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Winter returns

Schools cancel classes, power outage reported in Dayton

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen Rhonda Williams, of Fort Dodge, works on clearing her front steps Friday during her lunch hour to make her mail carrier's job a little easier in the 400 block of North 27th Street.

Dayton residents spent part of the early Friday morning hours without electricity as a winter storm hammered the area.

Dayton Police Chief Nick Dunbar said the problem was a substation on the south side of Dayton. Dunbar, who is also the assistant Dayton fire chief, said his department was called out at 2:49 a.m.

“The initial call was for a transformer on fire,” he said. “When we got there, we found a switch arcing really badly and one already burned up.”

The department monitored the situation until a crew from Midland Power Cooperative arrived and repaired the problem.

“City crews switched on the generator for a while till it was fixed,” Dunbar said.

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen A pedestrian makes their way across South Ninth Street Friday afternoon in this view down the alley between Central and First Avenue South as snow starts falling again. After a break in the morning, more snow fell later in the day following the early Friday morning precipitation.

He said the power was out for about an hour before service was restored. City crews then spent several hours checking power lines in the city to see if there were any further problems.

High winds and icy roads made for treacherous travel Friday, especially for big trucks.

“We’ve been busy in the last probably five hours now,” Iowa State Patrol Sgt. Aaron Smidt said Friday afternoon.

“The big problem we had today was with unloaded semis,” Smidt said. “No weight, high wind, and the roads are just ice covered.”

Although numerous drivers went into the ditch, there were no injuries reported, Smidt said.

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen A City of Dayton plow truck makes it's way south along Third Street NW Friday morning as an Iowa Department of Transportation plow truck going through town goes north. Crews with area cities, counties and Iowa DOT were kept busy Friday cleaning up after the latest snow storm to hit the area.

After a rough morning, there was a bit of a lull, but things got busy again around 1 p.m. when the wind picked up, he said.

“With the wind and the ice packed roads it’s making travel pretty dangerous right now,” he said. “Hopefully the wind dies down, and gives us a break this evening.”

Wind gusts as high as 45 miles per hour were reported in the Algona and Clarion areas, said Craig Cogil, senior meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Des Moines.

Humboldt received one of the highest snowfall totals in the state — nearly a foot, Cogil said.

“Humboldt has been anywhere from 9 to 11 inches. Social media is saying 1 foot,” he said.

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen Pete Porter, of Fort Dodge, works to get his snowblower over the windrow left at the curb at South 13th Street and Fourth Avenue South Friday while setting out to clear several of his neighbor's sidewalks.

Fort Dodge had reported about 6 inches Friday afternoon, but with snow still falling pretty quickly, said Cogil.

Webster City received around 4 inches, and Pocahontas reported 10 inches.

The snowfall was about as much as had been expected, he said.

Temperatures are expected to remain with highs in the 20s today, and a bit warmer on Sunday.

“The weekend is relatively quiet by comparison,” Cogil said. “Really no threat of precipitation this weekend.”

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen Anandi Simmons, of Fort Dodge, works on clearing her neighbor's sidewalk Friday in the 1200 block of Fourth Avenue South.

The snow and cold was a rather abrupt return to typical February weather after earlier this week, when temperatures peaked at 70 degrees on Wednesday.

That week of warm is making work trickier for Webster County crews clearing the roads, said Webster County Engineer Randy Will.

It’s made the gravel roads soft.

“The roads are very soft because of the warm weather we’ve had and the rain,” Will said. “You only can use the motor graders. … We’ll have to see. Trucks on soft gravel roads are a little risky.”

In fact, the trucks and graders didn’t get to the gravel roads at all Friday, he said.

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen Cattails, growing in a ditch along U.S. Highway 169 south of Fort Dodge, remain covered with snow Friday morning.

“There’s been snow all day,” Will said. “We’ve basically been doing the paved routes only, essentially all day. We just have not been able to get on the gravels.

“We couldn’t keep up with the paved routes, and per our policy that’s the highest priority.”

Crews will be working hard starting at 5 a.m. today, he said.

No injuries were reported in Fort Dodge or in the county.

“Nobody hurt that I know of. It’s just been small accidents,” said Fort Dodge police Lt. Matt Wilson.

“Cars are in the ditches here and there, but no major accidents as of right now,” said Webster County Sheriff’s Deputy Josh Van Waes.

After finishing snow blowing his own sidewalk, Pete Porter, of Fort Dodge, took his machine on the road to some of his neighbors in the area of Fourth Avenue South and 13th Street.

“I’m helping out the neighbors,” he said. “Some of them are elderly.”

Porter was encountering the result of rain, then slush, then snow, falling on ground no longer frozen. The result was an inch thick layer of ice immune to the blades of his snowblower.

“It wouldn’t be bad if it wasn’t for ice,” he said.

A similar effect was present on many of the residential streets in Fort Dodge and other area communities: the early slushy wet snow that fell at the start of the storm had frozen into a hard layer of ice.

Nearby, Anandi Simmons was hard at work clearing snow the old fashioned way, with a shovel.

After finishing her own sidewalk, she began working on her neighbor’s.

“I love our neighbor,” she said. “This is my way of showing it.”

She even got to use her neighbor’s equipment.

“She’s actually letting me borrow her shovel.” Simmons said.

Along the 400 block of North 27th Street, Rhonda Williams was using her lunch hour to clear the snow from her front steps. She wanted to make sure her mail carrier could safely get to her mailbox.

Like many, she wasn’t 100 percent sure if the storm predictions had lived up to the reality.

“You just never know in Iowa,” she said. “It’s not over yet.”

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