Airport hopes to clear snow faster this winter

A liquid de-icer, eight snow tractors, and five new snow blowers are going to make snowstorm-straddled airline passengers' lives at Pierre-Elliot Trudeau International a little less miserable, Aéroports de Montréal (ADM) announced yesterday as it demonstrated some of these latest acquisitions to local media. "With this equipment, we'll reduce clearing times to 20 minutes from 40-45 minutes," said Donald Desrosiers, director of facilities maintenance for the Montreal-area airport authority.

According to Desrosiers, though last winter, with its record 3.7 metres of snowfall, was particularly taxing on the airport's snow-clearing crew, the airport did not decide to renew its fleet based on early forecasts this winter would be as white and as cold. "This was part of a five-year plan to renew our fleet anyway," Desrosiers said.

He declined to comment on how much the airport paid for the vehicles, which were mostly purchased from Oshkosh Corporation, a Wisconsin-based company that designs emergency vehicles as well as military ones for clients such as the U.S. Army. "I can tell you our entire fleet is worth about $36 million," he said, adding the purchase was made through the ADM setting up a public bidding offer to various companies.

Later on, outside, the company demonstrated one of its new snow tractors. "At 22 feet, the broom width is twice as wide as on the old machines," Desrosiers explained.

Driver Patrick Lebeau started off the tractor and wheeled it around twice outside. Though there was no snow to clear, he gave the large broom a spin. Its bristles kicked up a cloud of dust as the small group of demonstrators watched. "That's my GPS," Lebeau explained to The Chronicle inside the roomy cabin of the truck as he tapped on an electronic monitor. The size of a small computer screen rather than the typically tinier models for use in personal vehicles, the GPS is necessary for drivers like Lebeau in the thick of white-outs. "It tells you where the airport's trail is so you can stick to it rather than go off when visibility is reduced," he said.

The usual elements of a dashboard-a speedometer, fuel gauge, odometer, etc.-are all bunched together on another digital screen, leaving ample room for the many accoutrements of the tractor, including switches for the many lights on the front and back of the vehicle, its plow and broom, as well as its six windshield wipers.

Communications director Christiane Beaulieu reminded passengers to always call and check ahead of time to find out if their flights are delayed or cancelled in the thick of a snowstorm during winter. "Now we also have a new SMS service," she added. It amounts to a phone number passengers can text message to on their cell phones. Once received, the message prompts the service to constantly update passengers with text replies to their cells on how the flight's departure time has been affected.