MARYSTOWN, N.L. — There were some power interruptions and almost all activity ground to a halt, but compared to other places in the eastern area of the province, the Burin Peninsula coped well during the monster blizzard that swept over Newfoundland on Friday, Jan. 17.
Among the scattered minor incidents, a pilot boat tied to the wharf in Little Bay, Marystown sank Friday night.
Still, the storm was quite a doozy in this region, one of the worst in some time, according to Burin town manager Leo Hartson.
“In snow clearing that I’ve known the past 20 years, it’s the first time I wanted to come in and park the truck and wait it out,” he told SaltWire Network on Monday, Jan. 20.
“It just wasn’t safe to be out there.”
The town’s equipment operators managed to work their regular shifts during the storm but, Hartson said, "There was times where they just had to come in and wait it out because of visibility."
A fresh batch of heavier snow on Sunday evening, Jan. 19, added to the cleanup headache, Hartson said. Because of the weight of the snow, the town had to use heavier equipment, slowing work down.
“Snow clearing will consume most of our time this week, just pushing back, because you never had a real chance to get pushed back and cleaned up from Friday’s mess when we got hit with a heavier mess last night,” he said.
“Other than that, we had a busy weekend, but we kept everything open."
Hartson acknowledged a worker had to be called in Sunday evening to plow a road so a person could get to the hospital.
In Marystown, acting chief administrative officer Alje Mitchell said the town’s plows were busy making sure the main thoroughfares were open in case of an emergency and otherwise were on standby.
“We didn’t leave them on the road all day because it was dangerous, a lot of whiteouts and stuff, and it was just no point,” he said.
There were no emergency situations, he added.
“We had everything pretty much cleared up here relatively early Saturday,” he said, adding equipment operators were back out again 2 a.m. this morning to deal with Sunday’s snowfall.
“We got it all cleaned up again fairly early this morning, so it didn’t cause too much troubles for us."
Town manager Linda Collier reported Fortune was “fortunate,” as well, though the fire department was called out during the storm to deal with a chimney fire and wind damaged a structure at the Burin Peninsula Marine Service Centre on Harbour Drive.
The fire did not result in significant damage, she said.
“Our workers were out all day pretty much, like three or four times during the day, so we always had a clean path going,” she said.
“I had everything directed to me at home and the office was closed. Everything was good for us.”
Plan in place
Grand Bank was one of the towns in the region where some residents lost power for a time during the storm.
Because of its severity, Newfoundland Power crews were delayed in responding, but they were on the scene pretty quickly once the weather allowed, Mayor Rex Matthews said.
In the future, the town may need to make sure everyone is aware of where they can go when the need arises.
In this case, both the Grand Bank Retirement Centre and the Salvation Army opened their facilities for people to warm up or a get bite to eat.
“It was a real nice act of kindness by both organizations and we really appreciate that kindness,” he said.
Matthews said he was not aware of any emergencies in Grand Bank during the lengthy blizzard.
“We have a pretty good emergency plan in place, and in the event something did happen like in St. John’s, there’s a plan that we follow very good," he said.
"Most people stayed home, and our operators, they work very, very efficiently. I must say the roads were in good condition all throughout the storm really."
Though the area fared okay this time, Matthews thinks of storms to come.
"They always seem (to bring) higher winds and more snow.”