3/5/2019 1:53:01 PM
On February 25th, the majority of Minnesota had received heavy snow fall. The snowstorm prevented many from being able to leave their homes. However for the Minnesota Department of Veterans Affairs State Cemetery in Preston it was just another day.
Just a few weeks prior to this storm, Preston Cemetery Administrator, Robert Gross, along with his staff members braved the -50 wind chills. During this snowstorm the Preston Cemetery staff had snowshoed a mile into work. Gross said that their “main goal was to not have this impact the families, or impact them as little as possible.”
On the day of the snowstorm, road clearing took a day. The team snowshoed a mile to their equipment to clear the property. The snowfall on the roads had reached three to four feet on average. Other areas had drifts of snow adding up to six to seven feet of snow.
The drifts and under layer of ice made clearing a little more difficult. Snowplows got stuck a few times with the drifts that reached the mirrors of their plows. Though it took more time, the Toolcat and snow thrower did the trick. Gross says that the team got through the day as they always do “through hard work and dedication to our mission and understanding what these locations mean to Veterans and the families we assist.”