Cottonwood Heights plow drivers working 18 hours straight 

COTTONWOOD HEIGHTS, Utah — Snowplow drivers pulled an impossibly long day Wednesday with some working through the night and then all day to clear every city road.

The storm dropped a foot of snow in many places around the Salt Lake Valley.

By noon Wednesday, many people living in Cottonwood Heights made it outside to clear their driveways by shovel and snowblower. They found that even with a late start they were still ahead of the plows.

“We’re just a small neighborhood, and they don’t get to us until later in the day,” said Marty Scheide.

That’s OK, he said — Scheide understood why it took so long for plows to arrive.

Cottonwood Heights Public Works Deputy Director Danny Martinez explained that they called in all 12 of their plow drivers at 10 p.m. Tuesday night when the snow began to hammer the valley and bench.

“(We were) only expecting one to three inches, and then we get pounded with 1-3″ within a couple hours,” Martinez said. “It just makes it a little more challenging.”

They knew the snow was coming, just not 12-15″ of it. Plow drivers pushed full steam ahead through the night and the entire next day.

Martinez asked people to stay patient, promising that they would get it all done. He expected that all roads would be all clear by 6 pm.

“When we have a storm like this that comes in, and it came in so intense, we fight it with full shift and we stay ’til every road is cleared,” Martinez said.

Drivers clocked in somewhere around 18 hours. After they go home to rest, Martinez said they’ll be back at work early Thursday morning as more snow arrives before the morning commute.

Scheide certainly does not envy that. He’s retired and slept in Wednesday before he dug in to clear his driveway.

Though the shoveling does get harder after the plow finally passes by.

“When they push snow, it means that it’s a lot of work for me to clear off what they just pushed,” he said, adding, “And that’s okay, that’s part of the deal.”