NEW ULM — The cleanup from this week’s three-day snow storm is underway. A total of 14.6 inches fell on New Ulm, according to the National Weather Service, but the two-part storm, with a bit of a break Wednesday morning, helped local crews keep on top of the snow.

Brown County Highway Department General Foreman Fred Gareis said the department was using eight tandem trucks, a single-axle and four road graders on county roads Thursday.

“We began at 5 a.m. Thursday. The snow is still moving around a bit yet,” Gareis said. “We plan to stop at 4 p.m. Thursday and be back out at 5 a.m. Friday.”

Gareis said salt and sand supplies are pretty full.

New Ulm Public Works Superintendent Jeff Hoffmann said the snowfall cleanup has gone pretty easily, considering the amount of snow.

“It’s pretty light snow, so it pushes around a lot easier,” he said. The fact that the snow came in two waves helped as well.

“We were able to a full plow on Wednesday and again today (Thursday),” he said. “We were able to get the plowing done in about nine hours on Thursday.

The crews will begin the downtown snow removal early Friday morning and continue until it is done.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) reported U.S. Highway 14, State Highways 68, 19 west of Fairfax and TH 15 from Winthrop to Fairmont and TH 4 from Hector to Sherburn were completely covered with snow Thursday. State Highway 19 east of Fairfax was reported to be partially covered with snow.

State highway department trucks continued to salt and sand highways and reported blowing snow and ice forming on roads late Thursday afternoon.

The National Weather Services (NWS) reported 14.6 inches of snow fell in New Ulm over the last 24 hours Thursday afternoon. Fourteen inches of snow was reported in Lafayette and 12 inches in Gibbon. North Mankato reported 18 inches of snow, Lamberton 14.1 inches over the same period.

The snowfall over the past two days in New Ulm may have rivaled that of the historic Halloween Blizzard in 1991, but the February blizzard of 2023 lacked the kind of wind that created the huge drifts that blocked the highways 32 years ago.

During the Halloween Blizzard, 13.3 inches was recorded overnight.

But the lull in the storm on Wednesday morning allowed plowing crews to clear the roads in the area, and the winds weren’t creating the kinds of drifts that made travel so miserable in 1991.

In 1991, when The Journal was still driving pasted-up pages to the House of Print in Madelia, massive drifts on Highway 15 trapped The Journal’s driver as he tried to drive the Saturday paper’s pages to Madelia on a Friday night. It wasn’t until the road was plowed clear on Saturday that the Saturday pages got to Madelia and could be printed, just before the Sunday paper went to press. Both papers were delivered on Sunday.

No such road blocks bedeviled The Journal’s drivers Tuesday and Thursday nights.