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March 13, 2004 Reprinted with permisson
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March 13, 2004 Reprinted with permisson
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By John Harrigan
conditions, how much work its blade and grooming sled need to do, and traffic. The average speed is five miles an hour. The operator uses the blade to knock the tops off humps in the trail and push them into hollows, and to angle in snow from trailsides when needed. The grooming sled has a series of blades to scrape and smooth snow, and can be adjusted by hydraulic controls in the cab. On this day, a weekday, there was little traffic to worry about, and during a day's worth of grooming we encountered only 98 machines. Phil and the nine other regular and standby groomers have to be all attention when they're at the controls. They have to run the groomer, keep an eye on getting its blade past obstacles, watch the grooming sled to make sure it's doing the right thing for the trail, listen for any change in the sound of treads or engine that might spell trouble, and keep a sharp eye out for oncoming traffic. This last concern can put an operator's heart in his throat. "I've had them barrel around a corner head-on, and then they have nowhere to go except right off the trail and into the woods," said Phil. Sometimes an out-of-control rider's sled will just flip. Nobody wants to hit the groomer's huge blade, and so the woods or even a rollover stop looks better. The groomer drivers are always hoping that no out-of-control sleds will come around a blind corner or over a hilltop, but they know it can happen at any moment, and it has. The Ski-Bees club has upwards of 900 members, its membership having nearly tripled as a result of the new state law requiring membership in a club to qualify for the lower state registration fee. It has an annual budget of between $250,000 and $300,000. It has two other grooming machines (a Massey-Furgeson and another Piston Bully) and spends between $10,000 and $12,000 on diesel fuel alone during its normal 12 weeks of grooming. Payroll averages $2,000 a week, and then there are the repairs, and trail and bridge maintenance, and hundreds of signs, fences and markers. To pay for all this the club relies on membership dues, poker runs and other fundraisers, grants from the state, and donations. Good relations with landowners are of paramount importance to the club. Its members know that without landowner confidence and permission for trails, there would be little real snowmobiling in the North Country. The club's trails cross land belonging to more than 340 private property owners, who get nothing in return except whatever they might derive from the trickle-down effects of what snowmobiling generates for the local economy. Landowners do not have to allow motorized recreation to get the extra Current Use tax break, so there's no payback there. But they do get friendly waves from riders, and the heartfelt thanks of the club. They also get a Landowners Appreciation social and dinner at the Country Club at the end of each season, the Ski-Bees' way of saying a big "Thanks." Phil is president of the club. He's careful not to call himself a regular groomer operator or a trailmaster. "I'm just one of the backup operators," he said. Regular operators are Jim Therrien, Jamie O'Connor, Bruce Lyons, Jim Salinia, Tom Soucy, and Davy Dame. Backup operators, besides Phil, are Bruce Owen, Buddy Boudle and Clay Hinds. Bruce Owen is the trailmaster for the north side of Route 26, Barry Graham Sr. for the south. "I guess you could call me the trailmaster for wherever I need to be at the moment," said Phil, as he maneuvered the groomer back onto the trail, watching for the icy spot that gave the machine a slippery time on the way up. |
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Colebrook Ski-Bees, Inc., P.O. Box 125, Colebrook, NH 03576
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