From December 1 - 4, 2014, Eileen McKenna and Bob Gramm of AdSTM provided training on vendor inspection techniques in Hanoi, Vietnam. Workshop participants included staff from the Vietnam Agency for Radiation and Nuclear Safety (VARANS); Mechanical Research Institute; Center for material damage assessment (COMFA) - Institute of Materials Science; Vietnam Society of Sciences and Technology Welding - Ministry of Industry and Trade; Center for non-destructive evaluation (NDE); Center for technical standards of quality measurement; General Department of Standardization, Metrology and Quality; Nuclear Safety Center - Institute of Technical and Nuclear; and several companies involved with welding and non-destructive examination.
The AdSTM instructors discussed nuclear vendor inspection principles; application of codes and standards for vendor inspections; inspector access to facilities; the importance of nuclear quality assurance; planning, conducting, and documenting vendor inspections; counterfeit, fraudulent, and suspect items; and international initiatives for vendor inspection. The workshop covered how to develop inspection programs for regulatory oversight of vendors providing equipment and services for use in the nuclear power plant. Numerous practical exercises were included where recent USNRC vendor inspection reports for a variety of vendors were reviewed and discussed. During the workshop, the instructors also provided illustrative examples from Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspection related documents.