That's snow business! (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

That's snow business!

TAMASH LAL goes out with the gritting lorries to find out what happens on the roads of the area when snow is forecast.

SWINDON'S ice-busters are poised for action to prevent the town grinding to a halt during this week's sub-zero temperatures.

We might have escaped the snow in the town so far, but the mercury looks set to fall to 2 deg C tonight, meaning that roads could become treacherous.

But when the weather unleashes its wrath on Swindon, a dedicated team of gritters are placed on 24-hour call-out.

The Met Office was predicting a snowstorm at around 3am on Friday, but the blizzard didn't materialise.

Bands of snow which hit the east and west coasts and got as near as Avebury by-passed Swindon.

But on Thursday afternoon, Swindon Council was braced for action, fearing a repeat of last month's freak blizzard which caused traffic chaos.

The weather warning came as the rush hour was starting at 5.30pm, but even so, seven gritters loaded up with rock salt rolled out of the council's Barnfield depot.

The whole operation is planned like a military exercise.

Between September and April, a troop of highway workers are placed on 24-hour call-out to man the gritters. A team of three officers co-ordinate the operation.

The weather is monitored by a senior officer from environmental services who is fed information by the Met Office.

Out of hours, he or she is provided with a laptop to monitor temperatures.

Information from two road sensors is also fed into the computer. The sensors placed in the road at Blagrove and Chiseldon measure the temperature of the surface and the amount of salt present.

On Thursday, the weather was being monitored by Derek Edgington, who had to decide what action was needed.

If bad weather is predicted, and the roads need gritting, it is up to Richard Hedges to mobilise the troops.

Richard, who is in charge of the highways department at Swindon Services, has one hour to get the gritters out.

On Thursday, the decision to grit came as the rush hour was about to start, but they still had to go out.

The council prioritises roads which will be gritted.

Main commuters roads called A routes are usually first, followed by bus routes, known as B routes.

Access routes to emergency services, such as hospitals, are also covered, as are main roads to outlying villages.

Each driver grits two routes a session, but the roads will need to be done again if it snows.

The third person involved in running the exercise is a highway inspector, such as Henry Matysek, who makes sure everything runs smoothly.

Henry drives around the different routes to see if there have been fresh snowfalls.

Usually everything runs well, but, of course, motorists always remember when things go wrong.

Commuters were furious when the blizzard on January 28 caused gridlock.

But Richard explained that they are always at the mercy of nature.

He said: "We have all this technology to help us nowadays, but sometimes nature still beats us.

"The problem was that rain was predicted, so there was no point gritting the roads before then as it would get washed away.

"The gritters were ready to go when the snow came from nowhere.

"It wasn't predicted, it was a freak storm. I have never known anything like it.

"We get a lot of unfair criticism. All my men are extremely dedicated, and once the gritters have been out other men come in and help to grit pavements by hand."

Mick Liddiard, 53, has gritted Swindon's roads for 27 years.

Each driver has two routes one A and one B.

Mick, a father-of-three from Chiseldon, knows every twist and turn of his route, which takes him to Wroughton, Chiseldon, Badbury, Liddington, Wanborough and Bourton.

Some of Mick's route consists of country lanes, but they need to be gritted because they are important access routes.

As we drove through the former RAF base at Wroughton, Mick recalls the worst winter .

He said: "It was 1983, and I had to ensure the runway and helicopter pad at the hospital were clear.

"There were 6ft snow drifts, and the weather was atrocious.

"We don't get winters like that anymore, and I can't remember the last time we had to get the snowploughs out."

Mick loves the job because he knows he is helping people get to work and children get to school.

"I have a family and children so I want the roads to be clear," he said.

"We get a lot of grief, but sometimes you can't win.

"If we grit the roads and it doesn't snow we are wasting taxpayers' money, but if we don't and it does snow, all hell breaks loose."