As students returned for a second week of classes, an arctic blast dropped snow and ice onto the region. Both Tuesday and Wednesday were 16 degrees Fahrenheit at their warmest and fell below zero at night. In an email sent out on Jan. 18, Dean for Student Life Trae Yeckley issued precautions to remain safe, including appropriate clothing and recommendations to monitor time outside. At the same time, Physical Plant prepared to salt the sidewalks and push snow from walkways. The department worked throughout the week to make sure the campus remained functional while it was plunged in the cold. Director of Facilities Joseph Michael spoke to the work the Physical Plant did to keep operations running across campus.
“We continue to provide maintenance. We try to make sure everything is up and running, so the goal, of course, is safety first.” Michael said. “Make sure people have heat and make sure people can get safely from point A to point B.”
Michael says that accidents like trips and falls are mitigated directly by the work the department does during the winter. Some conventional methods were unavailable because of the cold, so the sidewalks and roads were pretreated to get ahead of the snow and ice buildup. Preventative measures such as these, and alerting the public to what they can expect with these weather events, are important to making campus a safe place to be.
“We had a couple instances where we were unable to eliminate the ice, so we had to go out with hammers and metal shovels and try and break it up.” Michael said. “When we know there’s a cold snap coming, we try and let building coordinators, RAs and students know. They know to keep their windows closed, to look out for those sort of things.”
Tyler Belz, the stadium and grounds lead, also spoke about his work with the physical plant. He primarily works on the upkeep of the Robertson Athletic Complex, but works at the Maintenance Building with the Physical Plant in the winter. Because of the cold, Belz mentioned that the salt can only work to a certain temperature, which leaves the department with limited options in terms of keeping pathways safe enough to walk on.
“It’s been a while since we had a winter like this, snow everyday. And a lot of the time it’s been a lot of daytime snow this year, so that’s probably why you guys see it so much. ” Belz said. “Usually, it snows at night and we clean up in the morning and we’re pretty much done with the snow aspect of the day. But, this year has been a totally different animal.”
Professor of Environmental Science and Sustainability Richard Bowden also spoke about the extreme cold, as well as what we can expect in winters going forward. As the climate changes and the planet warms up, different regions will begin to see differentiating weather events that they might not have experienced beforehand.
“One of the most rapidly warming places on earth are the polar regions. As it gets warmer, the polar vortex, a concentration of winds that swirl around the North Pole. And then, the polar jet stream, a band of very high velocity winds, high in the atmosphere that stays around the polar area, are normally constrained by very cold temperatures.” Bowden said. “As it’s gotten warmer, they can now dip farther south, which is why it is that last week it was exceptionally cold. Because the polar vortex weakens, the wind stream then dips down more often in ways that it never have in the past.”
Bowden stressed that, even though the weather may feel cold in the moment, the climate change has suddenly ceased completely. The projection for Crawford County and the surrounding areas are fewer snowy winters as time goes on. The snow will stay on the ground for shorter amounts of time, as well as raining more often during the colder months.
“The projections are, for our area, is to see a lot more mixed precipitation events; a lot more melting events, a lot more rain, and less snow on the ground. In summer, projections are, and what we’re seeing as well,” Bowden said. “In the next 20 to 30 years the average temperature will be a lot more like Atlanta, Georgia. And a lot more extreme events.”
Physical Plant utilizes different salts for both roads and walkways during their clean-ups. The rock salt used on the sidewalks is specifically dyed blue to easily see which paths have been treated and are safe to walk on. The department still recommended suitable footwear for walking, especially in the event where they aren’t able to salt the walkways in time.
“A lot of times, you’ll see people still wearing their flip flops or something out. So you’d hate to see someone fall. Just make sure you’ve got good footwear.” Belz said. “During a freezing rain, there’s not so much we can do. One tip I always try and tell kids if I see them walking is that you walk in the snow. That way, you’re not walking on the sheet of ice.”