By George Lobsenz
Failure of Sandia National Laboratories personnel to promptly relay information to the operator of the Energy Department’s Pantex plant about an “emergent issue” related to modification of the W-76 warhead led to Pantex workers conducting operations without full knowledge of potential hazards, according to a safety oversight board.
The incident was disclosed by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB), which oversees safety at DoE nuclear sites, in a Jan. 25 letter to Thomas D’Agostino, head of the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), the semi-autonomous DoE agency that runs the department’s nuclear weapons plant.
The DNFSB did not provide details about the incident, which is the latest in a series of safety issues associated with so-called W-76 Mod 1 operations at the Texas nuclear warhead assembly plant. At the same time, NNSA has been under pressure to deliver refurbished W-76 warheads to the Pentagon.
In its letter to D’Agostino, the board said it had “observed unacceptable processing of information concerning an emergent issue at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) regarding components used in the W76 Mod 1 program.
“The lack of timely review and communication of new information from SNL personnel to those qualified to assess its safety impacts resulted in operations being performed by the Pantex contractor without a complete understanding of the hazards involved.”
The board said timely communication of safety information developed at the weapons design labs to NNSA production facilities was essential to ensuring “an appropriate margin of safety is maintained for ongoing nuclear or nuclear explosive operations.”
The DNFSB asked for a report within 30 days on NNSA efforts to prevent any recurrence of the incident.
NNSA officials had no immediate comment on the DNFSB letter.
The safety board initially raised questions about so-called W-76 Mod 1 program in 2007 over NNSA granting exemptions from various safety requirements to expedite startup of operations.
Then in May 2008, B&W Pantex, which operates the plant for NNSA, suspended all W76 nuclear explosive operations when a process review identified tooling configurations that presented previously unanalyzed electrostatic discharge vulnerabilities. The DNFSB at that time expressed concern that the vulnerabilities had not been identified before startup of operations.