Whistleblower testifies TVA safety was issueby BRIAN LAWSON, Huntsville Times |
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Hearing opens for paint foreman fired at Browns Ferry
A Tuscumbia man contended at a hearing Tuesday he was fired from his job as a paint foreman at TVA's Browns Ferry nuclear plant after raising safety concerns.
In federal court here, James Speegle is seeking reinstatement of his job, back pay and related damages under federal nuclear plant whistleblower protection laws. Speegle had complained that a company plan to lower qualifications for paint crews working in a critical part of the nuclear plant's cooling system would pose a safety problem.
Attorneys for defendant Stone & Webster Construction Inc., a lead contractor in the Tennessee Valley Authority's $1.8 billion effort to restart the Browns Ferry Unit 1 reactor, said Speegle was fired in May 2004 following insubordinate cursing remarks at his supervisor.
The hearing before District Chief Judge Richard D. Mills, a Department of Labor administrative law judge, is scheduled to run through Friday.
David Marshall, an attorney representing Speegle, called it a "very important whistleblower case," in his opening statement. Marshall said the treatment of Speegle had a "chilling effect" on other workers and said it is important for nearby communities that workers feel able to speak up about nuclear plant safety issues.
Marshall said the issue for Speegle was safety, not fear of lower-paid painters taking union jobs. He said Speegle approached the Nuclear Regulatory Commission about his concerns before he was fired, not the painter's union.
Speegle's attorneys have argued that Stone & Webster was eventually forced to use an outside contractor to repaint the area that Speegle had complained about.
Jason Schwartz, an attorney representing Stone & Webster, did not make an opening statement Tuesday, but during a time-constrained cross-examination of Speegle focused on Speegle's actions regarding his supervisor, questioning the appropriateness of Speegle's behavior and heated remarks.
Speegle, who had worked at Browns Ferry for 12 years, testified his termination came after his repeated complaints to his supervisor at Stone & Webster and a few days after a meeting about those concerns with NRC officials.
He said Stone & Webster had lowered testing standards to give apprentice painters a less difficult test to gain certification to work in the plant's Level 1 areas. Speegle's attorney said the lowered standards reflected a labor shortage faced by Stone & Webster.
During Tuesday's hearing, Speegle testified that over a period of days he insisted to his supervisor, Sebourn Childers, that apprentice painters could not be certified to do the complex painting work in the Unit 1 torus area. The torus is used to hold more than a million gallons of water and pumps water as needed to cool the reactor down in an emergency.
He said the changes in temperature and humidity required varied levels of paint thickness. The work was done in an area that included a number of odd-shaped pieces of equipment and some of the work had to be performed hanging upside down.
Speegle said if the paint wasn't applied properly it could crack, causing pieces to fall into the cooling system which could in turn impede the operator's ability to cool down the reactor properly.
He said the company was seeking to change the requirements called for in the "G 55," a manual Speegle said painters consider their bible. The manual covers painting specifications, painter qualifications and even paint mixing in extensive detail.
The proposed change would eliminate the word "journeyman" and insert the phrase "coatings applicator" to provide an expanded definition of who was qualified to paint in the torus area.
Schwartz pressed Speegle about his admission that he cursed following a third day of challenging his supervisor about the changes to the G 55.
Speegle had testified that, following an exchange with Childers during a painter's safety meeting, he walked away from Childers at meeting's end and, while facing a wall some 15 to 20 feet away, said, "If they're not going to follow the G 55, they can stick that paper up their a-"
Speegle insisted his remark was not said to or directed at anybody, but Schwartz pressed him on whether it was directed at Childers, pointing to earlier statements Speegle made to federal regulators where he seemed to suggest Childers might have heard him and could have assumed it was directed at him.
Speegle said a short time after the safety meeting he was called into a meeting with Childers, his union steward and another Stone & Webster official and was suspended. Speegle testified Childers told him "nobody was going to tell him to shove..."
