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In his 40 years of maintaining Rock County rural roads, Rodney Lowe said he’s never seen this much snow.
“In terms of the shear amount of snow on the roads, it’s the most we’ve had to move,” said Lowe, who is finally wrapping up his road clearing work this week.
One for historical records
Last week’s blizzard dropped 15 to 20 inches of moisture-laden snow on an already snow-covered landscape in Rock County and the region.
It’s not a record, but the National Weather Service considers it historic in terms of heaviest snowfall in a 24-hour period.
In Sioux Falls the record is 26 inches set on Feb. 17-18, 1962, and the last time this area saw double-digit snowfall in 24 hours was 14 inches on April 13-14, 2018.
The Jan. 2-3, 2023, snowfall likely ranks third in the record book, according to the NWS, and pushes seasonal snowfall totals toward the top of historical records.
This winter is so far the second snowiest on record with more than 33 inches tallied in Sioux Falls between Dec. 1 and Jan. 4. The snowiest on record was in 1968 at 41 inches during that time, according to the NWS.
Round-the-clock plowing
Last week’s storm closed roads, schools, businesses and airports, and sent snow-removal crews into high gear.
For Lowe, it meant 15-hour days circling rural square miles to uncover gravel.
“It’s hard to imagine ever saying this in our part of the country, but the wind didn’t blow hard enough with this last storm, because it didn’t blow off the roads,” he said.
“Normally you have occasional big drifts to contend with, but this last storm left a solid 15 to 18 inches on the road, and we have to move it all.”
It’s not that the wind didn’t blow, however.
He said after his first round of work he opened all the roads by Wednesday only to have them all drift shut Wednesday night.
“It’s going to be days before we have everything open,” he said Thursday.
He started with a single pass through all 103 miles he’s in charge of, so that at least one lane of traffic was open for residents and rural mail carriers.
Lowe spent Friday and Saturday widening those passes to two lanes and ultimately to wing out the shoulders in order to prevent the next round of snow from closing the roads so quickly.
He was among hundreds of workers in Rock County and the region moving snow to clear roads, sidewalks and parking lots.
In the city of Luverne, public works supervisor John Stoffel said his crews hauled 375 loads of snow from streets and alleys to snow piles near the Rock River south of Redbird Field.
By the end of this week, he estimates that number will climb to 1,200 loads after hauling from downtown, the airport and temporary piles in the city.
“I would put this storm in the Top 5 since I started in 1989,” Stoffel said.
The man hours, fuel and equipment costs will affect the city’s budget, but he said recent mild winters will balance expenses over time.
“It all evens out,” he said.
On the private sector side, Riley Cowell of Cowell Construction, Luverne, said he didn’t sleep much last week.
Working with his dad, Tim Cowell, and Kendall Meyer, they cleared parking lots at Dollar General, the BP gas station, Rock Vet Clinic, the radio station, the post office, McClure Electric, Centennial Apartments, Bomgaars, Stroeh Auto and Country View Apartments, plus 20 residential properties.
“We didn’t sleep much,” Cowell said Saturday. “We had one 13-hour day with a couple breaks. Otherwise, it’s been 10- to 12-hour days.”
Snow business
Winter weather created opportunities for local merchants in the snow business.
Bomgaars, for example, sold out of snowblowers as quickly as they could get them assembled.
“What we kept getting in, we were selling,” said Bomgaars assistant manager Logan Bleyenburg.
“We’ve sold 10 so far this winter, when usually we sell only one or two.”
He said there was a big run on ice melt after the pre-Christmas storm that started with freezing rain, and after the last snowfall, roof rakes have been in short supply.
Also, he said shoppers are seeking the heavy-duty grain scoops.
“They need the bigger ones to actually lift snow,” Bleyenburg said. “With the heavy snow they haven’t been able to push it; they have to scoop.”
Merely having the right equipment wasn’t enough for many area residents who found that the heavy snow was hard on moving parts.
Bill Aanenson of Rock Motor Sports said he’s seen extra business over the past two weeks.
“We sold 20 to 25 new and used snowblowers and repaired about 40 snowblowers,” he said.
“We had a lot of people looking for parts to repair their snowblowers — belts, cables, shear pins. … It’s just been constantly busy with people coming in because of the snow.”
He said he’s also worked on some snowmobiles and sold motor oil and belts for local snowmobilers. (See the related story about snowmobiles.)
The forecast calls for highs in the 20s, reaching 33 by Sunday, with temperatures in the high 20s predicted for next week.