The Long Winter - Snow Finally Removed In Our Neighborhood

 

Temperatures like -5˚F and lower have been pretty common morning temperatures.  Temps like these weren't uncommon in 20 or 30 years ago, but they didn't linger for three months.  There might be a spell of cold (down to -20˚F) for a week or even two.  But the below zero temps didn't hang around all winter. More recently there have been winters when it never got below zero and others when it only happened a few times.

This winter is different.  It's been below zero frequently since early December.  

[If you're confused, it's an indoor/outdoor thermometer.  Red is for inside and navy blue is for outside.]

And here it is mid March and it's still below zero when I check the thermometer in the morning.  

The chart below from the Anchorage Daily News gets the point across .  Two days our high temperatures were below the normal low temperatures.  Three other days they were just slightly above the normal low.  

And we've also had lots of snow.  One morning there was a deep horn blowing outside.  I looked out to see  a garbage truck faced with a car parked on one side of the street and the berm on the other side so far out in the street that the truck couldn't get past.  I went out and talked to the driver.  "I can't do this street because I can't get by."  I asked if I could bring my garbage can around to the other side so he could take it.  I did and he did.  And then the guy came out to move his car.  I think he works the night shift.  

But at one corner, the snow was piled up so high and so far out into the street, you couldn't see if there were cars coming down the cross street.  

But this Thursday afternoon, there were plows on the street and they had no parking signs in front of every house for Friday.  I've suggested some kind of notification so that people could move their cars for the plows, because you never know when they are going to come. So this is a big improvement.  I managed to get my car up our driveway.  

Then Friday, they spent the whole day in our subdivision plowing snow and shooting it into dump trucks to haul away.

It takes about 30 seconds to fill a dump truck.  They have a line of dump trucks, so as soon as one is full, the next one pulls up.  I'm not sure where they are dumping all the snow.  It couldn't be too far because the trucks were back in line quickly.  

Our street is back to its normal width.  The surface of the road was scraped as far as they could go.  Still some snow, but not the several packed down inches.  

Of course, today we got more snow, but so far it's really only a light dusting.  

And Friday was the day the stove man was coming over to fix the oven door, which decided not to open when my wife wanted to get some chicken legs and yams out.  But with the snow plows, there just was no place for him to park. He kept calling after each job to see if it was clear for him.   Eventually I was able to get my car out of the driveway and over to the university and he could get into our driveway.  

Let me add that I'm reading Coming Into The Country which was released 50 years ago next year.  This is a book club book.  I read it when I got to Alaska, when it came out.  Much of the book is focused on Eagle, Alaska and the folks who live in cabins along the Yukon tributaries near Eagle.  Those folks had normal temperatures in the winter of -20˚F to as low as -60 and -70˚F.  So -10˚ is not that big a deal.  You just have to be dressed for it.