Adam Prudhomme
Editor
While most people don’t even want to think about winter just yet, it’s comforting to know Ontario’s municipal works snowplow drivers are already in midseason form.
On Tuesday and Wednesday plow truck drivers from across the province had the opportunity to showcase their skills during the Association of Ontario Roads Supervisors’ (AORS) Roadeo, held at Napanee’s Strathcona Paper Centre.
An obstacle course of sorts was set up in the arena’s parking lot and drivers were challenged to maneuver through the markings.
“It tries to mimic the sort of obstacles that they would see if they were actually out plowing snow in the real world,” said John Maheu, AORS executive director.
Each competitor is awarded a final score, the driver with the most points declared the winner.
“Basically it’s a merit system,” said Maheu. “There are judges at each station and they are judged by whether or not the blade or the truck touches something that it’s not supposed to touch or goes onto a certain point when it’s supposed to stop or if it’s too close or too far in some cases. They’ll measure different points of the truck after they’ve done a certain part of the circuit. They also test for things like have they done a proper safety check of their vehicle. Have they been able to spot a couple of deficiencies in a couple of the vehicles that we have set up there, that’s part of their job as well, to inspect their vehicles to make sure they’re safe. And do they do things like proper stopping and braking and signally, things like that. It’s all very much safety as well as performance.”
There are 32 AORS districts across Ontario, Greater Napanee being classified as part of District 8. They are all invited to host their own regional qualifier with the top two drivers from those events advancing to the provincials.
On Tuesday it was the District 8 qualifier followed by the provincial championship on Wednesday. Corey Gemmill and Mike Griffin were the top qualifiers from District 8. At provincials it was Ben Kipp of Lanark County placing first with 322 points, just ahead of Derrick Duval of Eastern Ontario with 321 and Jonathon Smith of Simcoe with 315.
Hosted in a different district each time around, this year marked the first Roadeo since 2019, which was halted during the pandemic.
Maheu complimented the Town of Greater Napanee, noting they were great hosts for both events.