Battle Creek Has a Massive Snow Removal Machine Named ‘Chewy’

Battle Creek, Michigan is massive in size. Believe it or not, it's the 3rd largest city in the state by area at 42 square miles. Only Detroit and Grand Rapids are larger. The massiveness of the city comes from a 1983 merger between the city and surrounding Battle Creek Township.

What that means during winter is that Public Works crews have mountains of snow to move off roadways. Oh, and runways, too. The city also oversees snow removal at W, K. Kellogg Airport, err, Battle Creek Executive Airport at Kellogg Field. The city showed off its snow-removal prowess recently in this Facebook photo, which also revealed to me, that the machine that clears runways bears the endearing name of Chewy.

That, by the way, is how you nickname properly. Not choosing something asinine like Snowy McSnowface. My God does that meme make me watch to punch holes in walls.

Think there is nothing majestic about municipal services? Check out Chewy's work:

The city describes how Chewy works in ways a little different than a street plow:

This snow blower blasts 5,000 tons of snow per hour, to make sure aircraft have a safe place to land here in Battle Creek.

A plow (think street snow plow, but giant-sized), runs through first, leaving that section of snow you see along the runway lights. The blower comes in to remove the snow more precisely, so we don't cover or hit those lights.

And you can see the snow removal in action:

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=492644528089918

Because we are in a snow belt and deal with lake effect every winter, would it surprise you to learn that Western Michigan University has a 100-page manual to deal with snow removal on campus?