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Jilly_in_VA

(9,852 posts)
Mon Jan 24, 2022, 03:41 PM Jan 2022

Plowy McPlowface has a job to do

This week, another winter storm is streaking across the northern Plains and the Midwest, dropping a few inches of snow. And it's so cold outside, iguanas are falling out of trees.

But this won't stop Plowy McPlowface, one of Minnesota's famed snowplows. Through frosted windows and low visibility, these trucks plow on. Here's what it is like to drive in such harsh conditions.

"Your visibility is low, it's snowing, freezing, your windshield wipers are clacking along trying to keep the windshield clean."
Dan Pendergast is one of the drivers of the 800 snowplows in Minnesota. And in the Twin Cities where he drives, they can see as much as 51 inches of snow in a single season.
"Here in Minnesota, things can happen so fast. It can switch from rain to snow to ice very quickly and it's hazardous," says Pendergast.
In Minnesota, snowplows are given names and snowplow drivers are local celebrities. Plowy McPlowface, Darth Blader and F. Salt Fitzgerald, just to name a few.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/24/weather/frozen-iguanas-pancake-ice-snow-midwest-cold-wxn/index.html
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Might as well have some fun with miserable weather

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The Jungle 1

(4,552 posts)
2. That is from Boaty McBoatface.
Mon Jan 24, 2022, 03:53 PM
Jan 2022

I loved that one. I got a whole new respect for our British friends over that.
I wonder if we have to pay some copy rights?

JustABozoOnThisBus

(23,283 posts)
3. Boaty McBoatface was the internet-selected name for a new British research ship. But, ...
Mon Jan 24, 2022, 04:12 PM
Jan 2022

... Powers-that-Be decided the name was undignified, so the ship was named "Attenborough" after some television narrator.

I don't think they'll be seeking copyrights over the name of a dump truck.

Brits should have allowed the McBoatface name to be used. There would have been much more interest in the research vessel by school kids.

muriel_volestrangler

(101,152 posts)
5. You have to think about the dignity of the scientists and sailors
Mon Jan 24, 2022, 05:24 PM
Jan 2022

"Where are you working now?"
"Boaty McBoatface"
"Is that a children's TV programme?"

"The research for this paper was carried out on the 2035-36 Antarctic voyage of RRS Boaty McBoatface".

JustABozoOnThisBus

(23,283 posts)
6. Scientists' and sailors' dignity somehow survived a voyage on a ship named "Beagle"
Tue Jan 25, 2022, 09:04 AM
Jan 2022

A voyage which, like 23-and-me.com, let us know that some of our relatives are apes. I think I know which of my relatives are clearly apes.

 

The Jungle 1

(4,552 posts)
7. They should have named it Boaty McBoatface.
Tue Jan 25, 2022, 09:41 AM
Jan 2022

Then a couple of years later changed it.
They defied the will of the people. 124,109 people voted Boaty McBoatface. Never good to defy the people.
We defied trump and look how that went. A treasonous revolt occurred. OH WAIT trump LOST the election. Boaty won the election.

GopherGal

(1,999 posts)
4. More than "as much as 51 inches" in a single season...
Mon Jan 24, 2022, 04:25 PM
Jan 2022

Average annual snowfall at MSP airport: 52.4 inches. Record 101.5 inches.

It's no Houghton Michigan or anything, but sheesh: "as much as"???

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