Beatrice Municipal Airport fighting the snow, just like others

BEATRICE – It’s not just streets, highways and roads that have to be cleared during winter weather…..add runways to the list.

"This one stalled us, a little bit. Last year, everything we had was just two or three inches at a time and we were able to get that cleared off in a day or so. This one here, took us a couple of days. We had the snow and by the time it quit, the winds picked up...and with the drifting we just couldn't get on top of it. Yesterday, we got the airport opened back up, so it took a couple of days with this," says Dennis Schmitt, the Manager of the Beatrice Municipal Airport.

It's a facility at the north edge of the community that’s exposed to high winds that can drift areas shut very quickly. "When it's only two or three inches we can just kind of plow it off to the edge of the runways and pile it up that way. But we have to be careful about covering up the lights. When we get a storm like this past one, we have to kind of windrow it and blow it over the lights."

Schmitt says the airport employs a lot of equipment for snow removal to keep runways open for aircraft arriving or departing. "Good sized equipment, but it's older equipment We have some old surplus Oshkosh Army plows and stuff like this...but we do have a newer tractor with a good blower on it and a bigger blade. It's just myself and two fulltime employees out there doing the best we can to get the snow off."

Schmitt commented on airport operations Thursday, on KWBE’s Ask the Mayor program. The bad news is another round of snow is expected overnight Thursday and Friday.

The Beatrice Municipal Airport has two hard-surfaced runways.....about 5,600 feet and 4,400 feet in length.