The big dig: Duluth, North Shore battle 20-30 inches of sloppy, soggy snow
TWO HARBORS, Minn. – More snow brings more beauty, but there are also more piles, more puddles, more plowing, more pushing, more pain and just more problems.
"I've been here for all my life, I'm 75 years old, I've never seen it this wet and sloppy," said Two Harbors resident Paul Jones, sitting in his large pickup with a plow in front. "It's just a mess."
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The mess follows nearly three days of on-again, off-again snow that first pummeled the Plains and then Minnesota and northwest Wisconsin. Even after two days of blizzard warnings in the North Shore, the National Weather Service still has a good chunk of the Twin Cities and beyond under a winter storm warning through Thursday, and possibly into Friday.
Jones, who lives in Two Harbors northeast of Duluth, told CBS News Minnesota it took him four hours to clear his driveway.
"I got an eight horsepower snowblower, and you can go 3 feet forward then have to back up, and that's in low gear. As low as it will go," he said. "It's just frustrating you can't move it. It's just slop."
Finland, Minnesota, hit the highest mark on the ruler at 29 inches of snow, according to the National Weather Service. Two Harbors had up to 26.
"It takes a little oxygen to move all this. It's very heavy," said resident Ray Waldron, as he took another deep breath. "We just have to keep working at it. Take a lot breaks. Drink water."
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The work continued well into Thursday evening, and many of those plowing and snow blowing and shoveling and salting shared concerns about an impending dip in temperatures that will soon turn all the slush into slick ice.
"You go down once quick, hit your head and it could be all over," Waldron said. "That's all I want to do is make sure people are safe, and I'm safe."
