Ted Katz, 

23 NIOSH, no conflict. 

24 MS. ADAMS (by Telephone): Nancy Adams, 

25 NIOSH, no conflicts. 
8

1 MS. BURGOS (by Telephone): Zaida Burgos, 

2 NIOSH, no conflict. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you. 

4 Are there any Oak Ridge staff on the 

5 line? And if you are, would please identify 

6 your name and say if you have a conflict with 

7 Chapman Valve? 

8 (no response) 

9 DR. BRANCHE: SC&A staff participating in 

10 the room, please? If you could please say if 

11 you have a conflict. 

12 DR. MAKHIJANI: Arjun Makhijani, no 

13 conflict. 

14 DR. BRANCHE: SC&A staff by phone? 

15 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): John Mauro, no 

16 conflict. 

17 DR. BRANCHE: Other federal agency staff? 

18 MS. HOWELL: Emily Howell, HHS, no conflict. 

19 MR. KOTSCH (by Telephone): Jeff Kotsch, 

20 Labor. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: Are there petitioners or their 

22 representatives on the phone who would like to 

23 identify their names? 

24 (no response) 

25 DR. BRANCHE: Any workers or their 
9

1 representatives on the line who would like -- 

2 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER (by Telephone): Yes. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Sir, would you like to 

4 identify your name or just want us to know 

5 that you’re there? 

6 UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER (by Telephone): 

7 Representing for Theodore Quall (ph), 

8 deceased. 

9 DR. BRANCHE: Thank you very much. 

10 Are there any members of Congress or 

11 their representatives on the line? 

12 (no response) 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Are there any others who would 

14 like to mention their names? 

15 (no response) 

16 DR. BRANCHE: Before I hand it over to Dr. 

17 Poston, I would just ask that those of you who 

18 are participating by phone, we appreciate that 

19 you’re there. And we would ask that you mute 

20 your phones. If you have a mute button, then 

21 please use it. However, if you do not have a 

22 mute button, then please dial star six to mute 

23 your line. And then when you are ready to 

24 speak you can use that same star six to unmute 

25 your phone. 
10

1 I understand from Dr. Poston that we 

2 will not be taking a lunch break, but we might 

3 be taking other biology breaks as necessary. 

4 So please understand that we will be working 

5 through. And again, thank you for muting your 

6 phones, and we do ask that you stick with us 

7 today. 

8 And, Dr. Poston, it’s all yours. 

9 INTRODUCTION BY CHAIR

10 DR. POSTON: Thank you, Dr. Branche. 

11 First, I want to welcome everyone 

12 here. I know it was a short fuse trying to 

13 get this meeting put together. I appreciate 

14 the fact that we have everyone here face-to15 face as opposed to on the telephone. I did 

16 finally get out an agenda on Tuesday, and I 

17 think everyone has a copy of that. I’d like 

18 to stick to that as much as possible, but I’d 

19 see if there’s any additions or anything that 

20 we need to add to the agenda. 

21 (no response) 

22 DR. POSTON: Hearing no additions, then 

23 we’ll just assume that this is the accepted 

24 agenda. As Dr. Branche indicated and I 

25 indicated to you in e-mails, I would like to 
11

1 try to finish today about 2:30. If we have to 

2 have an additional meeting, then we’ll do 

3 that. We’ll try to schedule that at some 

4 time, but I think there’s a lot of things that 

5 we can do today that perhaps would resolve a 

6 number of the issues. 

7 DEAN STREET FACILITY

8 The first thing I’d like to do is try 

9 to agree on those things upon which we can 

10 agree so that then we can focus our efforts 

11 and our energies on those things that need 

12 discussion and resolution. And so I have put 

13 down as the first item for discussion the 

14 impact of adding the Dean Street facility to 

15 the Chapman Valve cohort, and exactly how that 

16 would play into the work of this working 

17 group. And I’ll try to explain what I mean by 

18 that. 

19 As I understand it -- and I’m subject 

20 to being corrected -- there’s a specific time 

21 period over which we’re considering this 

22 cohort. And that time period is in the 1940-

23 ’49 timeframe. And even according to the SC&A 

24 review, the Dean Street facility was 

25 dismantled essentially immediately after, or 
12

1 at least was abandoned immediately after the 

2 dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima and 

3 Nagasaki. So it’s unclear to me what impact 

4 adding the Dean Street facility to the site 

5 actually has as an impact on this, on what 

6 we’ve been doing so far. 

7 So is that a correct assumption? 

8 DR. MAKHIJANI: Dr. Poston, just a 

9 clarification of what’s in the SC&A report. 

10 The only information in this as you know is 

11 from that interview. And in the interview it 

12 was that the work that was described by the 

13 interviewee about cleaning the manifolds was 

14 terminated immediately after the end of World 

15 War II. 

16 DR. POSTON: Well, what your report actually 

17 says is you began -- and I read the report on 

18 the plane again to make sure that I had it 

19 correct. The report actually says they began 

20 packing things and moving out of that facility 

21 immediately after Hiroshima. 

22 DR. MAKHIJANI: Right, that’s what -- 

23 DR. POSTON: Well, that’s -- 

24 DR. MAKHIJANI: That’s according, all I’m 

25 saying is that in the report, everything in 
13

1 the report about the Dean Street facility -- 

2 as you know, well, there are two reports of 

3 SC&A. But in the first report, everything 

4 about the report and the Dean Street facility 

5 was based on the site expert interview. In 

6 the second report we reviewed the documents 

7 also provided by DOE, which are only Manhattan 

8 Project documents. And as you know, we didn’t 

9 do a review beyond that at the instruction of 

10 the working group. 

11 And so just for the record, what is in 

12 the SC&A report is really based on the DOE and 

13 Manhattan Project records and what happened 

14 after World War II in terms of work at the 

15 Dean Street facility based only on the site 

16 expert interview. That’s it, and I just 

17 wanted to say that. 

18 DR. POSTON: So let’s get back to the 

19 question. Does the addition of that facility 

20 to the site because there were no activities 

21 after World War II, does that have any impact 

22 on the evaluation of this, the original 

23 Chapman Valve facility that we were charged to 

24 review? 

25 DR. BRANCHE: Before you begin responding, 
14

1 again, if everyone on the line would please 

2 mute your phone, it will enhance the quality 

3 of everyone on the line being able to hear. 

4 We hear some typing. We hear some typing on 

5 the line. If you don’t have a mute button, 

6 then please use star six. 

7 I’m sorry, Dr. Poston. 

8 DR. POSTON: That’s all right. 

9 I mean, I’m trying to understand this 

10 situation. Maybe Emily could help. The 

11 charge to the committee was to look at this 

12 particular timeframe, and there was a certain 

13 activity inside of that timeframe that was 

14 going on. And we’ve established that that was 

15 only a small portion of this year and a half 

16 or so time period. And since the Dean Street 

17 facility was added, that to me doesn’t have 

18 any impact on what we’ve done so far, but I’m 

19 ready to be corrected by members of the work 

20 group that see it differently. 

21 MR. GRIFFON: I guess that’s the question is 

22 that if the expert’s account is accurate, then 

23 it would fall outside that time period. I 

24 guess that’s true. I don’t know if NIOSH has 

25 done any other, I don’t think so based on 
15

1 what’s on the O drive you haven’t found any 

2 other documents to corroborate that or to 

3 modify that opinion. But I mean, I guess 

4 that’s -- 

5 DR. NETON: The only thing I can point to is 

6 the H.K. Ferguson report is very explicit as 

7 to what work was done and where and how in the 

8 1948 and ’49 timeframe for AEC operations. 

9 And nowhere in that report does it mention 

10 anything about a Dean Street, interaction with 

11 the Dean Street facility as far as the 

12 preparation of the slugs. Now, I can’t speak 

13 to what went on at Dean Street now other than 

14 what the site subject expert said at Chapman 

15 Valve that after the war, it seemed to have 

16 been put to bed so to speak. But I can’t 

17 speak as to what happened. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: And I guess if the Dean Street 

19 facility operated into a later time period, it 

20 could still be treated separately, right? I 

21 mean, I don’t think we’re locked out of that 

22 time period. So either way we could separate 

23 Dean Street, I guess. 

24 DR. POSTON: You know how you solve 

25 problems. You define what the problem is 
16

1 first, define what it is. And it appears to 

2 me that if we take the opposite view, that 

3 there’s nothing to refute or substantiate, 

4 then we just dissolve the work group because 

5 we can’t go forward because we don’t know. 

6 But based on what I think we know or 

7 the lack of records, then I think we need to 

8 not worry about the Dean Street facility and 

9 consider the facility that we’ve been, that 

10 we’ve put so much effort into already. And if 

11 we can agree on that, then we can move 

12 forward. 

13 MR. GRIFFON: I mean, I think as long as we 

14 can legally treat it separately I guess that 

15 seems reasonable to me. 

16 MS. HOWELL: My understanding of what the 

17 Department of Energy and the Department of 

18 Labor have done at the facility is that they 

19 just said that Dean Street is now considered 

20 part of the facility. And in other classes we 

21 have certainly split various physical areas of 

22 a facility. So I don’t think that acting on 

23 the main portion of Chapman Valve and not 

24 acting on the Dean Street portion would 

25 preclude you from being able, if information 
17

1 was found or it was determined that a lack of 

2 information was substantial enough, to later 

3 have a class. 

4 DR. NETON: Well, let’s be careful because, 

5 if you recall at the last Board meeting, we 

6 modified the proposed class definition to 

7 include Dean Street. Right now it reads all 

8 employees who were involved in work at Chapman 

9 Valve manufacturing facility, i.e., Building 

10 23 and the Dean Street facility. So if the 

11 class is decided not to be added, for example, 

12 then that would imply that Dean Street would 

13 have been -- 

14 MS. HOWELL: But you could -- 

15 DR. NETON: -- but new information could 

16 always -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: For that time period, yeah. 

18 DR. NETON: Yeah, for ’48 and ’49. 

19 MS. HOWELL: New information can open it, 

20 and if NIOSH and the Board members were 

21 agreed, you could also renew, I mean, we could 

22 go back to the old definition that was -- 

23 MR. GRIFFON: If we didn’t say Dean Street 

24 in there, I think we could -- 

25 DR. NETON: Yeah, we’re not required to have 
18

1 Dean Street in. We just added it because it’s 

2 part of the facility. 

3 DR. POSTON: Would we have to make a formal 

4 decision to go back to the old definition or 

5 can we -- 

6 MR. GRIFFON: I think the Board can make 

7 their own definition, too, right? 

8 DR. NETON: It can happen several ways. 

9 Either NIOSH could amend their definition if 

10 we chose to or the Board could, in voting on 

11 this, just restrict their change. 

12 MS. HOWELL: And the Board and NIOSH don’t 

13 have to have the same definition. It’s 

14 certainly helpful when we do, but it’s not a 

15 requirement. 

16 DR. POSTON: So would it be appropriate for 

17 this work group to bring a recommendation to 

18 the Board that those be separated? Is that 

19 what we’re saying? 

20 DR. ROESSLER: To me it’s most easy to 

21 understand a way to do it. Otherwise, we’re 

22 always going to come back to the same 

23 discussion and talk about dates and talk about 

24 the lack of any information for including it. 

25 DR. BRANCHE: I think it would help your 
19

1 fellow Board members who are not on the work 

2 group to know what your thoughts are. 

3 Whatever your recommendations are be able to 

4 provide them in writing and present them in 

5 such a form will facilitate it at the Board 

6 meeting. 

7 DR. POSTON: Well, working group members, is 

8 there an objection to or is there agreement 

9 that we should make a recommendation to the 

10 Board that these be separated? 

11 DR. ROESSLER: By separated do you mean go 

12 back to the original -- 

13 DR. POSTON: Right, go back to the original 

14 definitions where we’re just going to focus on 

15 the Indian Orchard. We don’t have any data on 

16 the, or very little. 

17 Mike, how do you feel? 

18 MR. GIBSON: Yeah, that’s fine. 

19 DR. POSTON: Okay, so we’ve agreed that 

20 we’ll go back. So I’ll make, at our next 

21 Board meeting I’ll make a recommendation that 

22 we go back to the original definition because 

23 keeping the two together makes our job almost 

24 impossible. 

25 Well, we’re having a nice discussion. 
20

1 I’m taking a minute here to write this down so 

2 the old man doesn’t forget. 

3 INDIAN ORCHARD SITE

4 Since we’ve done that I’d like to sort 

5 of interpose a three and a half agenda item 

6 here and see if there’s a couple of other 

7 things that we can agree on since now we’re 

8 focusing on the Indian Orchard site. Is it 

9 generally agreed among the working group 

10 members that the external dosimetry that is 

11 from the film badges and so forth is 

12 sufficient to reconstruct doses? 

13 MR. GRIFFON: I think the data was there for 

14 that. 

15 DR. POSTON: So there’s general agreement 

16 that the external dose then the records are 

17 sufficient to -- 

18 MR. GRIFFON: Can be bounded, yeah. 

19 DR. POSTON: -- so that we can bound them. 

20 So what I’m trying to do is peel this onion or 

21 whatever you want to call it. 

22 So that brings us to the internal dose 

23 assessment situation, and I, as I told Arjun, 

24 I re-read the SC&A report and found it very 

25 interesting as they went to some of the other 
21

1 places like Simonds Saw and so forth. And I 

2 forget the words you used in your report, but 

3 it’s amazing, unbelievable or something 

4 agreement between the results at Chapman Valve 

5 and the results at some of the similar 

6 facilities. 

7 DR. MAKHIJANI: I think the revision was not 

8 done by me, so I don’t remember the exact 

9 words. 

10 DR. NETON: Which report are we speaking 

11 about? 

12 DR. MAKHIJANI: This must be the earlier -- 

13 DR. POSTON: This is the earlier one, 2/06. 

14 DR. NETON: Oh, the original draft. 

15 DR. MAKHIJANI: But I do remember there was 

16 a fair amount of discourse about these 

17 bioassay records. 

18 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): This is John 

Mauro. The December 6th 19 report goes into quite 

20 a bit of detail on the bioassay records and 

21 sort of like to validate the bioassay records. 

22 What they would mean in terms of what kind of 

23 air dust loading you might have to have to get 

24 that kind of urine, uranium concentration in 

25 urine comparing that to the large array of 
22

1 different sites where we do have air sampling 

2 data. So there’s quite a bit of work went 

into the December 6th 3 report. It’s a 

4 relatively large report not only on the 

5 external but also on the internal. But, of 

6 course, the internal focused entirely on 

7 natural uranium. 

8 DR. POSTON: Well, I guess I was caught, I 

9 came up short here, John, because when I sent 

10 you an e-mail asking you to send me the latest 

11 report, your staff sent me the 2/06 report so 

12 that was the one I read thinking that was the 

13 latest one. 

14 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Oh, that’s an 

15 error on our part. Yeah, of course, there’s 

16 the later report, March 2008, which was 

17 prepared by Arjun and reviewed by me which 

18 specifically addresses I would say the delta 

19 issue related to Dean Street and the 

20 radiochemical issues related to enriched 

21 uranium. So it’s unfortunate -- well, I guess 

it’s good you looked at the December 6th 22 

23 because that’s sort of like a baseline, the 

24 rock we’re standing on. 

25 And many of the issues by the way that 
23

are identified in the December 6th 1 report 

2 related to the fire and there are a number of 

3 issues that we do raise. All of these have 

4 been addressed and I believe resolved to the 

5 satisfaction of the working group except for 

6 the matter of Dean Street and the enriched 

7 uranium matter. 

8 There’s one other issue that I believe 

9 that really has not been addressed has to do 

10 with the later years and using data obtained 

11 during the FUSRAP Program characterization to 

12 reconstruct the doses to people who worked at 

13 the facility after termination of AEC 

14 operations at Chapman Valve. We really never 

15 talked about some of our concerns there. I 

16 would think that that kind of concern leans 

17 more toward a site profile, but I wouldn’t, 

18 I’ll certainly leave that to the working 

19 group. It’s really a matter of how do you use 

20 the available data to characterize internal 

21 and external exposures post operations from 

22 residual radioactivity. We really never 

23 talked about that. 

24 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): John? I’m 

25 calling for John Poston. I just wanted to 
24

1 make sure that John Poston knew that Brad 

2 Clawson was on the line. I apologize, but I 

3 had a meeting overrun into this one, and that 

4 I am board. I wanted to let John Poston know 

5 that I am on the line. 

6 DR. POSTON: Great, Brad, thank you very 

7 much. 

8 DR. ROESSLER: John Mauro, this is Gen. 

9 What years are you talking about on the later 

10 comment that you had? 

11 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): After the period 

12 of operations, which I believe is a year, year 

13 and a half, 1948, ’49, ’50, that timeframe. 

14 Then there is -- in fact, the way the petition 

15 is written, there’s various time periods that 

16 follow operations that are addressed. And one 

17 of our concerns was that once operations 

18 terminated where the majority of the exposures 

19 of concern, then you move into this residual 

20 period where all you really have is some clean 

21 up. There’s certainly quite a bit of clean up 

22 took place, and we describe that in some 

detail in the December 6th 23 report. But there’s 

24 always the question, okay, what do we do about 

25 the residual radioactivity. And there was the 
25

1 FUSRAP work that took place, I believe, in the 

2 1990s where they fully characterized the 

3 residual activity. And, of course, that was 

4 the basis for further FUSRAP clean up 

5 activities. Now, one of the concerns we 

6 expressed, I believe, was that the data that 

7 was collected in support of the FUSRAP clean 

8 up was used, which was done many, many years 

9 later, I believe in the ‘90s -- 

10 DR. MAKHIJANI: ‘Ninety-two. 

11 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): ‘Ninety-two. Was 

12 used, in other words the Becquerels per meter 

13 squared contamination on surfaces. And then 

14 knowing that level of contamination in theory 

15 you could predict what the inhalation 

16 exposures may be based on resuspension. What 

17 they did is they took that characterization 

18 and assigned that level of contamination to 

19 the post-operation years at Chapman Valve 

20 which goes all the way back, I believe, to the 

21 much earlier years, back 30 years or more. 

22 And we were concerned that you really can’t do 

23 that. There might be a better way to come at 

24 the problem than to use because so much time 

25 has passed by there’s some question whether 
26

1 you can back extrapolate that way. And there 

2 may be better ways in which you could come at 

3 the question of exposure to residual 

4 radioactivity. We never really talked about 

5 that issue. 

6 DR. NETON: John, let me remind you about 

7 the proposed class definition only covers ’48, 

8 ’49 and the petition requested ’91 through 

9 ’95. There was no petition here evaluating 

10 ’50 through ’90 at all. 

11 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Okay, so the -- 

12 DR. NETON: That period, it was silent in 

13 this evaluation for it because that was not 

14 petitioned. 

15 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): No problem then, 

16 so the resolution is that that issue really 

17 goes away as long as we’re only dealing with 

18 the period of operation. 

19 DR. NETON: It’s a profile issue, but it’s 

20 not been evaluated in this evaluation report. 

21 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Okay, then that 

22 helps. Thank you. 

23 MR. GRIFFON: But can you clarify, Jim, in 

24 the later part of ’49 I thought there was a 

25 back extrapolation technique used there, too, 
27

1 or no? 

2 DR. NETON: Yes, yeah, we would use a back 

3 extrapolation technique to go back into the 

4 period, but that technique is not being 

5 evaluated in this evaluation report. 

6 MR. GRIFFON: I thought it was for the -- 

7 DR. NETON: The ’91. 

8 MR. GRIFFON: -- last six months of ’49. 

9 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Mark, I believe 

10 you’re correct. I’m looking at, I believe 

there’s a May 1st 11 , 1949, -- 

MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, to December 31st 12 , yeah. 

13 DR. MAKHIJANI: I believe there is an eight14 month period in 1949 -- 

15 DR. NETON: We’ve been through this before. 

16 I mean, we’ve discussed that. We looked at 

17 operations they conducted and -- I didn’t come 

18 prepared to discuss -- 

19 MR. GRIFFON: I need to refresh my memory, 

20 but I think -- 

21 DR. NETON: But that’s not what John’s 

22 talking about. 

23 MR. GRIFFON: Oh, I thought he was. I 

24 thought that was in part. I mean, it extends 

25 beyond -- 
28

1 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Let me clarify. 

2 I have to go back and read it again. I was 

3 sort of trying to read through it all early 

4 this morning. There are time periods that are 

5 residual radioactivity periods. The question 

6 I have is, are any of the residual 

7 radioactivity periods included within the 

8 scope of the matters we’re discussing today? 

9 DR. NETON: Yes, and that’s 1991 through 

10 ’93. That’s what was evaluated in this SEC 

11 evaluation. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: So not those last eight months 

13 of ’49? 

14 DR. NETON: Eight months of ’49 are 

15 included, but those are not, we don’t consider 

16 those residual. Those are considered part of 

17 the work activities. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: How was the dose -- 

19 DR. NETON: And you’re right. There were 

20 bioassay samples that were taken somewhere 

21 before the end of the operations. 

22 MR. ROLFES: I think the last date of 

bioassay was October 7th 23 , 1948. That was the 

24 last day based on the H.K. Ferguson document 

25 that we have. There is some information on 
29

1 the decontamination proceedings that were 

documented. This is dated January 17th 2 , 1949. 

3 It goes through the extent of the 

4 contamination that was observed at the site. 

5 I believe what we did in the site profile was 

6 to extend the intakes beyond 1948 in order to 

7 be claimant favorable. The information that’s 

8 presented in the H.K. Ferguson document 

9 indicates that the contract was actually 

10 completed, that the production of the slugs 

11 was completed by the end of 1948. 

12 DR. MAKHIJANI: There’s just no 

13 clarification about the dates. I’ve got the 

14 ER, Evaluation Report, open here and what it 

15 said, just for clarity as to what it said. 

16 For purpose of this evaluation the period from 

17 January 1, 1948 through April ’49 is evaluated 

18 as the operational period -- semi-colon. The 

19 periods from May 1, 1949 through December 31, 

20 1949, and from January 1, 1991 through 

21 December 31, 1993 are evaluated as residual 

22 radioactivity periods. 

23 DR. NETON: That’s what, okay, you’re right; 

24 you’re right. So those six months -- 

25 DR. MAKHIJANI: Yeah, eight. 
30

1 DR. NETON: Did we not -- 

2 MR. GRIFFON: And that’s the question. Was 

3 there bioassay data there or was that back 

4 extrapolated from FUSREP-type survey data? 

5 MR. ROLFES: For the 1949 period I believe 

6 we just extended the intakes based on the 

7 previously calculated intakes based off those 

8 bioassay -- 

9 DR. NETON: I believe we assumed the chronic 

10 intake for the entire time period based on the 

11 bioassay that was collected during the 

12 operational period. In other words it wasn’t 

13 modeled as a residual contamination issue ‘til 

14 ’49. 

15 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Jim, that might 

16 be my mistake because when I reviewed the work 

17 -- now we’re talking about the report -- 

18 DR. NETON: See, I didn’t know we were going 

19 to go back into this bioassay issue again. 

20 DR. MAKHIJANI: Yeah, I think on page -- I’m 

21 also not fully prepared for this, but just 

22 looking at the ER on page 21 of the evaluation 

23 report just about 7.1.1.2, there’s a very 

24 short two-sentence paragraph for the post25 April ’39-’49 residual radioactivity period. 
31

1 NIOSH reviewed the file containing the 

2 radiological survey data used in the 

3 development of the residual radioactivity 

4 portion of the Chapman TBD. So this would 

5 indicate that the ’92 data were used for that 

6 eight-month period, I think. 

7 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): That’s my 

8 recollection also, Arjun. 

9 DR. MAKHIJANI: The ’92. This is my 

10 recollection, also from doing the TBD review 

11 that was carried over into the ER. 

12 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): That was my 

13 recollection, too, Arjun. And right now I’m 

14 looking at our report. Yes, and I believe 

15 it’s absolutely what was done. And we 

16 expressed some concern about that. 

17 DR. NETON: That might have been changed in 

18 our review. Let’s see, I’m looking. Bear 

19 with me here. I think either way if we 

20 didn’t, it certainly would be bounding to use 

21 the bioassay data through the end of ’49 which 

22 is what I thought we had done. 

23 DR. POSTON: That’s what I thought you did. 

24 DR. NETON: Estimation internal exposure 

25 uranium bioassay. Summary for the operational 
32

1 period, 1/1/48 through four. It does stop 

2 4/30/1949; that’s correct. You’re right. So 

for that period from ’48, from May 1st 3 -- wait 

4 a minute, through ’49. 

DR. MAKHIJANI: May 1st 5 of ’49, I think, yes. 

DR. NETON: May 1st 6 of ’49. 

DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Yeah, May 1st 7 , ’49 

through December 31st 8 , ’49 is the area at 

9 question. And I believe you did use the back 

10 extrapolation as opposed to forward 

11 extrapolation. 

12 DR. NETON: Right, okay. 

13 MR. GRIFFON: I mean, I sort of, John 

14 started this whole thing by saying it was 

15 maybe a site profile issue, too. 

16 DR. NETON: We’ve got the site data here and 

17 Mark just pointed out that we’ve got the 

18 January 1949 survey data from the H.K. 

19 Ferguson report which is obviously much more 

20 contemporary. So between those two pieces of 

21 information, I’m pretty comfortable that we 

22 can bound those exposures. 

23 MR. GRIFFON: We may have disagreement on 

24 how it’s done right now, but it might be a 

25 site profile discussion. 
33

1 DR. ROESSLER: So what is the conclusion 

2 with regard to the SEC event periods that 

3 we’re talking about? Are you in agreement 

4 that this is a reasonable approach, the 

bounding from, and the dates, May 1st 5 , 1949 to 

December 31st 6 ? 

7 MR. GRIFFON: Well, that’s the separate 

8 discussion. And I guess I’d want to qualify 

9 my answer to your previous question, too, Jim, 

10 that on the external dose I think if under the 

11 premise that everything that the operations 

12 are only as discussed in the H.K. Ferguson 

13 document, I’d say that the external data they 

14 have can be used to bound. But my problem is 

15 going back to this question of was there other 

16 operations there that are not described. And 

17 this gets back to the americium-uranium sample 

18 which we’re going to, it’s further on in our 

19 agenda. But, I mean, if there was different 

20 stuff going on there, then that raises 

21 questions of bounding the external. 

22 DR. POSTON: Of course, of course. But 

23 based on what documents we have, and as I say, 

24 if you’re going to put a caveat on everything, 

25 we just as well dissolve the group and go away 
34

1 and say we can’t -- 

2 MR. GRIFFON: I’m not the one putting an 

3 asterisk on the U-235 sample, so you know. 

4 DR. POSTON: I mean, I think we have to 

5 resolve that, and that’s why it’s next on the 

6 agenda. I really want to understand that. I 

7 mean, even today with our modern computer 

8 techniques and so forth that we have with 

9 radiation detectors, it’s easy to have 

10 radionuclides that show up in the spectrum be 

11 identified as something else which is -- I 

12 just want to learn more and understand more, 

13 and I’m somewhat skeptical right now because 

14 it’s so close to, it could be close to natural 

15 uranium. So are we okay on the periods now? 

16 (no response) 

17 DR. POSTON: Okay, and so all right, I’ve 

18 got your caveat about if we understand that 

19 there’s further activities going on or we 

20 discover other activities, then that may not 

21 apply. But as we see it now the external dose 

22 is not an issue based on the availability of 

23 the dosimetry data. We can bound it. 

24 ELEVATED SOIL SAMPLE RESULTS

25 How about the soil sample results? I 
35

1 looked at that again, and I’m somewhat 

2 confused I must admit. Maybe someone else can 

3 help me like Arjun or Jim or somebody. 

4 DR. NETON: I can provide some, it’s new 

5 information, and I don’t know if it’s going to 

6 be helpful, but it’s new. After the last 

7 Board meeting we contacted, I attempted 

8 through various channels to get a hold of the 

9 authors of the -- 

10 DR. MAKHIJANI: May I interrupt? Is there a 

11 piece of paper that we can be looking at while 

12 you’re speaking from this new information? 

13 DR. NETON: It’s going to be about four 

14 sentences. 

15 DR. MAKHIJANI: Oh, okay, okay. 

16 MR. ELLIOTT: It’s not a document. 

17 DR. MAKHIJANI: I thought there was a new 

18 analysis. 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: It’s a status report because 

20 at the last working group meeting I think it 

21 was you, Arjun, that suggested has anybody 

22 talked to whoever -- maybe it was -- can we 

23 find the guy that did the analysis. 

24 DR. NETON: This is not new data. This is 

25 new information. 
36

1 DR. POSTON: As I told the NCRP in my paper 

2 a couple weeks ago, this is a new technique 

3 called listening. I don’t have any slides, no 

4 PowerPoint, no anything. They had to listen 

5 to what I had to say. 

6 DR. NETON: So what we did was through 

7 various channels I tried to find get a hold of 

8 one of the authors. It turns out that Ray 

9 Foley, one of the authors of the 1992 FUSREP 

10 Report, authored by Foley and Uziel, has 

11 retired from Oak Ridge National Laboratory but 

12 is available for discussion. 

13 And I’ve had a couple phone 

14 conversations with him now, and he’s agreed to 

15 work on our behalf to try to shed some light 

16 on the nature of this sample. I only had 

17 quick call with him. He was on his way to Oak 

18 Ridge National Lab to try to figure out -- he 

19 knows where these records all are. 

20 But he in his mind is not clear what 

21 type of analysis was done. I asked him 

22 specifically was it alpha, gamma or neutron, 

23 and he said he wasn’t sure because they were 

24 changing techniques around that time period. 

25 Originally he thought it would have been 
37

1 neutron, but then he backed off into I’m not 

2 sure. We were changing our analytical 

3 protocols during that time period. 

4 So I hope to have a better update on 

5 exactly what happened, but he’s working on 

6 that right now. The bottom line is even the 

7 author of the report right now doesn’t know 

8 how they did the analysis. 

9 MR. GRIFFON: Maybe he can find the reports, 

10 too. That would be great, right? 

11 DR. NETON: Well, he actually, he was going 

12 to the lab to look at the data cards. He 

13 knows where they were. He was a team leader 

14 and was actually there collecting the samples, 

15 was in charge of the collection of the samples 

16 and the analysis of them. So if anyone should 

17 be able to help us shed more light on this, I 

18 expect he will, but we’re not there yet. So 

19 that’s what’s, Larry’s correct. It’s a status 

20 update. 

21 MR. ELLIOTT: We hope to be there within a 

22 matter of days maybe. I don’t know, a month? 

23 I don’t know. Before the next board meeting? 

24 I don’t know. 

25 MR. GRIFFON: There’s a glimmer of hope 
38

1 there anyway. 

2 DR. NETON: It may be that those results are 

3 gone because we heard through other channels 

4 that those results may have been either 

5 destroyed or transferred somewhere where no 

6 one knew. But I’m confident if anyone could 

7 find them, Ray Foley, who knew where they were 

8 stored originally, should be able to. 

9 So that’s where we’re at. Given any 

10 of those three techniques, I’m not sure, NIOSH 

11 is certainly not in a position to say anything 

12 about the 2.16 percent number yet. Because we 

13 have no idea how they were analyzed. 

14 MR. GRIFFON: Did you follow up at all on 

15 naval operations? Because my question is if, 

16 I just have this, I think there was some 

17 information in a newspaper, some naval work 

18 was done there. And that could have been, I 

19 don’t even know if it was radiological naval 

20 work. 

21 DR. NETON: I did look into that a little 

22 bit. I didn’t contact the Department of the 

23 Navy or anything like that, but -- 

24 MR. GRIFFON: But if they worked with 

25 enriched with the Navy -- 
39

1 DR. NETON: There were naval manifolds being 

2 made back there. Recently in one of the work 

3 group meetings that we had where someone 

4 indicated in 1943 timeframe possibly they were 

5 manufacturing valves for the Navy. They did a 

6 fair amount of contract work for the Navy as 

7 well. 

8 MR. ROLFES: There’s a picture in a 

9 newspaper article of a valve that was produced 

10 at Chapman Valve for naval applications. The 

11 valve which weighed 15,000 pounds was made of 

12 special corrosion-resistant ^ tight steel. 

13 The mammoth casting is part of the Chapman 

14 project to manufacture for atomic power 

15 installations. So, yeah, they did -- 

16 DR. POSTON: ‘Forty-three? 

17 MR. ROLFES: Yeah, that’s -- 

18 DR. POSTON: I’m saying Navy in ’43? 

19 DR. MAKHIJANI: This would have been for the 

20 Manhattan Project, atomic power. 

21 MR. ROLFES: There were separate contracts 

22 for the Navy as well, yes. They did produce, 

23 it was in the later years, Crane Company did 

24 produce, they had an atomic power division 

25 that produced valves. Chapman Valve was 
40

1 bought out by Crane Company in roughly 1958, 

2 and they did do additional work in the more 

3 recent time period for nuclear reactors and 

4 for the Navy as well. 

5 DR. MAKHIJANI: Would this be the Naval Lab 

6 in Washington that they were working for? 

7 MR. ROLFES: I don’t know. 

8 DR. NETON: It said that this one person who 

9 was interviewed in the worker outreach meeting 

10 that was conducted around 2005 talked about 

11 work for the Navy that was done in 1943 and 

12 1945. He specifically remembered doing some 

13 radiography on these units to check the 

14 integrity of the valves for the U.S. Navy. 

15 The exposed film was sent to the hospital. 

16 This was in ’43, ’45. The Navy compiled the 

17 X-rays. At least his recollection there was 

18 work in ’43 and ’44 for the Navy at the same 

19 time. 

20 The other piece of information, for 

21 example, that’s interesting -- I’ve re-read 

22 almost all this stuff again -- is that when 

23 Bechtel went in there to, you know, in 1992 

24 ORNL went in and did a FUSREP survey, and they 

25 identified the areas of contamination. 
41

1 Bechtel then went in 1995, and using those 

2 measurements, went about decontaminating the 

3 facility. 

4 They, of course, identified that hot 

5 spot again. But in their report they indicate 

6 that that spot, they had to actually dig out 

7 the ramp to get to the contamination that was 

8 underneath the ramp. Kind of interesting, 

9 they used a jackhammer to pull out all the 

10 concrete to get to this contamination they dug 

11 out and shipped off. They don’t characterize 

12 it at all unfortunately. But it was almost 

13 like fill material that was there of some type 

14 which leads me into this next area where the 

15 floor was made with fire brick in certain 

16 places. 

17 If you look at the Bechtel report they 

18 talk about the floor was made of wood, three19 by-three-by-five wooden blocks. So they 

20 essentially made a parquet floor out of, you 

21 know, the five inch went deep and then three22 by-three on top, and they made a block floor 

23 out of it. Where those blocks had eroded or 

24 become decayed, the report says they replaced 

25 them with fire bricks. 
42

1 So I don’t know if that adds anything 

2 to it at all or not, but fire bricks are known 

3 to contain a fair amount of natural 

4 radioactivity, if you look around, up to 38 

5 micro R per hour which is amazingly close to 

6 the reading of 32, I think, that was taken at 

7 that area. That’s all speculation, just 

8 things that are sort of, that are available. 

9 DR. POSTON: So to summarize, we basically 

10 have an opportunity maybe within a few days, 

11 maybe within some period of time to have some 

12 information to help to shed more light on this 

13 one sample, that soil sample, and how it was 

14 measured and so forth. 

15 DR. NETON: I think there’s one more piece. 

16 If you look at all of the health protection 

17 measurements that were made for Bechtel clean 

18 up, they were all made assuming that they were 

19 working with natural uranium. If you look at 

20 the values they would take air samples and 

21 transport them in the natural uranium intakes 

22 and that sort of thing. So in their mind they 

23 were dealing with a natural uranium 

24 contamination problem. 

25 DR. MAKHIJANI: It seemed like it was an 
43

1 assumption. 

2 DR. NETON: Yeah, it was. They didn’t do 

3 any more spectroscopy on them, but you’re 

4 right. They assumed they were working with 

5 natural uranium. 

6 DR. POSTON: Well, I guess to continue this 

7 discussion, I’m trying to understand what is 

8 the impact of this one sample on you folks in 

9 NIOSH to assessing doses. I mean, for 

10 internal exposure, I guess in my feeble mind, 

11 taking the approach that they did is a huge, 

12 huge overestimate of the potential internal 

13 doses for the workers. But I guess I can in 

14 the spirit of discussion, I’d be glad to hear 

15 someone else’s opinion on that. 

16 MR. GRIFFON: Well, it’s not the issue of 

17 dose assessment, I mean, as we’ve discussed 

18 before, it’s the issue of your whole story 

19 revolves around natural uranium, and here’s an 

20 outlier that doesn’t fit the story. So was 

21 something else going on there? I mean, if it 

22 was only two percent enriched, then I would 

23 think, sure, you can adjust your intakes, and 

24 you’re already doing an overestimating 

25 technique. I would agree then. 
44

1 But everything says they only worked 

2 with natural uranium, and you have this 

3 potentially outlying sample here that doesn’t 

4 sort of fit the story line of the facility. 

5 So the question in my mind is what else, was 

6 anything else going on there or is this, you 

7 know, I mean, that’s the question. It’s more 

8 than can we adjust the dose a little higher by 

9 assuming two percent enriched. That’s not 

10 really the question. 

11 DR. POSTON: Yeah, but I understand your, 

12 from a scientific standpoint I understand what 

13 you’re asking, but it appears to be an 

14 unanswerable question. We don’t have the 

15 data. No one’s turned up the data to indicate 

16 that anything’s going on that is a, that one 

17 sample is an anomaly. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: Well, it’s one out of two. So 

19 if you want to look at it that way. 

20 DR. POSTON: And when we talked to the folks 

21 up there, we immediately jumped to the fact 

22 that it may have come from Oak Ridge from one 

23 of the manifolds, but there’s no evidence to 

24 show that there were any manifolds shipped 

25 back to Chapman Valve for testing. It was 
45

1 only ones that were tested were shipped out. 

2 So even there’s a conflict between what the 

3 folks are telling us in the interviews and 

4 what paperwork there is to indicate what 

5 direction things went. 

6 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): John, this is 

7 Brad Clawson. That’s very true, and I agree 

8 with that. We have not found anything that 

9 has said that there were any manifolds or 

10 anything, but we have not found anything that 

11 says that there wasn’t either. This is part 

12 of the problem with a lot of these buildings 

13 and so forth like this. And we’ve had this 

14 with other site profiles and so forth like 

15 this. 

16 We’ve got into it, and they’ve said, 

17 well, we can’t find any information for this 

18 and that, and then all of a sudden stuff 

19 appears three years down the road out of some 

20 other place. I can’t, on my conscience, be 

21 able to say that there wasn’t something else 

22 that was going on there. 

23 We see this at numerous facilities 

24 that a lot of these sites were interconnected 

25 with one another and did work with one 
46

1 another. And just because we can’t find a lot 

2 of this paperwork does not mean that it didn’t 

3 happen though. 

4 This is what we’ve got to come to, and 

5 I understand your issue with not, being an 

6 unanswerable question, but this is what this 

7 whole system was set up to be able to do. You 

8 know, Dean Street wasn’t even into the part of 

9 it at the very beginning of it. 

10 There’s a lot of unanswered questions, 

11 and we’ve got to research these the best that 

12 we can to make sure that when we give this to 

13 the rest of the Board, that we have uncovered 

14 every rock that there is. 

15 DR. POSTON: So should I adjourn the 

16 meeting, and we should go look? I mean, what 

17 do you, what are you saying? 

18 MR. GIBSON: I’m with Brad. I mean, was 

19 this an anomaly or not? And if you’re just 

20 going to depend on DOE’s records to rewrite 

21 history, I think we all agree, that’s why this 

22 program’s in effect because of DOE’s poor 

23 record keeping. So you can’t look at the 

24 records that are there that they have 

25 generated and maintained as an adequate record 
47

1 of history. 

2 DR. POSTON: What are you going to use, 

3 Mike? 

4 MR. GIBSON: Well, I would value more a 

5 worker’s opinion even if it was a worker that 

6 was 80 years old than DOE records. 

7 DR. POSTON: I’m not saying that we 

8 discounted the ^. I’ve said it a couple 

9 times, you know, I went up there with Arjun 

10 and John, and we heard what they had to say. 

11 And even though there are no records that 

12 those manifolds came back, the folks 

13 remembered it quite well, and they pointed to 

14 a window and said they were about as big as 

15 this window. And Mark was there, and they 

16 have very vivid memories. 

17 MR. GIBSON: We’re not going to get an 

18 answer for what we’re going, we should use, 

19 but I don’t think we can just -- 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Well, I mean, but, John, you 

21 also said we’ve got an unanswerable question. 

22 But I think the law allowed for that 

23 potential, and that’s why we have the SEC. If 

24 you can’t answer a question, then we have a 

25 timeliness issue and a bounding issue. 
48

1 DR. NETON: Can I point one thing out 

2 though? I’ve said this several times, but 

3 maybe it bears repeating again. The SEC class 

4 is specifically for evaluating the exposures 

5 in Building 23. That was a 16-by-200 foot 

6 area carved out, the project was carved out. 

7 And that’s what we reconstructed. 

8 We have very good details of all the 

9 material that was used in that project for 

10 this year and a half, which was uranium slugs, 

11 natural uranium slugs, no indication of any 

12 enriched uranium being processed in the 

13 facility. It was specifically put in place 

14 for this project. I see no evidence of any 

15 enriched uranium being used or in this little 

16 area. I don’t disagree that we don’t know 

17 what happened outside of Building 23, but 

18 that’s not what we’re looking at. 

19 MR. GRIFFON: But the sample. We’ve been 

20 through this, too, Jim, the sample was in 

21 Building 23. It might not have been in -- 

22 DR. NETON: Yeah, underneath the loading 

23 dock. They would jackhammer out -- 

24 MR. GRIFFON: It wasn’t a soil sample first 

25 of all, right? 
49

1 DR. NETON: Yes, it was. 

2 MR. GRIFFON: I don’t think they 

3 jackhammered to get the sample, did they? 

4 DR. NETON: Not the sample, but it was a 

5 couple centimeters worth of soil, which is 

6 about 120 picocuries per gram. What I’m 

7 saying is how does that affect the 

8 reconstruction of this project that went on in 

9 that building. And that’s the only project we 

10 know went on there because it was an AEC 

11 secret project with guards stationed at the 

12 entrance. There’s no evidence that anything 

13 else happened inside this little 60-by-200 

14 foot area. 

15 MR. ROLFES: I’ll add a statement from this 

16 report -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: The only piece of evidence is 

18 that one, is the sample, the sample that we’ve 

19 been talking about for months. 

20 DR. NETON: Yeah, right. But if you’re 

21 going to throw away all that data and say, 

22 well, that one sample trumps -- 

23 MR. GRIFFON: So do you throw away one out 

24 of -- again, this is 50 percent of the samples 

25 that came up enriched. It only took two that 
50

1 they did, did isotopic analysis on. 

2 DR. NETON: So are you saying then that 

3 there was enriched uranium throughout Building 

4 23 that we don’t know where it came from? 

5 MR. GRIFFON: I’m saying I don’t know. And 

6 I’m saying I agree with you. Everything we’ve 

7 seen about that project indicates -- or was 

8 that the only project in Building 23? I don’t 

9 know. 

10 DR. NETON: The way it’s written up it is. 

11 MR. ROLFES: The DOE researched their 

12 information and that was the only thing that 

13 they had found under this contract that 

14 occurred at Chapman Valve, under Contract 74 -

15 - 

16 DR. NETON: Radiologically, and now you’re 

17 also talking about a sample that was taken and 

18 was found 50 years later after the project, 

19 and now you’re saying, well, it more than 

20 likely, could have likely happened in the 

21 middle of the project where we have no 

22 indication that there was any other 

23 radiological work going on. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: We’re in the tricky position 

25 of refuting data that we’re later going to 
51

1 rely on for doing these back estimates for the 

2 resuspension doses and everything else. I 

3 mean, we’ve relied on FUSREP data in quite a 

4 bit of the site profiles, I believe, to back 

5 extrapolate things for non-active periods, and 

6 now because one sample doesn’t sort of fit the 

7 bill here, we’re saying it might be, we don’t 

8 even know, but there might be uncertainty -- 

9 DR. NETON: Are you saying all the samples 

10 they didn’t measure for enriched then, are 

11 probably enriched now? Is that what you’re 

12 saying? 

13 MR. GRIFFON: No, I’m just saying you’re 

14 saying you can throw this one out because it 

15 doesn’t fit the story line. That’s what I’m 

16 concerned about. We can’t just ignore it 

17 because it doesn’t fit the story. 

18 DR. POSTON: But we’re not ignoring it. Jim 

19 just stated he was -- 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Right, so you’re following up 

21 on that. I think that’s where we’re at with 

22 that one. I don’t know. 

23 DR. POSTON: We have no intention of 

24 ignoring it. We’re trying to understand it. 

25 I mean, I certainly would like to understand 
52

1 it better. 

2 MR. GRIFFON: Me, too, and I’m not, I put it 

3 out there the question in my mind of the other 

4 things including other non-covered, like the 

5 naval operations because a lot of these 

6 facilities did do naval nuclear work. And if 

7 that is tracked back and we find out that they 

8 were working with enriched uranium from the 

9 Navy, that could very well explain the sample, 

10 and it’s not even covered, so we don’t, you 

11 know, we wouldn’t have to do anything with it 

12 really. 

13 DR. POSTON: Well, they wouldn’t have been 

14 doing any work for the nuclear Navy in 1948. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: No. 

16 DR. POSTON: And this is the thing I raised 

17 at the very beginning. Are we going to focus 

18 on that period where we feel like we have good 

19 data as to what went on in that room in that 

20 facility or are we going to look at all other 

21 eventualities? I mean, maybe something did go 

22 on. I don’t know. I don’t understand the 

23 sample yet. But the sample was collected a 

24 long time after this activity was over. We’ve 

25 found no evidence that they did anything but 
53

1 uranium rods and cutting and knelling (ph) 

2 those rods, and then shipping them to 

3 Brookhaven for use in the reactor. I haven’t 

4 seen any evidence anyone has brought forward 

5 that says there was something else going on. 

6 If there was, then isn’t it appropriate that 

7 we do something else? I’m trying to bound 

8 this problem for this working group. And 

9 we’re what-iffing ourselves to death here 

10 outside our timeframe. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: I think you have seen evidence 

12 that they’ve done something else, and that’s 

13 that sample. 

14 DR. POSTON: That one sample, yeah. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: Well, you haven’t seen no 

16 evidence. 

17 DR. POSTON: We’ve seen that one sample, one 

18 out of two. You can play that either way, 

19 Mark. But the fact is I’m trying to bound 

20 this problem so that we can make a decision or 

21 delay it further and wait for what we hear 

22 from Oak Ridge, from the work that Jim’s 

23 doing. 

24 MR. ELLIOTT: I think it’s appropriately 

25 stated to wait until we can get some more 
54

1 information or resolution as best we can on 

2 that sample, but I think it bears saying that 

3 it’s so difficult to prove a negative here, 

4 and we may not find more information about 

5 that sample. And the working group’s going to 

6 be faced with what you’re still faced with 

7 today. I think you know that’s stating the 

8 obvious I guess. 

9 MR. GRIFFON: I mean, but the other thing 

10 you can do is to at least lay out how we can 

11 separate Dean Street out. I mean, I think 

12 that’s a reasonable thing. 

13 MR. ELLIOTT: Separate Dean Street? I’m 

14 sorry. I was preoccupied. When I first sat 

15 down in here you all were talking about that. 

16 DR. POSTON: The Dean Street facility has 

17 been added, but we decided that since there 

18 was a different period, that we would 

19 recommend to the Board that it be taken out 

20 again so that we have a problem that we can 

21 get our hands around. So we agreed to do 

22 that. 

23 Well, Mark, you mentioned that -- this 

24 Mark -- you mentioned the fact that we could 

25 do the calculations using the elevated uranium 
55

1 sample or using data from the elevated uranium 

2 sample and recalculate the internal doses. 

3 You said that was a possibility. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, it’s not a question of -

5 - 

6 DR. POSTON: It’s not going to change the 

7 doses significantly. 

8 MR. GRIFFON: Right, not being able to bound 

9 the doses. It’s a question of do we know the 

10 operations that went on there. 

11 DR. NETON: Well, ^ machining operations in 

12 Building 23. We know that. 

13 MR. GRIFFON: The what? 

14 DR. NETON: Machining operations, grinding, 

15 cutting, sawing. 

16 MR. ROLFES: Every step of the process is 

17 clearly detailed in the H.K. Ferguson. 

18 DR. NETON: ^ brought in special machines. 

19 You know what the airborne is going to be in 

20 Building 23 based on the bioassay data. 

21 MR. GRIFFON: I mean in terms of the 

22 materials the question of was there, other 

23 than what’s described in the H.K. Ferguson, 

24 was there something else that went on in that 

25 building. And it certainly could have been 
56

1 later or earlier. In my mind it was probably 

2 later, but I don’t know that overlapped that 

3 one ’48-’49 period. 

4 DR. NETON: What I’m saying though is if 

5 they did something with uranium that was 

6 enriched in Building 23 in 1948 and ’49, we 

7 have diagrams and layouts of all the machines 

8 and operations that would have been conducted 

9 there. And we have bioassay samples on what 

10 we believe will represent workers from that 

11 operation. So if they did process enriched 

12 uranium, we could double the dose from the 

13 intakes or double the dose of enriched 

14 uranium. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: Number one, that hasn’t been 

16 put on the table, your evaluation report. But 

17 number two, I mean I would almost think that’s 

18 just this question of throwing a higher number 

19 at the problem, you know. You haven’t really 

20 answered whether they really did enriched 

21 work. You’re just going to say, well, -- 

22 DR. NETON: All we’re saying is, say that 

23 you can’t. Say it never comes to light, any 

24 of these records, we’ll still have no 

25 knowledge of that. So then what we’re saying 
57

1 is if it’s the general belief that enriched 

2 uranium was processed there, then that’s how 

3 we’ll, an approach. 

4 MR. GRIFFON: That’s a possibility. 

5 DR. POSTON: Well, yeah, it seems to me in 

6 an effort to move forward if we make that 

7 assumption that’s a reasonable assumption. 

8 DR. MAKHIJANI: I don’t know. I think there 

9 may be some technical difficulty with that 

10 because there was processed steel, regular 

11 work going on in that building after 1949. 

12 And so, and that’s, of course, the natural 

13 uranium gets deposited. So when you measure 

14 something that had layers of natural uranium 

15 deposited on it from other contamination, then 

16 I don’t know what the procedure would be to 

17 determine the actual enrichment of the work 

18 that was done. 

19 Presuming if there was work that was 

20 done, I think it would be a big problem in my 

21 mind, a technical issue as to what the 

22 enrichment was. Basically, I think it’s an 

23 issue of determining whether there was 

24 anything done or not in my opinion. 

25 DR. NETON: If we’re forced to prove a 
58

1 negative that’s not going to happen. We can’t 

2 do that if that’s the standard. 

3 DR. ROESSLER: What would you propose is the 

4 worst-case scenario during that timeframe? 

5 Describe to me what you think could be the 

6 worst case, and then I think we have to look 

7 at that and decide how would it affect the 

8 doses. That’s, after all, what we’re after. 

9 DR. MAKHIJANI: I actually would be very 

10 hesitant to say because anything that I said 

11 would be just speculation because -- 

12 DR. POSTON: I agree with that. 

13 DR. NETON: I totally agree with that. 

14 DR. MAKHIJANI: It would be completely 

15 speculation. All we know is that they tested 

16 two samples for enrichment and assumed 

17 everything else was natural, and one of the 

18 two came up with this measurement that is 

19 being investigated. So that’s not a lot of 

20 information to go on. 

21 MR. ELLIOTT: What was the purpose of that 

22 sampling effort? What can we say about that? 

23 DR. ROESSLER: Good question. Good 

24 question. 

25 MR. ROLFES: I just wanted to say that there 
59

1 wasn’t an assumption that everything else was 

2 natural uranium. It is very clearly 

3 documented that in the machining of uranium 

4 for Brookhaven reactor, the very first 

5 sentence states the metal for the Brookhaven 

6 reactor consisted of natural uranium slugs of 

7 the same overall dimensions as those used at 

8 Clinton, and it goes on. 

9 MR. GRIFFON: I think it is worth running 

10 down, I mean, maybe we come up empty, but 

11 because that question, you know, if that’s the 

12 case, and if what you guys are, and what we’ve 

13 found so far is the case, it strikes me that 

14 nobody would have addressed that in those 

15 reports when they did the, when they come out 

16 with a 2.1, 2.2 percent. 

17 DR. NETON: I asked that question. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: There has to be some 

19 explanation like wait a second, we weren’t 

20 expecting this and then -- 

21 MR. ELLIOTT: Go back and -- 

22 MR. GRIFFON: Resample or something, yeah, 

23 but we don’t have any of that. Maybe they did 

24 it. 

25 DR. NETON: I specifically asked Ray Foley 
60

1 that question. They were not going in there 

2 with any expectations in mind other than they 

3 were a contaminated ^. They kind of had a 

4 general knowledge of what went on. And I 

5 asked him why they specifically chose that 

6 sample to analyze. And he said because it was 

7 one of the first samples they saw, and it had 

8 a high -- 

9 MR. GRIFFON: High exposure, right, right. 

10 DR. NETON: So that just triggered their 

11 mind, and they pulled it. 

12 DR. MAKHIJANI: Don’t misunderstand the 

13 import of what I said. I agree with you, 

14 Mark, that if you look at the documentation 

15 from the period about what they were doing in 

16 regard to the machining and the Brookhaven, 

17 they were doing, I mean, the best, most 

18 sensible conclusion from the documentation is 

19 that they were doing natural uranium slugs for 

20 the Brookhaven reactor. 

21 What I said in regard to the 

22 assumption is directly from the 1987 Oak Ridge 

23 measurement protocols is when they took these 

24 samples, they analyzed the U-235 content, and 

25 they assumed that the samples were natural 
61

1 uranium and calculated the U-238 from that. I 

2 mean, that’s stated in the -- 

3 MR. GRIFFON: ^ methodology. 

4 DR. MAKHIJANI: So that’s the FUSRAP 

5 methodology that was adopted, and then they 

6 did these two samples to investigate whether 

7 there was enriched uranium or not, and we have 

8 the result. So that’s just a matter of what 

9 they did during the FUSRAP and not the 

10 documentation from the period. 

11 DR. NETON: Right, I think it would stretch 

12 credibility to believe that all those samples 

13 were nothing more than natural uranium up in 

14 the rafters and the joists because we know 

15 what they did. They processed tons of uranium 

16 through that facility, and it’s pretty 

17 contaminated and to suggest that it’s not 

18 natural uranium would be plausible. 

19 MR. GIBSON: Just look at samples from the 

20 rafters and everything else, you know, to me 

21 the structure of that floor and the way it was 

22 built was wooden blocks. That porous material 

23 will absorb any history that that building has 

24 had, and you can go by and take a survey and 

25 not see something one day, and the next day 
62

1 when the weather changes, you’re going to have 

2 contamination showing up. 

3 I mean, that was the same at Mound in 

4 M Building. Floors were made like that to 

5 absorb vibration of machines. But supposedly 

6 no hot work was done in M Building, but they 

7 take surveys through there for years, and 

8 there’s nothing. One day they’ll come through 

9 there, and they’ll have to rope off total 

10 areas as contamination areas. A month later 

11 it goes away. 

12 DR. NETON: All I can say to that is that 

13 this act is to reconstruct dose from AEC 

14 operations and activities. We have right now 

15 knowledge of two contracts only that Chapman 

16 Valve had with the AEC. One was the 

17 manufacture of valves that were original 

18 valves that were shipped to Y-12. The second 

19 one is to process these slugs. There’s no 

20 other contracts that have come forward that we 

21 know about that they did any other radioactive 

22 work for AEC. That’s all we have. 

23 MR. ELLIOTT: We asked DOE specifically -- 

24 DR. NETON: And DOE went and combed their 

25 records -- 
63

1 MR. ELLIOTT: -- to look for that. So if 

2 your assumption is that this enriched sample 

3 may represent other work that’s not been 

4 characterized, you also are presuming in that 

5 assumption that DOE, for whatever reason, is 

6 being inaccurate in their response to did they 

7 have other information. 

8 But at the end of that day -- the 

9 Board can exercise its prerogative -- but at 

10 the end of the day we’re only going to be able 

11 to reconstruct the dose on what’s called, you 

12 know, uncovered exposure for the activity 

13 that’s designated at that facility. But we 

14 can’t presume or you can recommend that there 

15 may have been something else that happened, 

16 but we can’t presume it did unless we have 

17 some documentation to support that. 

18 MR. GIBSON: Well, I’m not necessarily 

19 saying it’s even a covered activity. But I’m 

20 just saying that type of material is going to 

21 absorb every bit of history that’s ever been 

22 there. 

23 MR. ELLIOTT: I don’t disagree with you at 

24 all. 

25 MR. GIBSON: It could be someone just 
64

1 dragging something through the building. 

2 MR. ELLIOTT: They run a little tow motor in 

3 one building and bring it into the next 

4 building with that floor and run it across 

5 that floor, sure. 

6 DR. NETON: I guess it’s my point though is 

7 if it’s not a covered activity that happened 

8 during ’48 and ’49, it’s not relevant for our 

9 evaluation report. 

10 MR. GIBSON: I don’t think that’s clear at 

11 this point. 

12 DR. NETON: We don’t have any contract in 

13 1948 and ’49 other than this contract right 

14 now that generated any kind of radioactive 

15 contaminant. We can’t find any. There’s none 

16 we can locate. 

17 MR. GIBSON: Again, I fall back on DOE’s 

18 poor record keeping history. Oversight at 

19 30,000 feet throughout their history. 

20 DR. NETON: Well, and you can say that, but 

21 -- 

22 MR. ROLFES: They did do well on the 

23 documentation presented in the H.K. Ferguson 

24 report. I could certainly say that they did a 

25 very good job. This is a very complete 
65

1 report. This is probably one of the most 

2 complete reports that we have had for any 

3 given facility in the details that are 

4 presented to us. It’s one concise report. 

5 DR. NETON: It’s very concise. 

6 DR. POSTON: Mark, you would like to say 

7 something? 

8 MR. GRIFFON: I was going to say I don’t 

9 think we have many follow-up items or many 

10 areas of disagreement, but I think we need to 

11 really wait on Mr. Foley and what he finds 

12 out, if he finds out anything, and -- 

13 DR. NETON: I guess, I don’t know. You 

14 could delay or you could say, well, what if 

15 it’s not enriched? What’s the Board’s 

16 opinion? What’s the working group’s opinion? 

17 You’re going to have to face that issue at 

18 some point. 

19 MR. ELLIOTT: Either way. If he confirms 

20 that it’s enriched and it was an anomaly, and 

21 they never followed up, you’re still going to 

22 have to deal with that. And if he confirms I 

23 can’t find anything on it. I had no idea what 

24 we did, why we did it back then, you still are 

25 faced -- 
66

1 DR. NETON: I guess that’s what I’m saying. 

2 There’s only two possible outcomes here. We 

3 either know what the sample was, and it was 

4 truly enriched, back to that, or the sample 

5 does not conclusively demonstrate that it was 

6 enriched because of some analytical issues 

7 with the sample. 

8 DR. POSTON: If there was no -- back to what 

9 we agreed at the last meeting which is that 

10 the internal dose is of sufficiently bound 

11 based on the assumptions that you guys made 

12 for that exposure period. 

13 DR. NETON: I think it’s going to be a 

14 little murkier than that in the sense that 

15 we’re not going to be able to say it wasn’t 

16 enriched. The best we’ll be able to say is 

17 it’s not statistically significant that it was 

18 enriched because there is already a number 

19 that says it was enriched. 

20 DR. POSTON: I misspoke. 

21 DR. NETON: Well, I just wanted to be clear. 

22 DR. POSTON: The other option though is if 

23 it is statistically significant, then one 

24 approach would be to essentially double the 

25 doses. That would also bound the internal 
67

1 dose, right? Is that correct? 

2 DR. NETON: If they worked with uranium 

3 slugs that were two percent enriched, yes, 

4 that would be the case. 

5 DR. POSTON: I mean, that assumption bothers 

6 the heck out of me, but I mean, one approach -

7 - I’m not suggesting that it’s the only 

8 approach -- one approach is to say, okay, the 

9 data says that they worked with natural 

10 uranium, but we found this enriched uranium, 

11 so let’s make the assumption that the entire 

12 covered period they were working with uranium 

13 at two percent. 

14 DR. NETON: I would say it would bound it if 

15 we agree that that’s, if we know what work 

16 went on there, which was machining of uranium. 

17 And say for some reason unbeknownst to anyone, 

18 they processed a few uranium slugs that were 

19 enriched that no one knows about. It would be 

20 hard to imagine, but that would certainly be a 

21 bounding scenario. 

22 DR. ROESSLER: What I’d like to revisit is 

23 the doubling of the dose. Where does that 

24 come from? How do you come to that? 

25 DR. NETON: It’s just a fact that the dose 
68

1 per unit intake from enriched uranium has a 

2 higher amount of alpha activity due to the 

3 Uranium-234. So you just intake a lot more 

4 alpha -- 

5 DR. ROESSLER: So you would assume that all 

6 the time they were working with enriched 

7 uranium? 

8 DR. NETON: Right. 

9 DR. ROESSLER: Which to me seems like, and 

10 what I was trying to get out of Arjun is, to 

11 me that seems like the worst-case scenario. 

12 DR. POSTON: That’s a huge stretch. 

13 DR. ROESSLER: And you’re bothered by it 

14 because you think that’s a huge -- 

15 DR. POSTON: Well, I am bothered by it, but 

16 it is a huge stretch, and it would allow us to 

17 say that the doses are bounding. I mean, 

18 we’ve already agreed that as we understand 

19 what went on there that the external doses are 

20 bounded by the film badge data. And what 

21 we’re trying to do is provide, can we provide 

22 doses for the internal exposures or not. 

23 And so one approach is to assume that 

24 the uranium sample is not statistically 

25 relevant. We’re back to what we agreed last 
69

1 time that what NIOSH has done in making this 

2 conservative assumption that these people were 

3 exposed to the maximum concentration for the 

4 entire working period and calculating the 

5 doses based on that exposure is bounding. 

6 DR. ROESSLER: Is that a productive way to 

7 go rather than just wait and find out what we 

8 are going to find out as to talk about that 

9 particular -- 

10 DR. POSTON: I would be happy to do that. 

11 We can adjourn to the dining room and have 

12 lunch, and Christine could make it home, and 

13 Jim could go play golf this afternoon. 

14 MR. ROLFES: Please also keep in mind the 

15 way the initial intakes were calculated in the 

16 site profile, we used the two highest uranium 

17 urinalyses to calculate intakes. We assumed 

that the production occurred from January 1st 18 , 

1948 through April 30th 19 of 1949. So we’ve 

20 assumed roughly 16 months of production-level 

21 intakes that were incurred for everyone that 

22 worked in Building 23 -- 

23 DR. POSTON: When we know it’s only a 

24 fraction of that. 

25 MR. ROLFES: -- when we know the actual 
70

1 production operations were only conducted from 

May until October 7th 2 of 1948, so roughly, say, 

3 six months of production-level intakes versus 

4 the 16 which we’ve assumed based on claimant5 favorable assumptions. 

6 MR. GRIFFON: I think we’ve beat that one 

7 around plenty. I mean, I’m on the record 

8 saying I think that is conservative assuming 

9 the sample can be explained as enriched. So 

10 that’s where I’m stuck. 

11 DR. NETON: I still have trouble figuring 

12 why that’s important for bounding doses for 

13 this exposure that we know occurred. This is 

14 the only AEC operation that we know, we’ve 

15 been able to find, that exposed these workers 

16 -- 

17 MR. GRIFFON: You said that we know of. I 

18 mean, I don’t think we have evidence of is a 

19 good question, and this, this is... 

20 DR. NETON: We don’t know that it’s AEC 

21 exposure. We don’t know if it’s AEC, and we 

22 don’t know when it occurred. 

23 MR. GRIFFON: I agree. 

24 DR. NETON: You’d have to believe that 

25 there’s some contract that we don’t know about 
71

1 that happened in ’48 and ’49 that exposed 

2 these people to radioactive materials that was 

3 enriched uranium. 

4 DR. ROESSLER: And that wasn’t -- 

5 DR. NETON: -- that happened in Building 23, 

6 which we have a very good accounting of 

7 exactly what they did. 

8 DR. ROESSLER: That didn’t show up in the 

9 bioassay. 

10 DR. NETON: Well, we did a mass uranium 

11 measurement, so you wouldn’t be able to tell 

12 if it was enriched or not. 

13 DR. ROESSLER: But still it would, the 

14 bioassay would, if it did occur there it seems 

15 like the bioassay reflects what they were 

16 exposed to. 

17 DR. NETON: Well, that’s what we’re saying. 

18 If it was enriched uranium -- 

19 DR. ROESSLER: That’s why I can’t figure out 

20 why there’s any doubt about using this 

21 conservative bioassay data even with a 

22 question. It seems like you’ve got it 

23 covered. I just don’t understand why that 

24 doesn’t cover it. And I’d like somebody to 

25 explain what is -- 
72

1 MR. GRIFFON: It’s just a question of did 

2 it, I mean, I’m not arguing that, first of 

3 all, it’s total uranium bioassay, but I’m 

4 still not arguing that you can’t be 

5 conservative with that estimate based on what 

6 we know, as Jim said, of what was done in that 

7 building. It’s this point that’s been 

8 discussed in public meetings for over a year 

9 now I’m sure that I think if we can find an 

10 answer to and get rid of it, then it appeases 

11 everyone, even the public and everyone, that 

12 we’ve found, you know, we’ve got an answer on 

13 why. Instead of, I don’t want to be in a 

14 position where we’re trying to explain 

15 something away. If we have an explanation for 

16 it, if his reports say something more, I mean, 

17 I would argue there’s three things in my mind 

18 that I would like follow up on. 

19 DISCUSSION OF DOE FOLLOW-UP INVESTIGATION

20 I don’t think anybody ever followed up 

21 on the Y-12 shipping records. I know it’s 

22 later in your agenda. I didn’t want to get 

23 ahead, but it seems like we’re circling around 

24 there. But the Y-12 shipping records, and I 

25 think that was a really, we asked DOE to -- 
73

1 MR. ELLIOTT: I thought they did. 

2 MR. GRIFFON: I don’t know if they did. I 

3 didn’t get a sense that they, they said they 

4 hadn’t had any -- 

5 MR. ELLIOTT: We can verify that by asking -

6 - 

7 MR. GRIFFON: We can verify it, yeah. 

8 MR. ELLIOTT: We should do that. My -- 

9 MR. GRIFFON: It’s not a NIOSH task. 

10 MR. ELLIOTT: No, but my ^ to scour 

11 everything they could and included that. 

12 MR. GRIFFON: Maybe it was a matter of them 

13 saying they couldn’t find anything and Bob 

14 Presley saying I know that stuff’s there or 

15 something. So maybe we need to push -- 

16 DR. NETON: Let me ask you. What would this 

17 do? 

18 MR. GRIFFON: The only thing that would do 

19 is that question of manifolds being returned. 

20 And then if that was the case, then we could 

21 attribute it to Dean Street and maybe separate 

22 that whole thing. At least that would provide 

23 an explanation. 

24 DR. NETON: I could tell you I’ve looked 

25 through all the contracts for 1948 and the 
74

1 amendments of the contracts, and they’re all 

2 out there on the O drive. And the contract 

3 itself speaks specifically about manufacturing 

4 like a couple thousand of these huge valves. 

5 And it’s a one-way shipment from there to Oak 

6 Ridge, and all these acceptance testing 

7 criteria that were applied at the Dean Street 

8 facility. And there’s not one memo -- we have 

9 a listing of all the memos that were generated 

10 in ’48 and ’49. I guess 50, 60 memos that 

11 were generated, and not one speak about in 

12 that time period of anything coming back other 

13 than -- 

14 DR. MAKHIJANI: You mean ’43 to ’45. 

15 DR. NETON: ‘Forty-three to ’45, I’m sorry. 

16 But my point is we have a listing of all the 

17 memos, the correspondence, from that time 

18 period, and there’s not one memo that I could 

19 find that says, by the way, we’re waiting 

20 those contaminated shipments to come back 

21 here, those samples. 

22 Everything is a one-way street 

23 shipping brand new valves that have been 

24 factory acceptance tested using very similar 

25 techniques that the subject matter expert 
75

1 talked about that she thought were in regards 

2 to repair. In fact, those same techniques 

3 were applied to the brand new manifolds when 

4 they were being factory acceptance tested 

5 which is the coatings and the abrasives and 

6 all that kind of stuff. So there’s a fairly 

7 good record here of memos for that entire two8 year period, and not one memo speaks about 

9 that. I think that’s pretty clear. 

10 MR. ELLIOTT: A couple different questions 

11 for DOE to answer. Were there other 

12 contracts? What did Dean Street mean to this 

13 covered facility designation? Was there other 

14 contracts? What did that mean? And I thought 

15 there was another one or so that we asked. 

16 MR. GRIFFON: I thought I mean, maybe that’s 

17 just a matter of clarification. Maybe I’m 

18 misremembering, but that alone with the 

19 question about the Y-12 shipping records along 

20 with question of can we do -- and I don’t want 

21 to, I don’t know how big of an effort this 

22 would be -- but is there any way to find out 

23 whether there were Naval operations involved 

24 with enriched uranium at the facility. 

25 There’s probably no quick or easy way or you 
76

1 would have done it already I’m sure. 

2 MR. ELLIOTT: But we know that this facility 

3 changed hands, was bought out and operations 

4 were held in that facility under a new owner, 

5 too. So we’d have to check also those 

6 subsequent owners, right? 

7 MR. GRIFFON: I mean, I don’t know if DOD 

8 would have any of these records. 

9 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, ^ I’m going to say it. 

10 We get nothing out of DOD. We get nothing but 

11 a cold shoulder. I’m sorry to say that. 

12 DR. NETON: And, frankly, I’m afraid to say 

13 if we do that, we find nothing, we’d be in the 

14 same position. You can’t prove that either. 

15 I mean, we can always get down that road. 

16 MR. GRIFFON: Well, and the last one is the 

17 Foley report, I guess. 

18 DR. POSTON: Jim, I don’t want to start an 

19 argument with you, but I do want to express a 

20 little different opinion. And I understand 

21 that you have all the paper, but the thing 

22 that sticks in my mind is those folks when we 

23 talked to them, they specifically testified -- 

24 not testified because they weren’t under oath 

25 -- they specifically remembered those 
77

1 shipments coming back from Oak Ridge. And 

2 they were very precise about it. 

3 DR. NETON: But there were shipments coming 

4 back, but they weren’t manifolds. They were 

5 test equipment that was shipped to -- 

6 DR. POSTON: They said they were big tanks. 

7 DR. NETON: Right. Those are not manifolds. 

8 Those are pressure tanks that are used to test 

9 these vessels. 

10 DR. POSTON: Well, okay. 

11 DR. NETON: I think it might be worth 

12 getting back with this subject expert and 

13 just, not to challenge, but to just sort of, 

14 in light of the facts as we know them now, to 

15 sort of try and -- 

16 MR. ELLIOTT: You may want to lay it out in 

17 front of her and just say here’s what we have. 

18 How does this match up with what your 

19 recollection is? And maybe -- 

20 DR. POSTON: Maybe I can get Arjun to help 

21 here, but my recollection is that she said not 

22 only did she remember them, but she typed most 

23 of the shipping orders or something like that. 

24 Is that, do you have some sort of recollection 

25 of that? 
78

1 DR. MAKHIJANI: I agree with you, Dr. 

2 Poston. She was very specific about saying 

3 manifolds. Now, there could be a 

4 misunderstanding. I’m not saying that. It’s 

5 just a characterization. And I found her 

6 memory to be very remarkable because she was 

7 so precise. 

8 And she remembered the names of the 

9 people who she wrote letters to and what she 

10 ordered in terms of equipment and that was 

11 returns of manifolds on rail to the main site 

12 where it was transferred to truck. So, we 

13 don’t have another explanation. All I know 

14 about it from the point of view of returns is 

15 what we have documented from this expert. 

16 DR. POSTON: And I’m not disputing anything 

17 you said. 

18 DR. NETON: I’m not either. I mean, I’ve 

19 gone through all the memos, and I can’t find 

20 one memo -- as a matter of fact, she may have 

21 typed some of these memos. I haven’t gone 

22 into that level of depth. But there are memos 

23 about, typed memos, saying please ship these 

24 here by rail to the facility and drop off 

25 here, and they’ll be. It’s very similar. 
79

1 DR. MAKHIJANI: I have gone through as part 

2 of our review of your revised ER, I also 

3 looked at all the documents. And as we said 

4 in our report, we have no disagreement about 

5 what’s in those documents. Those documents 

6 are all about manufacturing manifolds and 

7 valves and shipping to Oak Ridge. And as we 

8 said I believe pretty explicitly, that in 

9 those documents there’s no evidence of 

10 returns. But that’s very clear. 

11 DR. NETON: I’d be surprised, we have all 

12 the documents in those time periods and these 

13 other ones would be just -- I think it’s 

14 worth, I don’t know if it’s worthwhile. 

15 DR. POSTON: Can we go back to, whose action 

16 would that be if we went back and talked to 

17 her again? 

18 MR. ELLIOTT: I think it ought to be a joint 

19 action. 

20 DR. NETON: Yeah, I think it -- 

21 MR. ROLFES: I think it would be a good 

22 idea. 

23 MR. ELLIOTT: I’m sorry, but I just think it 

24 needs to have the stakeholders’ 

25 representativeness at this point. 
80

1 DR. NETON: It might be worth waiting on the 

2 sample results before we do that because in my 

3 -- 

4 MR. ELLIOTT: It may go away. Why frustrate 

5 this poor lady. 

6 DR. NETON: Yeah, I mean, I don’t want to 

7 confrontational mode. 

8 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, eight people 

9 interviewing, yeah. She’s got to be pretty 

10 old. 

11 DR. ROESSLER: Be careful what you say about 

12 being old. 

13 MR. GRIFFON: As old as me. 

14 DR. POSTON: Because she was actually a 

15 young woman, I mean, in her 40s. 

16 DR. NETON: All I just thought it was 

17 uncanny how the description in these memos 

18 matched almost exactly to what she said. And 

19 it was something different than what she said 

20 it was. 

21 DR. POSTON: So the two issues, the two 

22 things that we’ve somewhat decided was we’re 

23 going to wait to hear from Foley on the 

24 samples. 

25 DR. NETON: I expect that to happen soon. 
81

1 DR. POSTON: And if that doesn’t remove the 

2 concern then we may schedule another trip to 

3 Springfield to see if we can talk to these. 

4 And I don’t know whether it, I guess, it would 

5 be better for us to go there than trying to 

6 get her. You have all the records. 

7 DR. NETON: Well, they’re all right here. 

8 DR. POSTON: So it’s not that big a deal. 

9 DR. NETON: No. 

10 MR. GRIFFON: Can we follow up on this Y-12 

11 question? Maybe it’s my misremembering -- 

12 MR. ELLIOTT: I’ll send an e-mail on that to 

13 Pat Worthington, and I’ll ask her to confirm 

14 whether or not they examined in their search 

15 for Chapman Valve and the Dean Street issue 

16 and this manifold transfer issue, did they 

17 check the shipment records for Y-12 to Chapman 

18 Valve for any -- 

19 MR. GRIFFON: I mean, the -- 

20 MR. ELLIOTT: -- any product or anything 

21 like that. Enlighten us here. 

22 MR. GRIFFON: I’m curious if they -- 

23 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): Hey, Larry. 

24 MR. GRIFFON: -- you know, if they were done 

25 onsite checking for records or had the local 
82

1 DOE check, not just a review of their 

2 archives, records in D.C. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: We need a person to mute the 

4 phone, please. 

5 I think somebody had a question for 

6 you, Larry. 

7 DR. POSTON: Brad, did you have a question? 

8 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): Yeah, I did. I 

9 can’t hardly hear you guys because somebody 

10 hasn’t got their phone muted or whatever. But 

11 what I wanted to bring up to Larry is he was 

12 talking to Y-12 and so forth like that. I’ve 

13 dealt in the manufacturing area before, and a 

14 lot of times when we send out products and, 

15 yes, they made all the criteria, all of our 

16 pressure tests. 

17 They may get back there, and they may 

18 get, there may be a malfunction in one or 

19 tracked or dropped, and it always came back to 

20 us to be able to repair these, to make them to 

21 the standards they wanted. I hope that we 

22 would look into and make sure that we look at 

23 any kind of the return receipts for anything 

24 like that for any of these shipments. 

25 I know it’d probably be easier for the 
83

1 ones just going out, but a lot of times if 

2 there was a malfunction with one, or one was 

3 dropped, they would always send them back to 

4 these facilities to do the repairs so that 

5 they meet their criteria that they need. I 

6 just hope that we look into that. 

7 MR. ELLIOTT: I will ask that question Brad. 

8 It’s a valid point. I’m working on an 

9 assumption that DOE has done that, but we’ll 

10 verify that they have or have not. 

11 DR. NETON: I’m looking at their report 

12 here, and actually, what it says is for the 

13 Oak Ridge Y-12 facility using all possible key 

14 words identified for this site, Oak Ridge Y15 12, the Department of Energy’s National 

16 Security, the NNSA, performed comprehensive 

17 searches of all records in our custody for any 

18 documents on Chapman Valve. The only 

19 documents they found were 37 drawings that 

20 were in there. 

21 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): Well, and I 

22 understand that. 

23 MR. ELLIOTT: That’s shipment records and 

24 return receipt. 

25 DR. NETON: Chapman Valve would have been a 
84

1 key word if there was a shipment record with 

2 Chapman Valve, but we can ask that question. 

3 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): We need to look 

4 into this because I am not trying to slam DOE 

5 or anything else like that, but I got to take 

6 the -- this is in today’s time -- I have to go 

7 out and have my picture taken by the side of a 

8 building that they said didn’t never exist. 

9 And that was just done yesterday. 

10 So as I said when I came back to 

11 Cincinnati when this program first started 

12 going, that if we are relying on just the data 

13 of DOE, we’re in for a world of hurt. And I 

14 talked very in depth to Larry about that, but 

15 you know, we’ve been given this project. This 

16 is what we’re trying to do. The thing is is 

17 we need to make sure that we have overturned 

18 every rock we can so that when we put this out 

19 that we’ve done the best that we can. That’s 

20 my main concern. 

21 And I really have an issue with a lot 

22 of, and I understand John’s frustration and so 

23 forth like that, but I have a real heartache 

24 with a lot of these documents and stuff. You 

25 know, these searches and stuff like that, a 
85

1 lot of these searches haven’t shown a lot of 

2 stuff, but all of a sudden papers that have 

3 came up, when they’re switching from one 

4 computer program to another, there’s a lot of 

5 things lost. And I just, we need to do the 

6 best, in my mind, we can. And if we can’t, my 

7 personal opinion is we’ve got to fall towards 

8 the claimant-favorable situation. Thank you. 

9 DR. POSTON: So basically then to summarize 

10 what we’ve been talking about, we would wait 

11 for the results from or any feedback from Mr. 

12 Foley. Larry’s going to contact DOE and Pat 

13 Worthington about more records regarding 

14 shipments and returned shipments especially if 

15 those pop up on a... And then we may actually 

16 make another trip back to Springfield to talk 

17 to the folks up there about what they remember 

18 and so forth although they were pretty sure. 

19 I understand that because I feel the same way 

20 sometimes. I can take the health physics 

21 research reactor apart in my sleep, and it’s 

22 been 40 years since I worked there. So you 

23 remember, it’s amazing the kind of crazy 

24 things you remember. 

25 Mark, do you want to say something 
86

1 about when you say ORAU, is that what you were 

2 talking about, the O-R-A-U results? You were 

3 talking about actually the ORNL results? 

4 MR. GRIFFON: ORNL, yeah. 

5 DR. POSTON: Yeah, your e-mail said O-R-A-U. 

6 I just took it literally. Okay, so we’ve got 

7 that. 

8 Other records, I’m not sure -- 

9 MR. GRIFFON: That note I put in, just as a, 

10 and I think Jim followed up on this. This is 

11 the question of when Bechtel did the clean up, 

12 and I think you found some of the -- 

13 DR. NETON: No, there’s a full report. 

14 There’s a document I’ve gone through, 787-page 

15 docket that Bechtel filed after the clean up. 

16 And I’ve searched for enriched uranium, looked 

17 for it, and saw nothing in there. 

18 MR. GRIFFON: I had mentioned in past 

19 meetings this question of was there any 

20 manifest, was there any records of manifests 

21 that went to waste disposal, but I don’t think 

22 you had any luck finding that, right? 

23 DR. NETON: No, but even within that 

24 document they would have identified if there 

25 was enriched uranium. 
87

1 MR. GRIFFON: They assumed, as you said 

2 before, it was all natural, right? 

3 DR. NETON: Yeah, they assumed it was all 

4 natural. 

5 MR. GRIFFON: The shipping records, the 

6 waste records would probably match that, I’m 

7 sure. 

8 DR. NETON: Exactly. In fact, I think they 

9 could have done that because the shipping 

10 criteria, I think, for shipping small amounts 

11 of enriched like that were similar to just 

12 natural uranium. So there would have been no 

13 motivation on their part to segregate it 

14 legally as like a fissionable material because 

15 it was so low I think. 

16 MR. GRIFFON: Well, the sites have limits on 

17 grams of U-235 usually, to use that, separate 

18 that out. 

19 DR. NETON: But I did go, and in fact I -- 

20 MR. GRIFFON: And that was certainly placed 

21 in the ‘90s. 

22 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Jim, this is John 

23 Mauro. I have a thought question that it 

24 might be helpful here. What I heard, which I 

25 wasn’t aware of until this conversation, is 
88

1 that the methods used by the FUSRAP folks were 

2 to grab the samples and do an analysis of the 

3 samples for U-235 and then based on that 

4 activity in the sample they estimated the U5 238 and U-234 content of the sample. Is that 

6 a correct statement? 

7 DR. NETON: I’m not sure that’s correct. 

8 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Okay, because 

9 that’s what I heard earlier. It did sound a 

10 little unusual. 

11 MR. GRIFFON: The neutron activation 

12 methodology, but we don’t know if that’s what 

13 -- 

14 DR. NETON: Yeah, if you look at their 

15 methodology, that’s exactly what it says. But 

16 in this particular case I can’t imagine that 

17 they would have done that because then they 

18 couldn’t have decided if it was enriched 

19 uranium. 

20 MR. GRIFFON: Exactly. 

21 DR. NETON: There’s sort of a logic flaw 

22 there. 

23 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): I do want to 

24 point something out. I think this is probably 

25 a consideration. If they did do that, then 
89

1 that means the estimates, whatever they 

2 estimated for U-238, were, and there really 

3 was, let’s say, a considerable amount of 

4 enriched uranium of any level, you would have 

5 a lot more U-238. In other words the 

6 estimated activity, I’m trying to figure out 

7 how that would affect the amount of U-238 that 

8 now is being reported. 

9 DR. NETON: Well, I think if you look at 

10 their report, it’s pretty clear in my mind 

11 that they quantified U-238 by gamma 

12 spectroscopy. Because there’s numbers for all 

13 of them, and they did gamma spec, and they 

14 pulled these two samples out and said we want 

15 to do isotopic analysis for uranium on them. 

16 The question is how did they do that analysis 

17 for isotopic uranium. And we don’t know 

18 whether it was alpha, gamma or neutron. Now 

19 if you look at their neutron procedure, it 

20 says, the neutron procedure is sort of generic 

21 in the sense that they’re trying to quantify 

22 total U by that procedure, not enrichment. 

23 But if they already knew the amount of U-238 

24 based on the gamma, and then they could 

25 measure the U-235 using neutrons, then they’ve 
90

1 got their enrichment. I would suspect that’s 

2 what they would have done. But we’ll wait to 

3 see if Ray Foley can elaborate on that. 

4 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): Okay, okay. 

5 DR. POSTON: That reminds me, you raised 

6 manifest on waste disposal and Mike raised an 

7 issue about the floor. I don’t recall any 

8 discussion of what happened to the floor. I 

9 remember the discussion that the floor was 

10 made of blocks, but were they removed, 

11 disposed, how were they disposed and so forth. 

12 MR. ROLFES: We do have information from one 

13 individual who said that he had assisted in 

14 washing down the walls following the machining 

15 operation that was conducted, and he also did 

16 indicate that he had removed the blocks from 

17 the floor as well and replaced the flooring 

18 material. I thought I recalled that it was 

19 concrete that they put in there, but Jim said 

20 that he thought it may have been fire brick as 

21 well. 

22 DR. NETON: Well, the fire brick was used to 

23 replace the deteriorated blocks. So when they 

24 took out the wood -- I can’t speak to what it 

25 was -- I think I did recall concrete. 
91

1 DR. POSTON: But in the clean up there’s no 

2 records of anything of surveys of the wooden 

3 floor or anything? 

4 DR. NETON: Oh, yeah. 

5 MR. ROLFES: In the H&K Ferguson Report at 

6 the end there is some information regarding 

7 the decontamination proceedings that were 

8 conducted after the uranium machining 

operation after it ended on October 7th 9 , 1948. 

10 DR. POSTON: They went all the way, they 

11 took all of that out and went all the way to a 

12 concrete floor? Is that what they did? 

13 MR. ROLFES: I’m not certain. Let me take a 

14 look here. 

15 DR. ROESSLER: But the fire bricks were part 

16 of the original building. Is that what you’re 

17 saying? Was it fire bricks and then wood 

18 floor on top of it? Or, no, the wood floor 

19 when it deteriorated was replaced by fire 

20 brick. During what time period was that? Was 

21 that in the operational period? 

22 DR. NETON: I believe so, yes. Because I 

23 think Ray Foley was telling me that there were 

24 gaps in the floors. By the time they got 

25 there in 1992 the floor was pretty 
92

1 deteriorated, and there were bricks put in 

2 where the floor had deteriorated. 

3 DR. POSTON: Oh, so the floor was still 

4 there when they got there. 

5 DR. NETON: I believe it was in ’92, yes. 

6 DR. POSTON: Because Mike raised a very good 

7 point. 

8 DR. NETON: Yeah, because he told me, 

9 clearly he told me that there was a wood 

10 floor. So the only way he would have known 

11 that is he got there in ’92. Now, I don’t 

12 know whether Bechtel took out that entire wood 

13 floor. I think it might be in the 

14 certification docket, but I didn’t read it in 

15 that detail. 

16 DR. POSTON: I don’t have any, I didn’t see 

17 anything about it either. That would have 

18 certainly given some information. 

19 DR. NETON: We don’t know what type of 

20 information. 

21 DR. POSTON: Well, Mike was saying that you 

22 never knew what was down in the cracks between 

23 the blocks. And sometimes the stuff would 

24 come up and -- 

25 MR. GIBSON: Actually absorbed in the 
93

1 blocks. 

2 DR. POSTON: -- in the blocks. And if there 

3 was enriched uranium of any sort it ought to 

4 be, could be in those blocks. But I was just 

5 wondering what they did with them. 

6 DR. NETON: Oh, the blocks. They’re 

7 probably shipped already, buried them 

8 somewhere. I can look through the 

9 certification report docket and see if they 

10 talk about disposal. They pretty much tore 

11 down the whole building I thought. I don’t 

12 think they would have left the wooden blocks -

13 - 

14 DR. POSTON: My thought, my logic is -- if 

15 there is such a thing, and please don’t answer 

16 that question -- but my logic is, okay, we 

17 have this sample which is at the loading dock, 

18 but it’s outside of this area that we’re 

19 concerned about. But there is this wooden 

20 floor and Mike has said, okay, we have a 

21 history of stuff going into the wood and going 

22 between the woods and so forth, and if it’s 

23 natural uranium, then, and it could be in 

24 those blocks. 

25 So we could verify one, it’s either 
94

1 natural uranium or it’s slightly enriched 

2 uranium simply by looking at the contamination 

3 on those blocks. But we don’t even know where 

4 they went and so forth. Nobody analyzed them 

5 as far as we know. 

6 DR. MAURO (by Telephone): John, this is 

7 John Mauro. I’m looking at our report. There 

8 was a [Personal Identifier redacted] that was 

9 interviewed as part of the work that NIOSH did 

10 in terms of compiling all the records. And 

11 I’m reading his case here. He was a person 

12 that spent time at the site in the 1940s, and 

13 he states that when all work was completed at 

14 the end of 1948, the equipment and machinery 

15 used in the program were removed along with 

16 the wood blocks. So apparently there was 

17 quite a bit of decontamination took place in 

18 1948 after the completion of the machining 

19 operation. And that included removal of the 

20 wood block floors. 

21 DR. NETON: Excuse me, John, but Mark Rolfes 

22 just gave me an except here out of the H.K. 

23 Ferguson report that talks about large-scale 

24 incineration of lumber, rags, oil-soaked 

25 material. They put a big pan out there and 
95

1 burned all this stuff. 

2 MR. GRIFFON: But you said Ray Foley 

3 remembers the wood floor as being there still, 

4 later. 

5 MR. ROLFES: Yeah, they did put down -- 

6 MR. GRIFFON: It sounds like at least they 

7 removed some of it. 

8 MR. ROLFES: The H&K Ferguson Report does go 

9 on to say that after the floor was cleaned, 

10 they did put down -- let me get the exact 

11 sentence here. They did put down new blocks 

12 in some areas, three inch -- 

13 DR. POSTON: So we don’t have any, so that 

14 might -- 

15 MR. GRIFFON: The originals are gone, yeah. 

16 DR. POSTON: -- I was hoping that would 

17 provide some evidence. 

18 RECOMMENDATION TO THE ABRWH

19 Well, folks, I’m at a loss as to what 

20 to do right now. If we do get the information 

21 from Foley then we could have a telephone 

22 conference and try to work this out. We’re 

23 down to if it’s not statistically significant, 

24 then I think we’ve already agreed what our 

25 path is. If it is statistically significant, 
96

1 then we need to think pretty hard about what 

2 we’re going to recommend. 

3 MR. GRIFFON: Well, and then we have those 

4 few other actions to follow up at the same 

5 time, right? 

6 DR. POSTON: Right, so if we could get all 

7 those or have something as soon as we hear 

8 from Mr. Foley. When is our next meeting? 

9 It’s not until the end of June, isn’t it? 

10 DR. BRANCHE: Yes, we have a conference call 

on the 14th 11 , and actually Chapman Valve is on. 

12 Dr. Ziemer wanted to hear your progress. 

13 DR. POSTON: Well, that should take about 

14 ten seconds. 

15 DR. BRANCHE: But I think the members, the 

16 representatives for the members of Congress 

17 are going to be alerted because it’s a 

18 specific item on a brief telephone, I mean 

19 it’s a fairly brief agenda. 

20 DR. POSTON: So I don’t know what else to 

21 do. I mean, there’s no path forward here 

22 until we have the answers to those questions. 

23 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, I think those actions 

24 are -- 

25 DR. POSTON: I’m sitting here counting my 
97

1 tax dollars at work because it took a lot to 

2 bring everybody together, and I apologize for 

3 that. 

4 DR. BRANCHE: Well, I think a face-to-face 

5 meeting after having had the decisions. As 

6 you said in our meeting in the early part of 

7 April, you all hadn’t met face-to-face or by 

8 phone since you got the information from DOE, 

9 and now you have some better indication. You 

10 have some assignments, and being able to 

11 schedule a follow-up conference call or 

12 meeting -- 

13 DR. POSTON: Well, today’s the first, so we 

14 actually have two weeks before the conference 

15 call, right? 

16 DR. BRANCHE: About ten days. 

DR. POSTON: I thought you said the 14th 17 . 

DR. BRANCHE: It is the 14th 18 . I’m thinking 

19 business days. And our Board meeting begins 

on the 24th 20 of June. 

21 MR. GRIFFON: You might want to, I don’t 

22 know if you’re getting ready to close. I 

23 don’t know if anyone on the phone has 

24 comments. 

25 DR. POSTON: Is there anything else that we 
98

1 need to talk about? 

2 DR. NETON: The three things that we’re 

3 following up on are the Y-12 shipping records 

4 from DOE. Mark raised this issue about 

5 looking at naval operations. I’m not sure 

6 where we would start with that. 

7 MR. ELLIOTT: Even if we could, even if we 

8 tried something as straightforward as a 

9 Google, it’s not going to be productive. We 

10 take a more active action like approach DOD. 

11 You all could be sitting here next year 

12 waiting for us to find something out. They 

13 don’t have to give us anything. There’s no 

14 leverage for us to use for this law that would 

15 force them to give us. 

16 DR. POSTON: Well, the issue is really not 

17 the ’48, ’49 period; it’s subsequent periods, 

18 right? 

19 MR. GRIFFON: Yeah, it could be. Anything 

20 that explains that sample basically is what 

21 we’re looking for. 

22 MR. ROLFES: Information, we do have some 

23 information, limited information. It’s from a 

24 newspaper article regarding some work that was 

25 done. Chapman Valve did produce some canned-
99

1 type valves for naval nuclear propulsion 

2 applications in the ‘50s which was 1957. They 

3 also did -- let me take a look here -- this 

4 was related to the Nautilus, the first 

5 submarine that was produced for the Navy. It 

6 says they had produced, the valves were of the 

7 canned-type utilized in a completely enclosed 

8 operation. Westinghouse’s Atomic Power 

9 Division was not affected by the strike. Also 

10 built a reactor for Nautilus -- it goes on. 

11 If you’d like a copy of this, I believe it is 

12 on the O drive already. But it does discuss 

13 that they did produce a non-radioactive valve 

14 for the Navy. 

15 MR. GRIFFON: I know, when was that dated? 

16 MR. ROLFES: This was from 1957. It was 

March 13th 17 , well, 1956. I take that back. It 

18 mentioned 1957 in here. That was the Navy’s 

19 plans for submarines in 1957, and it discussed 

20 their fiscal budget in 1957. 

21 DR. BRANCHE: And then the third follow-up 

22 item is the -- 

23 DR. NETON: Foley Report. 

24 DR. BRANCHE: -- the Foley Report. 

25 DR. NETON: I hope we can get something in 
100

1 the next week or so. I mean, they’re either 

2 there or they’re not, I mean, the records. 

3 DR. BRANCHE: Will it come in a form that 

4 you can either, that you can use e-mail to get 

5 it to the work group members? 

6 DR. NETON: Yes. 

7 DR. POSTON: So the goal would be then to on 

the 14th 8 discuss this or make a report. 

DR. BRANCHE: Make a report on the 14th 9 . 

10 Even if you have to schedule a meeting of the 

11 work group after that to discuss this further. 

12 DR. POSTON: Mark, anything else? 

13 MR. GRIFFON: I think those three cover it. 

14 DR. POSTON: Gen? 

15 DR. ROESSLER: (no audible response) 

16 DR. POSTON: Michael? 

17 MR. GIBSON: Maybe one more little thing 

18 here. I just asked Mark, I guess these valves 

19 and stuff, their inception was originally 

20 somewhat classified so if that’s being the 

21 case, there wouldn’t necessarily be commercial 

22 shipping invoices and everything else for 

23 these valves if they did, in fact, come back 

24 to the site. 

25 DOE probably used DOE couriers. So I 
101

1 don’t know if that would have, those kind of 

2 records even exist or if they would have even 

3 showed up in the types of searches that DOE 

4 did. 

5 MR. ROLFES: If the materials were 

6 classified, it’s very likely that they would 

7 be more carefully documented in order to 

8 prevent the loss of that material or 

9 equipment. So whether they still exist today 

10 if there were, in fact, shipments, that’s, I 

11 couldn’t comment on that. 

12 MR. GIBSON: I mean, but a lot of critical 

13 components, well, some critical components, 

14 were shipped back to the site where they were 

15 built and dismantled to check the reliability, 

16 et cetera, and there was no procedures allowed 

17 to be generated. This all had to be done from 

18 memory. 

19 DR. POSTON: Let me make sure I understand 

20 what you’re saying. Courier, you’re talking 

21 about DOE personnel themselves or, again, 

22 relying on Arjun to correct me, they were very 

23 adamant about rail transport coming in on 

24 rails right beside the facility. And that was 

25 my recollection. 
102

1 DR. BRANCHE: That was described at the 

2 Naperville meeting. 

3 DR. POSTON: And that is a good point. 

4 Maybe that some of the records were not 

5 available because shipping the valves one way 

6 -- 

7 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, what questions do you 

8 want us to ask DOE? Because now I hear your 

9 point, Mike, and I want to make sure that we 

10 ask the right questions of DOE to verify, 

11 validate as best we can from their response 

12 that they turned over every stone or thought 

13 about their searching for information with 

14 these kinds of thoughts in mind. 

15 MR. GIBSON: Well, I guess just that a lot 

16 of the required DOE activities for different 

17 items, different sites was not necessarily 

18 printed in black and white on a contractual 

19 agreement between them and the contractor. 

20 Somehow it could have been stated in there and 

21 some wording that didn’t make it clear to the 

22 public what was going on, but would those type 

23 of situations, documents, would DOE have 

24 pulled those up or found them or references to 

25 them in the search that they have conducted? 
103

1 MR. ELLIOTT: Would their search include 

2 secure, restricted data information. 

3 MR. GIBSON: Based on this little blip that 

4 came up yesterday via e-mail, I don’t know if 

5 they’d tell you anyway, but -- 

6 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): But, Mike, what 

7 Larry is saying is true. We need to look at 

8 the classified data because I agree with you. 

9 Up until about two or three years ago, we 

10 still used certified couriers for the 

11 paperwork. Now the shipments were done on 

12 normal transports, but it was just understood 

13 what was classified. You know, a lot of the 

14 stuff wasn’t opened up. 

15 As a matter of fact, I get shipments 

16 today that are classified material on public 

17 carriers. They’re just locked up boxes. So 

18 when Larry goes to DOE to ask this, we need to 

19 look at the sensitive, classified information 

20 of any kind of shipments or so forth on this. 

21 MR. ELLIOTT: And I presume they’ve done 

22 that, but -- 

23 DR. NETON: I guess I’m at a loss as to why 

24 they would be classified since we have the 

25 original contract with all the specifications 
104

1 and all the engineering drawings for all the 

2 valves that they made. Why, all of a sudden 

3 then when they became contaminated, they would 

4 have been secret classified and shipped back 

5 separately. I mean, we’ve got shipping 

6 paperwork here for virtually everything. It 

7 seems to be the substantial bulk of what they 

8 produced. 

9 MR. GIBSON: I’m just raising the 

10 possibility. 

11 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): Oh, and Jim, I 

12 agree with you 100 percent, but you know what? 

13 There’s a lot of stuff out there that I don’t 

14 understand why they classified it or whatever. 

15 But they may have. If they were contaminated, 

16 and they didn’t want people to know outside 

17 the area what they were really working with or 

18 different isotopes or so forth like that, 

19 there’s a lot of things that have been 

20 classified that in my mind’s eye I don’t see 

21 why they were. But guess what? DOE has done 

22 a lot of that. And I just want to make sure 

23 that we’re checking every avenue that we’ve 

24 got. 

25 MR. ELLIOTT: Well, Mr. Chairman, I’m asking 
105

1 Jim to craft this e-mail to send to Pat 

2 Worthington in my absence. And I want to make 

3 sure that he includes the questions this 

4 working group wants answered to verify, I want 

5 him to reference the letter that he’s speaking 

6 from that Pat sent to the Board, and ask these 

7 pointed, pertinent questions that the working 

8 group has. 

9 I don’t want, right now, I don’t want 

10 to be the one to frame those. I don’t think 

11 Jim should be the one to frame those. Please, 

12 if you will, frame the questions you want us 

13 to ask. Besides we’ve got to do something 

14 until the food arrives anyway. 

15 DR. NETON: I think I’ve got that captured 

16 here. 

17 DR. POSTON: Well, what I was going to 

18 suggest is if you think you’ve got it 

19 captured, then why don’t you draft it and send 

20 it to us an e-mail, and we’ll send it right 

21 back to you. 

22 MR. ELLIOTT: This falls back in your court. 

23 DR. BRANCHE: I would suggest that it -- 

24 DR. NETON: Why don’t you guys craft what 

25 you want us to ask -- 
106

1 DR. POSTON: And then we can do that. 

2 DR. BRANCHE: Yeah, that might be the better 

3 thing. 

4 MR. ELLIOTT: I don’t want to put words in 

5 your mouth. 

6 DR. POSTON: Let’s not do it in session. 

7 Let’s proceed on, and we’ll decide what it is 

8 -- 

9 MR. GRIFFON: It’s hard to -- 

10 DR. POSTON: -- and then the four of us will 

11 get together, and we’ll write some sentences 

12 and put -- 

13 DR. BRANCHE: Or you could assign one person 

14 to come up with a first draft. 

15 DR. POSTON: Well, I think we just, the four 

16 of us need to put our heads together and 

17 decide what it is we want from them. 

18 DR. NETON: Then there’ll be no -- 

19 DR. POSTON: And I’ll take responsibility to 

20 get you something ASAP, hopefully before we 

21 leave. 

22 Brad, do you have anything else? 

23 MR. CLAWSON (by Telephone): No, that’s it. 

24 DR. POSTON: Any comments from anyone else 

25 on the speakerphone? 
107

1 (no response) 

2 DR. POSTON: How about anybody else here? 

3 (no response) 

4 DR. POSTON: Well then, I think we’ll 

5 adjourn. 

6 DR. BRANCHE: I’m going to close out the 

7 line then. 

8 (Whereupon, the working group meeting 

9 concluded at 11:51 a.m.) 

10 

11 

12 

13 

14 

15 

16 

17 
108

CERTIFICATE OF COURT REPORTER 

STATE OF GEORGIA 

COUNTY OF FULTON 

 I, Steven Ray Green, Certified Merit Court 

Reporter, do hereby certify that I reported the 

above and foregoing on the day of May 1, 2008; 

and it is a true and accurate transcript of the 

testimony captioned herein. 

 I further certify that I am neither kin 

nor counsel to any of the parties herein, nor 

have any interest in the cause named herein. 

 WITNESS my hand and official seal this the 

4th day of Dec., 2008. 

___________________________________ 

STEVEN RAY GREEN, CCR, CVR-CM, PNSC 

CERTIFIED MERIT COURT REPORTER 

CERTIFICATE NUMBER: A-2102