Wednesday, January 07, 2009

Ol' Man Winter

He justs keeps snowin' along:
SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) - More than 6 feet of snow in the past three weeks has left Spokane residents frustrated. Tempers are so frayed that a man was arrested for shooting at a snow plow operator.

This unusually harsh winter has disrupted schools, traffic, garbage pickup and mail service in the city of 200,000.

Roofs are collapsing, streets are clogged with ice and slush and locals are starting to refer to this as Sno-maggedon.

....Spokane has received more than 78 inches of snow...since mid-December. That's far above its average of less than 50 inches for an entire winter. Normally about 16 inches would have fallen at this point.

The local record for an entire winter is 93.5 inches set in 1949-50. That is likely to be shattered soon.

....Weight on roofs is a major problem. The National Weather Service has estimated that the existing snow is placing a load of about 25 pounds per square foot roof on roofs designed to hold 30 to 40 pounds. Rain forecast to follow the snow this week will add significant new weight, the agency said.

That has created a brisk market for day laborers willing to go up on roofs and shovel snow off for at least $15 per hour.

And, in the really unbelievable, Gonzaga's men's basketball team has lost 4 of it's last 5 basketball games.

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