Y-12 Blog
Anyone who has stepped foot onto Y-12 National Security Complex is aware of the importance placed on safety. Trainings, signs, procedures, and more are all put into place to help employees and visitors return home in the same, if not better, condition than they arrived. For one employee, remembering a random safety fact from a training long ago and implementing a small but impactful change is attributed to helping save her life during a recent wreck.
Quality Assurance Specialist Susan Donnelly was driving a rental SUV on I-81 in Virginia to a trail race she’d been waiting two years to attend. She was in the left lane when she came up over a hill to see traffic at a standstill. She stopped quickly and easily behind the next car in her lane but worried that any vehicle coming behind her would not stop successfully.
Donnelly kept watch in her rear-view mirror and immediately saw the movement of a vehicle dodging its stopped lane and changing into hers. All she had time to do was push the brake pedal and brace herself.
Quality Assurance Specialist Susan Donnelly
“I heard the violence of the crash — sound of glass shattering and metal smashing, the vehicle bouncing up and hitting the vehicle in front of me, and everything in my SUV flying everywhere — and then silence,” she said.
Donnelly was taken by ambulance to the hospital, given x-rays and a CT scan, and was told she had suffered bruised ribs and airbag burns on one arm and her knees. The emergency room doctor explained that he had expected to see more damage.
Just thirty minutes before the crash, Donnelly randomly remembered a safety meeting at work from years ago that explained how close a driver should sit to the steering wheel.
“I remembered it was around twelve inches, so I estimated it, decided I needed more room, and scooted the seat back,” she said. “I checked that I could reach the gas and brake — all fine — and forgot about it, until after the wreck.”
The simple act of shifting herself back from the steering wheel might be what saved her life, or reduced the possibility of serious injury.
“A paramedic I talked to after the wreck said remembering that tip from a long-ago safety meeting was probably why I walked out of the ER,” Donnelly said.
“While on-site, employees are provided regular safety information with the goal to develop a safety culture where employees look out for hazards and complete work in a safe manner,” explained Julie Cramer, Y-12 Safety and Industrial Hygiene Senior Manager. “We also want employees to bring that information and mindset home. Employees will see many of the same safety risks off site and if we can keep people safe at work and influence them to be safer at home, that’s a win-win.”
“Take it from me, something small you hear in a safety meeting could prevent debilitating injury and save your life,” said Donnelly.
One of the New Employee Orientation classes during 2022 at Y-12’s New Hope Center.
Starting any new job is overwhelming, but starting work at a nuclear weapons production site is even more so. Human Resources and Communications led an effort to improve the onboarding experience for new hires at Pantex and Y‑12, with substantial engagement from other organizations. The goal was to create an onboarding experience that empowers employees with a clear understanding of our mission and enables them to contribute to our mission more quickly.
The enhanced orientation program acquaints new employees with goal‑setting, provides intensive employee training with presentations about both sites, and connects each new hire to an organizational ambassador from his or her business area. By the end of orientation, new employees have a deeper understanding of their individual roles in achieving the mission. They also have a clearer organizational picture, familiarity with the Pantex and Y‑12 strategic plans, and continued support through the connection and relationship built with their organizational ambassador.
As an organizational ambassador, Leslie Mathews of Y‑12 Production Operations provides one‑on‑one support to new employees during their first 90 days of employment (and often longer). “I hired in almost 15 years ago,” she said. “I did not get all of this information on day one. It takes lots of time to understand the magnitude of what we do, but with the onboarding structure, new hires have the opportunity to learn so much at the very beginning.”
“The engagement of senior leaders and organizational ambassadors in onboarding has been a game-changer,” said Senior Director of Communications Jason Bohne. “New employees are not only learning how they connect with the mission but are also gaining perspective on our priorities and beginning to build a network of people who can help them be successful in the short term and throughout their careers. Welcoming them and giving them the tools to succeed helps make us all successful.”
Making sure new employees are introduced to how they fit in our national security mission falls to Recruitment and Placement Specialists Zuleyma Carruba-Rogel and Jay Aspray.
“We’re always asking ourselves, ‘Is this the best that we can be?’ That constant reflection and adjustment lets us know we’re on the path to success,” Carruba-Rogel said. “When we see and experience the community that new hires are creating; when they respond to content and tell us they feel welcome; or when they talk about what a great experience onboarding was for them — that’s when we get to reap the fruit of those labors.”
Pantex Deputy Site Manager Kenny Steward said, “In our sites’ histories, we have rarely had to compete with a broad range of employers to attract talent to Pantex and Y‑12. Orientation is one of the opportunities we have to show new employees that they made the right choice and have joined a team they can be proud of for the rest of their careers. It’s our new employees’ introduction to life and culture in a high‑hazard, nuclear production environment, allowing us to set the stage for tying each employee to our critical nuclear deterrent mission and ensuring they know the dramatic value they add to the important work done at our sites.”
At the Global Security Analysis and Training Learning Lab, the use of different virtual or augmented headsets allow people to communicate with others across great distances for common objectives.
The Oak Ridge Enhanced Technology and Training Center (ORETTC) is under construction on the west end of the Oak Ridge Turnpike. It will be a state-of-the-art training complex that serves as the nation’s preeminent training facility for radiation response, nuclear processing, and emerging technologies. However, some of the ORETTC technology has been getting a trial run across town.
While ORETTC is being built, the training for radiological emergency responders has continued at Y-12. Relatively new to the mix is the Global Security Analysis and Training (GSAT) Learning Lab. The facility sits a short distance from the Y-12 site and its success is due in part to the challenges posed by COVID-19.
“We went from having all these face-to-face engagements to needing to do virtual engagements,” said Mary Lin, senior manager of Knowledge Acquisition and Performance Studies (KAPS).
She said technology became the solution.
Within the walls of the lab are instructional designers with expertise in video and technology. There is an attorney on staff for nuclear safeguards and policy instruction.
“Our augmented reality program came to life out of the COVID-19 pandemic. Our distance learning and virtual-learning-use green screen technology. All that came out of the pandemic,” said Lin.
Green screens allow participants to be placed into virtual locations that simulate real-life scenarios.
“One of the things that we do with green screens,” said Lin, “is play videos, similar to a news production, allowing a person to point out things in the video for better comprehension. We also use iPads that let them be John Madden, who was famous for diagramming football plays on monitors. It allows [instructors] to kind of circle the event in a video and say ‘look at what’s happening.’ So it creates that immersive learning experience.”
Participants are offered a full menu of training resources. “We do everything from international engagements to domestic training, where we offer everything from alarm response training to international nuclear material accountancy and control courses,” Lin said.
Toby Williams, who heads GSAT, said the courses being developed at the learning lab will benefit all its programs and create a better learning environment.
“Augmented reality training allows us to engage with participants in an immersive manner in both in-person training and distance training,” Williams said. “It makes the training and concepts more interactive, which means the participants are more likely to remember what we taught,” he added.
Being off-site also has the benefit of lowering the risk level GSAT potentially presents to the site.
“Security is a huge deal at the site and understandably so. Moving to ORETTC will reduce the level of risk we present to the site, allowing us to challenge new processes, ideas, and concepts. Specifically, within our international engagements, we will be more adaptable.” said Williams.
Ashley Stowe is the new director of ORETTC.
“The GSAT group provides nuclear and radiological response training to our customers. The learning lab is a place where we develop the technologies and the course materials to deliver to our customers,” said Stowe. “In the gaming universe, they use this type of technology on a regular basis.
The use of different virtual or augmented headsets allow people to communicate with others across great distances for common objectives. It’s the same for us, but these are just toys until we provide the educational component, which the KAPS team provides.”
Stowe said working with their customers and subject matter experts, they are creating real-life simulations with gaming attributes. Add the educational component, and participants receive an enhanced training experience.
Stowe, Williams, and Lin all said the center will promote and challenge critical thinking in high-consequence operations or emergency response events, and will create a more adaptable and efficient training curriculum.
ORETTC is located on an 81-acre campus in Roane County within the City of Oak Ridge. It will consist of two facilities, the Simulated Nuclear and Radiological Activities Facility and the Emergency Response Training Facility, and will serve as a graduate-level academy for first responders, nuclear security professionals, and nuclear nonproliferation experts.
Stowe said they intend to host their first ORETTC training class with outside participants in early December.
Activities such as radiological material moves can be simulated in the Global Security Analysis and Training Learning Lab.
Personnel are shown in the NOC/SOC Control Room, surrounded by monitors used to assess the quality and security of the CNS network.
If you imagine Consolidated Nuclear Security’s network as an overall body of systems, applications, and workstations, the Network Operations Center/Security Operations Center (NOC/SOC) would be its central nervous system. Tasked with a combination of responsibilities from processing network information, monitoring, and alerting any instabilities of our network, the NOC/SOC runs a 24/7 operation with 14 personnel to ensure that everything from web based applications to computer systems are protected and functioning as normal.
Established in 2019, the NOC/SOC consists of a team of information technology experts as part of Information Solutions and Services’ (IS&S) IT Operations organization. While based at Pantex, the NOC/SOC is an enterprise wide service that plays an essential role for the continuity of business operations for both Pantex and Y-12. From server equipment and firewalls to telecommunications and dashboards, the team uses their primary system to proactively observe the state of our network around the clock.
The NOC/SOC was built from the ground up. Staff have gone from working out of conference rooms to having a centralized control room with modern equipment and technology.
With security being the top priority of our network, the NOC/SOC is integral to our sites’ cybersecurity posture as they are responsible for proactively monitoring any issues that could potentially impact or threaten our computer systems. As protocol, the NOC/SOC is also notified of any planned updates or maintenance impacts to our network in order to closely monitor its performance and ensure nothing is out of the ordinary.
Every case is treated with equal value, whether investigating a suspicious email or troubleshooting an application for enhanced performance. From application management, threat analytics, to end user support, the NOC/SOC holds a variety of proven skills that have cultivated personnel to continue to build their careers within IS&S.
More than 60% of the original NOC/SOC staff have advanced to other positions in IT and Cybersecurity. In addition to their knowledge, they have qualities that can’t be taught, such as attention to detail, a questioning attitude, and high standards.
While forming a model of excellence within the organization, the NOC/SOC is also working to develop the future of the IS&S workforce by growing the NOC/SOCteam and will continue to serve as an enterprise solution. As technology continues to become smarter and faster, so are the NOC/SOC staff. Their goal is to stay as up to date as possible, adapt to what’s new, and deliver for our national security mission.
Y-12 employees recently gathered to celebrate the conclusion of the roadmap.
Nuclear Criticality Safety is a foundation for much of the work performed at Y-12, and site leadership recognized the importance of improving the program to continue to ensure the safety of enriched uranium operations.
In 2018, the Nuclear Material Stewardship Site Initiative was created. It focused first on integrating the cross functional aspects of NCS. The NCS team took a risk based approach to investigate and analyze legacy issues, from equipment that had been out of service for decades to single items requiring proper disposition. The site initiative was used to ensure actions were executed as planned and were effective in preventing occurrence of accumulation events.
As the site initiative progressed, the task of coordinating all resources and actions became quite overwhelming. The Criticality Safety Management and Integration group was created under the Y-12 site manager to develop an integrated and resourced NCS schedule and to serve as the focal point for all Y-12 NCS activities.
A roadmap to success
In an effort to document the initiative, an NCS roadmap was created. The roadmap comprehensively captured the multiyear journey and clearly articulated remaining actions, as well as outlined the journey to becoming a best in class NCS program. An integrated schedule was fully used to track and complete actions, process descriptions were updated, and process drift awareness was initiated.
As the roadmap neared completion, a series of comprehensive reviews were completed and no significant gaps were identified. The roadmap completion took a great amount of effort from many organizations across Y-12, including Production Operations, Infrastructure, Training, Engineering, Quality, Safety and Industrial Hygiene, and others.
“The Y-12 NCS roadmap has been a true embodiment of the teamwork and can do spirit that makes Y-12 such a special and unique place,” explained Amanda Curtis, Y-12 Criticality Safety Management and Integration senior director. “Our workforce demonstrated that everyone is part of the NCS program. From the training team developing briefs on criticality safety evaluations to explain the ‘why’ behind the controls, the infrastructure team making modifications to improve the facility, the craft incorporating NCS into their daily actions, the engineering team who wrote procedures and drawings to implement improvements, the NCS engineers and Critical Safety Officers who wrote and implemented a huge number of improvements, and the countless others who worked on corrective and improvement actions, the culmination of these efforts has imprinted our NCS program on the collective DNA of the Y-12 workforce. It was a tremendous achievement.”
Process Engineering, through their improvement plan as part of the roadmap, updated all process descriptions to better define elements of each fissile processing system and held numerous classes to raise awareness regarding process drift. These items, in combination with efforts from all other NCS teams, were substantial improvements to prevent accumulation events.
“I am amazed at how far Y-12 has come in the area of NCS,” said Vice President of Mission Engineering Tony Boser. “The improvement to NCS processes and systems, along with the creation and execution of the roadmap, demonstrates what a healthy program looks like and that by working together we can achieve anything.”
After almost 5 years, the Nuclear Material Stewardship Site Initiative and the remaining roadmap actions were closed.
During a recent NCS roadmap completion celebration, Y-12 Site Manager Gene Sievers noted, “Arriving at the end of the roadmap signifies an immense amount of effort from multiple programs at Y-12. NCS is the fundamental and unique program at Y-12 as criticality safety impacts all organizations on this site.”
The goal of Best in Class
While the NCS risk and site initiative have been completed, the goal of becoming a best in class program continues.
“The best in class for NCS programs would be a very elite group, and there is no one in that group currently across the DOE complex,” explained Susan Kozemko, Y-12 Engineering senior director. “Best in class would mean that we have the best NCS program (comprehensively) and are set apart from the other NCS programs due to our ability to deliver the highest quality compared to our peers. We have made great strides over the last two years or so, but we have a number of things to accomplish to complete that achievement.”
To achieve the goal of best in class, the NCS team is developing a plan featuring comprehensive indicators that will indicate the total health of the program. Once those indicators are developed and agreed to by National Nuclear Security Administration Production Office, the NCS team will roll out the plan and use that to track program progress going forward and work toward achieving the title of best in class.
“It is important to see that, together as a team, Y-12 is setting the standard of what a best-in-class criticality safety program looks like,” exclaimed Rory Rauch, NNSA associate deputy manager of Operations at Y-12. “This could not have been accomplished without the entire Y-12 cadre working together.”