Near Central Terminal in Buffalo, there are two unsightly hills of dirt that didn’t exist before last November. If you manage to wade through the muddy pools surrounding them and whack them with a shovel, it quickly becomes apparent why. Underneath the muck is a mountain of slowly melting snow — a relic of last year’s huge storm that dumped up to seven feet of snow in the area — insulated by the dirt and grass that has protected it from 80-degree summer days.
“It’s sort of like an Oreo cookie right now,” New York state climatologist Mark Wysocki told the Associated Press, “where you’ve got snow in the middle and heat from above and heat from below and it’s slowly eating away at the snow.”
Meteorologist Patrick Hammer told WGRZ that the pile would most likely stay around at least until the end of August. It could even survive until the next snow storm comes around to replenish it, turning it from a weird seasonal curio into a geographical landmark.
Regardless of its eventual life span, the makeshift glacier thankfully lasted long enough to inspire a perfect local news segment. It has all the necessary ingredients — a flawless chyron (“Snow Pile From ‘Snowvember’ Still Exists”), a reporter with props, a difficult reporting roadblock (bog of eternal stench made of melted snow), an expert who shows an appropriate amount of awe about the subject he is tackling, bemused newscasters, cheesy lines, and a dramatic ending soliloquy recited from the top of a dirt pile.
Viva snow/dirt pile.
