Road Crews Prepped For Major Snow Storm
By Dan Spalding
and Leah Sander
InkFreeNews
WARSAW — Road crews are bracing for a snowstorm that will continue for two days and could be one of the biggest in recent memory.
Supervisors with the Warsaw Street Department and Kosciusko County Highway Department said they’re ready to deal with whatever develops.
The entire region will be hit hard by two storms that stretch from Texas to New England and will pass through northern Indiana beginning Tuesday night, Feb. 1, in the form of rain. A transition to snow is expected before daybreak Wednesday, Feb. 2.
Dustin Dillon, superintendent of Warsaw Public Works, said he’s talked with representatives of the National Weather Service, who told him to expect 12 to 15 inches Wednesday and three or four more inches Thursday.
The National Weather Service is predicting between 10 and 20 inches across the region through Thursday night.
The forecast from AccuWeather.com for Warsaw was more simplistic: one to two feet of snow.
Unlike many snow events, Warsaw street department won’t pretreat streets with brine Tuesday night, because the anticipated rain at the front of the storm would wash it away. Instead, crews will be salting intersections and hills as soon as sleet and ice start forming.
The city will rely on about two dozen workers, who will be divided into two groups and work 12-hour shifts. Four employees of the wastewater department are also lending support for snow removal, he said.
Dillon said they have an ample amount of road salt ready to go.
What the city needs, he said, is cooperation from motorists who often tend to park along streets.
He urged motorists to move vehicles off streets. Not only will they avoid having their vehicle buried in snow, but it’s also a public safety issue for emergency vehicles.
He said he realizes some residents have no choice but to park along a street but is hoping for as much cooperation as possible.
“It would be huge if residents would move as many cars off the street as possible to give us as much room to remove snow,” Dillon said.
Both the city and county will start road crew shifts at 7 a.m.
“If we come in at 4 a.m., we’re afraid that we’re going to miss the heavier part of it, which is later in the day, so starting at a normal start time is probably what we’re going to do at 7 a.m.,” said Kosciusko County Highway Department Superintendent Steve Moriarty.
The department has been busy prepping for the storm.
“For the most part these last couple days (preparation) has been going through our equipment, making sure that we catch any of those issues before we hit the road, changing the blades,” Moriarty said. “The other thing is making sure that all of our satellites are fully loaded with fuel and plenty of salt and sand mixture.”
The department has a lot of ground to cover throughout the county.
“We have 26 routes to cover 1,163 miles, so you know not very many guys to cover all that mileage,” he said. “In an eight-hour day, it’s like plowing down to Fort Myers, Fla., and back on both sides of the road, so it can be difficult, but we’ll have as many guys out as we can. In situations where it gets to be too much drifting and stuff, we’ll have to call some loaders out as well.”
Moriarty said the sheer amount of predicted snow has altered the department’s preparations.
“This one is finding where to put snow,” he said. “You know if it gets too much and you don’t handle it right away, that can make the road very narrow and in subdivisions you know putting the snow, it’s going to be difficult, so looking ahead of time a little bit to make sure that we catch it early enough that we can get it back so we can continue to stack it and the same thing in subdivisions is making sure we have locations where we can get it and we might have to haul it out after a couple of days.”
He said the public can help the department by giving the trucks space.
“Just understand once you see a snowplow coming down the road, if we’ve got a V plow on it, it’s coming on both sides, just being aware not to get too close or up underneath it because we’re focused on the job at hand and sometimes you can lose track of those vehicles if they tuck up underneath you,” he said. “The other thing is just kind of pull off to the side and let us go by and then you can continue on, but just being aware that we’re out there and we’re trying to get (snow plowed) as much as we can. With the blowing snow, sometimes as soon as we plow a road, I mean you turn around and it’s already blown back in. If you get 35 mph winds, it could be difficult, but eventually, we’ll get the upper hand.”