City workers clean up after wind storm

MOSES LAKE — It was quite a mess that faced Moses Lake city maintenance crews on Tuesday following Monday’s massive windstorm that ripped across the Columbia Basin.

And it will take most of the workweek to clear the debris created by the wind, which reached up to 40 miles per hour in places.

“As far as city parks go, Parks maintenance will be clearing fallen tree branches this week throughout all of our parks,” said Lynne Lynch, a spokesperson for the city of Moses Lake. “This is expected to take all week.”

Wednesday afternoon, work crews at Blue Heron Park were busy sawing off broken branches and even toppling a couple of trees that had snapped in the wind.

“We’ve been out here since 8 a.m.,” said Dean McPherson, a maintenance worker with the city, amidst the broken branches, leaves and logs scattered across Blue Heron Park. “We’ll be done by Friday.”

According to an email from Street Maintenance Manager Brian Baltzell, trees were reported down at Inglewood and Belair as well as Hill and Division, where the fallen tree was apparently caught on a power line and cleared by workers with Grant County Public Utility District.

At Third and Pioneer, a traffic signal was blown out of alignment and no longer able to show its lights to oncoming traffic.

“We took care of this signal on Tuesday first thing in the morning by crews,” Baltzell wrote. “It appears to have a broken clamp that we will have to order and replace.”

According to maintenance worker Philip Hanson, work crews cleaning up at Blue Heron Park first cleared the broken branches and then cut down a couple of trees that were snapped by the wind. Crews used a front-loader to haul away the logs.

“That one was snapped about halfway up,” Hanson said, pointing to a tree they were about to cut. “When that happens, we always take them down.”

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at [email protected].