FAIRBANKS — The city of Fairbanks is gearing up for a snowstorm that’s expected to bring as much as a foot of snow and strong winds to Interior Alaska.
Crews have been preparing to clear roads and repair power lines ahead of the storm predicted to hit the region Thursday and Friday. National Weather Service meteorologist Melissa Kreller said hilly areas are expected to see high winds of 30 to 40 mph, The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reported.
Brian Youngberg with the Golden Valley Electric Association said the Fairbanks-based utility has set up a communications center to help monitor and respond to outages and issue updates to residents. He said crews began taking preventative measures on Wednesday.
“We’ve had small outages throughout the night and we have crews out there today, going around trying to knock the snow off the lines and make sure that as much preventative types of items they can do, that’s what they’re doing,” Youngberg said.
City officials sent out an update Wednesday informing residents of snow removal plans and how to stay safe. The city is warning people to not use generators indoors and to be careful when using space heaters, which should be kept away from curtains, bedding and rugs.
The Alaska Department of Transportation is also preparing to help out during the winter storm, but spokeswoman Meadow Bailey said budget cuts could impact response time. Removing the snow on high priority roads could take as long as four days after a storm, she said.
“Each station is now responsible for an area that is just a little larger, and we have less staff and equipment. We still plow in the same order, but our response time is longer,” Bailey said.
