Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - Buffalo Niagara International once again hosted the annual International Aviation Snow Symposium, a gathering of airport runway maintenance professionals nationwide coming to train, learn and network on the most efficient ways to overcome the toughest obstacles of the job, mainly, snow and ice removal.
"It's a really great opportunity for education," said Josh Love, an electrical engineer from the Baltimore Washington International. "...training people on what all the FAA standards are. And it's a great networking between all the airports and able to talk with the vendors with more state of the art equipment and products."
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This Wednesday marked the sixth and final day of the event, where the crews tested their skills in operating the snowplow machinery in an annual obstacle course that they call, "The Snowplow Rodeo," which we've been told gets quite competitive.
"We get to show what we do. We'll be doing snow removal with the plows and all of that trying to not knock over the cones, like we will not knock over the lights [on the airfield]. Everybody gets to have a fun time and laugh about it. There's a great competitive nature to it," Brandon Taylor said, a coworker of Love at the BWI.
Talking Buffalo Blizzard
A lot of discussion and learning centered around the response to the deadly Buffalo Blizzard last year. The airport that never shuts down actually closed for five days in December during and after the blizzard.
However, that didn't stop the Buffalo team from winning their 8th Balchen/Post Award for snow removal excellence during the blizzard.
Chris McBride, Buffalo International's Landscape Supervisor gave WBEN some insight as to what their team had to face following the days after the blizzard, which kept the airport closed.
"It stayed closed just for the fact that we had over five feet of snow and we had to find places to put it," said McBride. "You want to make sure that runways and taxiways are safe for the planes to land, but with the driving ban going on, the people have to be able to get here. We wanted to make sure everything was opened up safe for the drivers around the airport, safer to get in here. Safety is the number one concern."
McBride, who's been working at the airport for 11 years, said that those blizzard days were the most difficult days on the job by far and the crews were not only taking care of the airfield, but helping out neighbors in the area as well.
"... the amount of snow, the winds, not being able to see. It was just crazy trying to be out on the roads trying to rescue people. I mean, the airport was closed but we're on the streets trying to get people out of their cars get in the warm shelter, get them fed."
Following the blizzard, Buffalo had crews come in to help clear and remove the snow following what can really only be described as an occurrence that happens once in a lifetime.
"We had guys from Pennsylvania and we had Top Dogs here coming from Maryland to help melt the snow once the blizzard was over. We had to stay here to help out, clear out on some of the city streets and around the terminal. So yeah, we had mutual help from all over," said McBride.
A deadly blizzard is surely something that would certainly shock and surprise anybody. However, the teams we interviewed say they weren't surprised to see the airport still closed after a blizzard of this caliber.
'It doesn't really surprise me, working at the airport up in Bangor, there's times it takes a long time to clean up. When you get that amount of snow, you're buried in it. It takes a lot of time to move that type of snow." said James Scripture of Bangor International in Maine and three-time victor of the Snowplow Rodeo.
"There's a lot of work to be done even when the initial storm goes away. You can't leave piles of snow on the airfield. Pilots won't be able to see where they are. And you have to clear the parking lot and adjacent roads because then people will have nowhere to park," said Taylor.
Crews say Buffalo continues to be a leader in snow removal.
"I think Buffalo set a standard this year. They showed the world what they can do and what they'll continue to do. BWI is always going to try to compete but you guys did a heck of a job and I'm proud to just be a part of this program," said Love.
"We believe Buffalo is the standard. We at BWI tip our hats to you guys for taking care of that because that wasn't an easy feat," added Taylor.