News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
Highway crews have given up trying to plow through towering snowdrifts to get the McKenzie Highway (Hwy. 242) open.
The Oregon Department of Transportation is waiting for Mother Nature - in the form of hot weather - to reduce the task to manageable proportions. That means the scenic highway probably won't re-open until the end of July, likely the latest opening ever.
The previous record late opening was July 18, 1964, according to ODOT records.
Crews took nearly three weeks to push up from the eastern snowgate outside Sisters to Windy Point - a distance of 3-1/2 miles. With a German-made snowblower that costs $160 per hour to operate, the cost of clearing the road could be staggering. And, according to ODOT's Mike Berg, even if they could get a trail opened up, drifts won't melt back fast enough to allow two-way traffic until the peak of summer.
Snowplow operator Gary Hughes noted that the ODOT blower can crawl up on top of drifts and peel off a layer about three feet deep. In places, he encountered drifts up to 16 feet high. Those spots required up to half a dozen passes to get down to the asphalt.
"The higher you go, the deeper it gets," Hughes said.
Recent warm weather has helped some. Drifts that were 16 feet deep a week earlier were down to 12 or 13 feet by Thursday, May 27. But they still tower well above the cab of an ODOT truck (see accompanying photo).
The late opening may push the highway toward another record. If snow comes early, it could be the shortest open season on the highway in history.
Currently, the shortest open span was 120 days, from June 21 to October 19, 1979.
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
Reader Comments(0)