Article Photos

Advertisement

As Monday came and went, all of northwest North Dakota was dealing with the aftermath of the 2009 Christmas blizzard. By reviewing snowfall totals on the National Weather Service Web site, it was apparent that Minot was on an island, having received 24 inches of snow, whereas the remainder of the area got anywhere from 6 inches in Williston to 19 inches reported in Martin.

Road crews were busy clearing highways in an attempt to restore normal transportation routes as quickly as possible.

Ward County Road Superintendent Rick Melchert, who is taking the point in this week's snow-removal battle in place of vacationing county highway engineer Dana Larsen, said Monday morning that things were going remarkably well.

"Actually, by the end of the day we should have all the county highways opened," he said. As of Monday morning, all the paved roads were already open.

"Just a few gravel ones," Melchert said of the remaining "holdouts."

Although the county spent the holiday weekend ready for action in case of emergencies, it was fortunate in that emergency action was rarely needed.

"We actually only had one (emergency call)," Melchert said. "We were spared quite well that way."

And although there are always calls to the highway department from people curious as to when the roads will be cleared, Melchert said those were also surprisingly few in number.

"We had just a few of those over the weekend," he said. "Nothing like it was last year."

McLean County Highway Superintendent Ron Wagner said that county was spared much of the wrath of the heavy snowfall that clobbered Minot.

He said no major emergency situations were reported to his department over the weekend

Wagner said Monday afternoon that by day's end, he anticipated the county roads would be in fairly good shape.

"We fired up the crews (Sunday) morning and by the end of the day (Monday), we should have everything pretty much clear," Wagner said. "We have things rolling down here pretty well."

McHenry County was hard-hit by the combination of a large snowfall falling on a largely rural county, however.

Nonetheless, LouElla Anderson, the chairwoman of the McHenry County Commission who lives in the Velva area, said that as of Monday things were slowly but surely returning to normal.

Few areas were totally clear yet, but several areas were becoming at least moderately passable.

"We're just now starting to get where there's a path most places," Anderson said.

With so much rural acreage, the reality of the situation is that county plows and blades can only run during daylight hours due to safety concerns.

"We're not running at night," Anderson said. "It gets to where you can't tell where the road is."

Reminded that Minot had faced similar conditions in recent days, Anderson chuckled good-naturedly.

"Yeah, but you guys have lights all over the place," she laughed.

Anderson said the county commission is watching the situation as vigilantly as possible and trying to make sure the best plan of action is being adhered to.

"We're keeping on top of it all the time constantly," Anderson said. "People can call if they have some kind of emergency, otherwise they just have to be patient and wait their turn.

"We can only do what we can do."