Driving a plow requires more than pushing snow
By DEB BENTLY
Staff writer
“I enjoy being out here when it’s crappy,” declares Adam Wacholz, snow plow driver with the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), based out of Albert Lea. The 37-year-old Hollandale resident has had the job for the past 9 years, and has acquired an interesting collection of experiences and knowledge.
Not all of which he is willing to share.
But given the chance to tell the driving public anything, he knows exactly what he wants to say:
“Give us room!”
When the weather calls for it, Wacholz is one of about 20 drivers who keep 10 MnDOT snow plows on the road around the clock, driving 12-hour shifts which last either from midnight to noon, or noon to midnight. The state-owned plows monitor interstate and state highways–in the case of those based out of Albert Lea, I-35 north and south and state highways 13 and 69 north to Highway 30 (New Richland and Ellendale) and south to the state line, as well as sections of I-90.
As the Dec. 22 storm began, he had already been working 9 days straight. Then he put in five more, in-- =≠≠By DEB BENTLY
Staff writer
“I enjoy being out here when it’s crappy,” declares Adam Wacholz, snow plow driver with the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), based out of Albert Lea. The 37-year-old Hollandale resident has had the job for the past 9 years, and has acquired an interesting collection of experiences and knowledge.
Not all of which he is willing to share.
But given the chance to tell the driving public anything, he knows exactly what he wants to say:
“Give us room!”
When the weather calls for it, Wacholz is one of about 20 drivers who keep 10 MnDOT snow plows on the road around the clock, driving 12-hour shifts which last either from midnight to noon, or noon to midnight. The state-owned plows monitor interstate and state highways–in the case of those based out of Albert Lea, I-35 north and south and state highways 13 and 69 north to Highway 30 (New Richland and Ellendale) and south to the state line, as well as sections of I-90.
As the Dec. 22 storm began, he had already been working 9 days straight. Then he put in five more, including Christmas day. All through the bad weather, in addition to driving as many as 300 miles a shift, he estimates he stopped at least 10 times to check on people in stranded vehicles. In other cases, when he could readily see people were unharmed, he radioed state troopers to the location.
“It’s a service,” he says. “I feel a sense of satisfaction knowing I made it possible for people to get where they wanted to go–or at least made sure they were safe.”
Since Wacholz drives his 55,000-pound truck at a typical speed of 20 to 30 mph along the interstate, and since he is frequently surrounded by a “snow cloud” created by the process of plowing, he has no need to be told drivers sometimes find him and his “service” an irritation–certain rude gestures send the message clearly. He seems to approach the problem philosophically.
“I just remember they maybe couldn’t even be on the road if it weren’t for me,” he says as he shrugs his shoulders.
“I count my shift a success when nobody goes in the ditch.”
Like all the drivers out of the Albert Lea location, Wacholz has a “route.” In his case, the 13 or so miles of I-35 between I-90 and Ellendale. He will leave the garage and head north, checking conditions and determining what can be done to keep the four lanes clear and safe; just past Hwy 30, he uses the crossover in the median to head back south. On Dec. 27, with a fairly strong wind from the southeast, he stays to the east side in both directions, breaking up drifts which are working their way toward the traffic lanes. The equipment in his truck tells him the air temperature is 18 degrees, but the road surface, thanks to friction from traffic, is 23. He, too, is constantly monitoring various factors: his hope, he says, is to leave the road “bare, dry, and cold.”
“I usually get out of the truck a few times each shift to see whether ice is building up anywhere,” he explains. If there is ice, he can choose between spreading a briny solution or solid salt, depending on conditions. “I know people sometimes get mad when we’re not putting salt down,” he observes. “But what they don’t understand is that, once the temperature is a ways below freezing, it’s not effective.”
When it comes to drifting, his best weapon, he says, is persistence: “There’s more to it than just pushing the white stuff,” he comments.
“We try to play the wind.”
By this, he explains, he means that he tries to leave any removed snow in a position and shape which will not encourage, and hopefully even decrease, the amount of buildup on the road. When the weather is bad, though, it’s simply a losing battle which must continue, one shift after another. “You know it’s going to be a busy day when you come back about an hour later and you can’t even tell you’ve been there.”
All snow plow drivers, Wacholz claims, have stories from such days.
A storm in February of 2019 seems to have inspired many of them. According to the National Weather Service, that particular system began with a wintry mix on Saturday, Feb. 23, and followed up with snow that fell at a rate of up to 3 inches an hour, leading to accumulations of up to a foot.
During that particular storm, Wacholz recalls driving a 17-hour shift because his replacement could not get to work. He also remembers a point at which the interstate was so blocked by snow that he and a second driver had to work together, with the first truck pushing the accumulation from one lane into the other, and the second maneuvering it off the shoulder.
At another point that weekend, Wacholz’s snow plow was rear-ended by a car that was driving too fast for conditions and, in the course of the collision, pushed well under the bed of his truck. A volunteer firefighter and EMT for Hollandale’s emergency services, he was better equipped than most to act as a first responder, but he wishes there had been no need for his skills. It’s well known among snow plow drivers, though, he says, that “It’s not ‘if’ you’re going to get hit, it’s ‘when.’”
“People should just slow down,” he says. “When visibility is bad, it’s what you do.”
In speaking with people from stranded vehicles, Wacholz says plow drivers are often astounded at the reasons they give for being out in dangerous conditions.
“They’ve told us they had a gift certificate they wanted to cash in, or they just wanted to get a coffee,” he recalls. “We always hear that they didn’t realize how bad conditions were.”
Wacholz also mentions out-of-state drivers who sometimes step out of their vehicles into the snow wearing flip-flops, shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. “You can tell they don’t know much about Minnesota winters,” he observes. Plow drivers are also taken aback by the number of people who, even though conditions are bad, are using their cell phones or distracting themselves in other ways.
Despite having a view from 9 feet or so above the road surface, Wacholz says, there are occasions when even he has trouble. During the Dec. 23 storm, and during nearly all significant snowfalls, he recalls, “There are times I can’t see past my hood.”
He has a photo taken in 2019 of a snowbank which came level with his shoulders–while seated in his plow.
He also remembers a time when he looked in his rearview mirror to see a semi approaching at much too high a speed. The next thing he knew, the semi was passing him–in the median. “He must have decided it was better to take the median than to rear end a snow plow,” Wacholz suggests. “That’s the kind of moment that will make your heart race.”
But whatever might be happening around him, he shares, he has little choice but to watch it unfold. “You can’t swerve,” he says, pointing to the 12-foot-wide blade at the front of his truck. “Think what might happen to other traffic if a vehicle like this one suddenly swung toward them.”
Still, Wacholz says he is grateful that, in 9 years and who knows how many miles of driving, the heart-racing moments have been widely spaced. While he admits he enjoys the challenge and occasional excitement of being on the front lines of the state highway system’s battle against the elements, he’s acutely aware that his job is to make it possible for people to reach their destinations.
“Whatever is happening, bad weather, an accident, we can only do our best,” he says. “We take conditions into account–whatever those ‘conditions’ happen to be.”