Spring Cleaning. On its fourth day of operation, the White Pass Rotary Fleet completes the 2011 spring line-clearing operation, as it removes a 9 ft. high drift that has accumulated in front of the station and dining hall in Bennett, B.C. This operation took the better part of 40 minutes, mainly because that drift is pure "Canadian Concrete." This is snow that has accumulated, settled, and perhaps thawed and refrozen numerous times. After walking up on that drift before the rotary moved in, I can personally attest to the fact that it is solid as a brick. No snowshoes were needed up there. I am amazed that they didn't break anything in the process of removing it. Needless to say, standing anywhere near the discharge plume from the rotary could be hazardous to one's health.
Located on the southern shore of the 27 mile-long Lake Bennett, this station complex is the halfway point between Skagway, Alaska and Whitehorse, Yukon Territory. In the winter, the north winds blow the loose snow off the long, frozen lake and tend to deposit it squarely in front of the first major obstacle on the southern shore....namely, this building. By early spring, some of the drifts here are pretty impressive, in this case, nearly covering the first story of the station building. The yard at Bennett is typically as far north as the rotary plow ever operates, when opening the line for the impending tourist season. Although the tourist trains to White Pass and Fraser typically commence in early May, the Carcross Trains, which stop for lunch here in Bennett, don't begin running for several more weeks. By that time, mother nature has generally taken care of the snow on her own.
