Evening Republican, Volume 16, Number 79, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 April 1912 — Annual Snow Battle Is On [ARTICLE]

Annual Snow Battle Is On

Enormous Cost of Maintaining Snow Plows and Crews—Much Damage la Caused by Avalanches. Denver, Colo.—The annual battle with the snow king is on in the Rocky mountains. From the middle of February to the Ist of May the struggle is at Its hardest. Western railroads are hurling their giant rotaries against the drifts that threaten to impede transcontinental traffic. Snowslides are booming down mountain, sides, sweeping away valuable timber and sometimes carrying away mining camps, villages, stage coaches and trains. To Becure an accurate estimate of the amount of money spent in fighting the snow king in the Rockies every winter and to cast up the total amount of damage done by avalanches is not easy. Authorities on the subject say that $20,000,000 would not cover the total. Every western railroad is under tremendous expense In maintaining snow plows and their crew*. The first cost ot a modern rotary plow is about $15,000. -- '■ : In Colorado, which contains the highest mountains of the continental divide, snow fighting has been developed to a science. Every railroad In Colorado has a full equipment of snow plows and maintains snow fighting crews for eight months of the year. t Necessarily when the snows are severest attention .Is centered on the main lines, which are kept clear most

of the time, traffic seldom being impeded an hour by the worst blizzard. The braflfcfi 1 ' lines, which penetrate the high' hills to the mining camps, do not fare so well, and some of toe Colorado mining towns like Silverton and Breckenridge are cut off from toe rest of the world for weeks, in spite of toe efforts of«the snow fighters. Probably the Moffat road, which is the popular name for the late David H. Moffat’s Denver, Northwestern ft Pacific railroad, now in course Of construction from Denver to Salt Lake, Is called upon to do more snow fighting than any other line In toe world. The Denver, Northwestern ft Pacific crosses the continental divide. about 60 miles west of Denver at ah 'altitude of more than 11,000 feet above sea leveL For miles on both sides of the divide the snow plows are required to do heavy service. The (rack must be swept clean every day, for the reason that the high winds are' constantly filling the cuts with snow. Hie drifts accumulate on- each side of the track until the trains are overtopped many feet and they pass through miles of snow lanes, yet so systematically is the track kept cleared that traffic ia seldom impeded. The damage caused by avalanche*, in the. Rocky mountains each winter is past all accurate computation. These sttowslldes are full of tfeachery and descend at the most Inopportune times and in the most unexpected places. There are some slides In the San Juan mountains in western Colorado which follow beaten trails and ■, v.

which come booming down the slopes at about the same time each year. Their paths are avoided and they do little damage. But toe average snowslide seems to be a creature of whims. It forms at the foot of some crai£ far above toe timber line. The winds whip the snow into deep drifts at the head of a slope leading thousands of feet into a deep valley below. Under the spell of the lengthening days and warm suns of February and March the drifts begin to loosen. Tiny rivulets trickle from beneath the white mantle, and suddenly, with a roar that is never forgotten by those who halve (nice heard it, the whole mass starts on its Journey to toe valley.