Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

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  • xzzy

    You can visit one of these in person if you’re ever in Anchorage. The Potter Section historical site has a rotary snow plow parked outside.. the diameter is somewhere around the 14 foot mark.

    Obviously seeing one in action is way cooler, but beggars can’t be choosers. 

    • http://www.facebook.com/jeffrey.e.fisher Jeffrey Eric Fisher

      There is one at the colorado railroad museum too.  Has a bright red painted rotary dohicky on the front.
      coloradorailroadmuseum.org

      Google images ‘colorado railroad museum snowblower’ and you can find lots of pictures.

  • http://johnstonsigns.blogspot.com/ dejoh

    At one time many years ago, those track were cleared by shovels.

    • http://goodsharer.com/ Aloisius

      *Many* years ago.

      Train wedge plows were developed in 1840 and the rotary plow (like the one shown) was developed in 1869. Even spreaders which are still used pretty frequently were developed over 100 years ago.

      By the time we had a transcontinental railroad, we had had train wedge plows for almost 30 years.

  • OldBrownSquirrel

    I can see the utility of this in passes and in cuts, but relying on something like that to move a train at a crawl over hundreds of miles of snow-covered plains seems impractical.  I suspect it would be more practical just to raise the bed a few feet and let the wind blow the snow off the tracks for the most part.

    • Adela Doiron

       A raised bed often traps snow against it to form drifts.

    • Aaron Bockelie

       After you gouge out all the large snow with the blower, you use one of these little guys to keep the tracks clear on a more regular basis.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=QenN5DVuLtw#t=73s

    • bzishi

      Nah, you’re thinking about it wrong. Think of it as an analogue to a snowplow. People in the same areas don’t all have snowplows on all of their vehicles nor do they have specially raised roads. Like a snowplow, this special snow blower is a piece of specialized equipment that is used only when it is needed after a big snowstorm or when big drifts occur.

    • Just_Ok

      Just put the train on skis.

  • mtdna

    That thing totally blows.

  • Paul Renault

    Man, that’s a slow snowblower!  I bet it would be more efficient to have two or three smaller blower/fans with feeder augers, than that one large fan – which HAS to rotate slower – ‘cuz of physics, no?

    See how it’s done in Montreal – which bounces back, 100% fully operational, from a 30 cm snowstorm after just 24 hours:
    (Note: This snowblower is clearing plowed and compressed snow and ice, not the dryer, more powdery snow in the video above) :
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpUSF1KVlLI

    • Guysmiley

       The snow being cleared in the video above is not “powdery”, it’s hard packed from wind. They’re WALKING on it… It gets broken up into powder by the ridiculously powerful rotary auger. Also, the locomotive snowblowers need to be able to clear much higher drifts than the relatively puny auger in the video you posted.

  • http://www.facebook.com/dimitrios.papagiannis Dimitrios Papagiannis

    In Russia snow blows you

  • snagglepuss

    The ghost of John Henry is watching this and thinking, “Yeah, okay – You Win”.

  • Jason Sewell

    Interesting to see Bruce Springsteen explaining the operation of the snow blower at the beginning of this clip.

  • http://profiles.google.com/kevin.liske Kevin Liske

    There’s a LOT of videos out there from the train chasers.  I know this because I have a young boy who went through a train phase.
    Watching a train smashing through 6 foot snow banks is might impressive.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=507634436 Misha Fedoseev
  • dumbbunny

    The sound of it, oh blessed yummy, it is far superior to the ocean waves on my night time noise machine.