Event Notification Report for June 29, 2000

UNIT OUTSIDE DESIGN BASIS DUE TO 10 CFR PART 50 APPENDIX R ISSUE

"10 CFR 50, Appendix R, Section (III)(L)(5) requires that alternate and dedicated shutdown facilities have the means to achieve and maintain cold shutdown condition within 72 hours. TMI committed to this requirement.

"Review of current analysis has determined that the commitment to achieve cold shutdown within 72 hours cannot be met. At 1644 on 6/29/00, this condition has been determined to be reportable under 10 CFR 50.72 (b)(1)(ii)(B), which says 'any event or condition during operation that results in the condition of the nuclear power plant, including its principal safety barriers, being seriously degraded or results in the nuclear power plant being in a condition that is outside of the design basis of the plant.' It has been determined that the equipment is operable, but in a nonconforming condition since the 10 CFR 50 Appendix R requirement to achieve cold shutdown within 72 hours cannot be achieved."

The NRC resident inspector has been informed of this report by the licensee.

OFFSITE NOTIFICATION - FAILURE OF A WARNING SIREN

During normal plant operations, a spurious and sustained actuation of siren #7 of the Off Site Emergency Warning System occurred. The actuation was not as a result of personnel actions. Local government agencies were notified. The affected siren actuated at 2112 and was deactivated at 2201. The area covered by the siren has been placed on backup route alerting.

The licensee will inform the NRC resident inspector.

COURTESY CALL RELATED TO BRUSH FIRE

This is a courtesy call regarding a brush fire located in the vicinity of the Columbia Generating Station located within the Department of Energy (DOE) Hanford Area in South Eastern portion Washington State. Columbia Generating Station is monitoring a brush fire (30,000 to 40,000 acres) located 2 to 4 miles west of the station. Currently the local Benton County Emergency Operations Center (EOC) and the DOE EOC are coordinating fire fighting efforts.

Current weather forecast anticipate winds climbing to 30 knots with continued hot & dry weather. At present the access roads to the station remain open with the DOE restricting access to essential personnel only. The DOE has indicated that later this morning a substantial increase in federal fire fighting assets will be available to fight the fire.

The licensee notified the NRC resident inspector.

NOVARTIS PHARMACEUTICAL CORPORATION REPORTED AN OVEREXPOSURE OF ONE OF THEIR EMPLOYEES.

An employee was working with carbon-14 in a hood wearing gloves when a drop of the organic compound solution went onto the gloves. He immediately removed the gloves and noticed discoloration to his skin due to the chemical going through the gloves to a certain extent. He then proceeded to decontaminate himself using normal decontaminating procedures. Surveys were made and further decontamination was conducted, and based on their preliminary calculations at this point, the dose at skin depth of .007 cm is approx. 100 rads(includes the step wise decon). They do not believe he exceeded the NRC dose limit until early July. The solution was on the tip of the left index finger where the skin is much thicker(approx. .04 cm) than the NRC depth of skin dose calculation of .007 cm. The dose, if the material is deposited on the surface of the skin, to the live tissue at a skin depth of .04 cm is zero from carbon-14 due to its low energy. Initially they counted 250,000 cpm on 6/29/00 and after various steps of decontamination it was reduced to 6,000 cpm after one week. Daily urine samples were taken and monitoring continued for a week. By 7/19/00 counts per minute were down to 100 cpm.