Crews from the Infrastructure Department, along with teams from St Helier, worked on foot and with gritting trucks to help keep the Island’s roads open.
Derek Noble, head of municipal services for the Infrastructure Department, said that early warning from the Met Office, along with a lower than expected snowfall, had made their work easier.
‘We had four gritters out, each crewed by two people, from 12 am until 8 am. The snow started to fall at about 1 am but it was only forecast to start arriving at 3 am so it was good that we managed to get salt down before that,’ he said.
‘We did not get as much as we were expecting, which allowed us to treat the main arterial roads very effectively, particularly those which lead into St Helier.
‘We also put two tractors out during the day with gritting attachments alongside the four vehicles we already had out.’
Mr Noble added that they had also pulled in 23 staff from other sections of the department to help with the snow and ice clearing effort.
He said: ‘In addition to the gritters we had nine vehicles from other sections with 16 staff helping to treat footpaths.
‘Seven staff from our parks and gardens teams salted the pavements near the parks as they were not able to do much else.’
The manager added that his department had two small snowplough attachments for their vehicles but because of the level of snowfall, they had not been needed.
Meanwhile, Debra d’Orleans, director of municipal services for St Helier, said that they had cancelled refuse collections within the parish and redeployed staff to snow clearing duties.
‘We have had most of our staff out dealing with the snow – 24 street cleaners and 22 refuse collectors,’ she said.
‘We started pre-treating surfaces at 10 pm on Wednesday and had a vehicle with a salting attachment working through the night, which used 24 tonnes of salt. We have just had to buy another ten tonnes.’
She added: ‘The guys have really worked well as a team – there have not been any issues. I am really proud of them.’
