Workers on Chinook Pass prove to be real snow men

CHINOOK PASS — When April arrives, Rick Lawson and several other state Department of Transportation workers leave their routine highway maintenance chores and head for Chinook Pass to remove snow.

Using large excavators, snowplows and snowblowers, a crew of five begins chewing away at the snow at the bottom of the pass on Highway 410 and eventually work up 5,430 feet to the summit, the state’s third-highest mountain pass.

Another crew equal in size treks through the mountainous landscape on skis, forecasting possible avalanches and ensuring the safety of machine operators below. The crew members also find and mark the roadway beneath the snow.

Their job: Clear the road and remove any snow higher up that may pose an avalanche risk.

Their goal: To have the pass open by the end of the month.

“This is a great job,” says Lawson, leaning out the cabin door of a large CAT excavator.

A few miles up the pass, he maneuvers joysticks to control a huge shovel that pulls snow from the mountain walls above the road, where a single lane snakes through 20 feet of snow.

Towering walls of snow line the neatly carved road. A damp mist hangs in the air, mingling with the smell of pine.

A snowblower’s roar mixes with the screech of the excavator as it chews through snow and spews it into a nearby ravine that slopes to the south.

“All day long I reach what I can and then the blower comes through, and then I go back and start again,” he says, explaining that his work above the road is to prevent future avalanches. “It’s just to eliminate any problems when the pass is open.”

Farther up the pass, the road completely disappears into the snow. Roofs of bathrooms in a large parking lot barely show through.

Skiers Aaron Opp and Kevin Marston zip down a northern slope with rescue dog Hannah, a yellow Lab. They’ve just finished posting signs warning skiers and hikers of avalanche danger and work that’s being done below.

“That can happen,” Opp says. “People can unexpectedly trigger an avalanche.”

Sometimes they blast potential problem areas above, allowing the snow to fall where it is later removed, said state Department of Transportation avalanche forecaster John Stimberis.

Thwarting any chance of avalanche keeps everyone safe, he says.

“We don’t want those snowbanks falling in on the road either,” he says.

Each worker wears an electronic Global Positioning System device in case one of them is caught in an avalanche. Hannah tags along as a backup in case anyone needs rescuing.

Just before reaching the summit, where snow reaches the 20-foot-tall arch over the road, Tom Martinson maneuvers a dozer near the edge of a steep grade and pushes snow to another dozer that, in turn, feeds it to a snowblower.

Snow boulders from a recent slide clutter the edge. Below, the remains of a large snow pile can be seen strewn across the ravine and into a stand of pine trees.

“When snow breaks off like that, it’s kind of a wakeup call,” he says, looking down the steep grade.

But Martinson, who has done snow removal here for the past 29 years, says working close to the mountain’s edge doesn’t bother him.

“That’s what we do,” he says with a smile behind a pair of dark sunglasses. “We’re used to it.”

Working nearly 30 feet above the road, he pushes off a few feet of snow at a time. Sometimes when an avalanche occurs, the snow can be as deep as 50 feet above the road. The farther down he digs, the harder the snow gets.

“Kind of like block ice,” he adds.

Just yards away is the summit, where the valley in which the road cuts is completely buried beneath a swath of snow. The only remnant of the road is a log-style arch that stands nearly 15 feet above the snow.

He says there’s about another three miles of 20-foot-deep snow that needs to be cleared on the west side of the pass.

Colder temperatures in April allowed for more snow in lower elevations of the pass this year, slowing snow-removal operations, he says.

“It’s a little slower process,” he says.

But crews are still shooting for a Memorial Day opening of the pass.

Either way, being on the mountain pass isn’t anything the crew complains about.

“We’re outside working on our skis every day,” Stimberis says. “It’s great. It’s the same thing with the equipment operators. They’re outside in beautiful scenery.”