几近破記錄的三月大風雪 / Near record snow-fall during the March 2008 winter storm

Photograph above 攝影图片: The snow pile was higher than this man who must be close to 6 feet tall.

Photograph above 攝影图片: The cars were buried in snow and had to be dug out first, then the driveway.

I was lucky to be able to squeeze in between two snow storms and flew back last Thursday from Peru back to Canada without having to stay for hours at the airport staring at the hundreds of cancelled flights on the screen. Of course, what followed was hours of non-stop shovelling out in the cold trying to clear the 54 cm of snow fallen on the driveway and the roof. Now, 54 cm might not sound a lot, but when one considers that 411 cm have been deposited by Mother Nature, that the city is only 33 cm short of the all time record winter snowfall, and that an average house lot is about 34x18 metres, they all add up. Already the roof of one house in the neighbourhood had caved in because of the weight on top and the family of four barely had time to escape unharmed.

On the bright side, a lot of skiers like myself just took to the hills whenever we finished shovelling and were able to get out of the driveway and the clogged streets. As of now, most of the major roads are open but the sidewalks of many residential areas are still jammed with heavy snow and are out of bound to pedestrians. It will take the municipal crew another 4 to 5 days of around-the-clock hard work to get the city back to normal. As to the city budget, well, the 68 million set aside this year for snow removal and maintenance is almost gone, just like the snow that will melt away when spring comes. We hope.