A NEW RISK ON THE ICE ROAD

ADD A NEW RISK...

...GETTING LOST IN THE FOG

MOUNT WASHINGTON...NOPE, NOT ME, BUT THAT'S THE HIKING TRAIL

VIEW FROM TOP OF MOUNT WASHINGTON

Thursday,  9:00 AM. -4 degrees F, wind N, light with some stronger gusts.  The sky is mostly blue, and the dense fog over the channel is being dissipated by a determined sun.  There are several inches of new snow waiting to be scraped from the driveway.
   Yesterday was truly a day when one wished to stay inside...perhaps joining the bears in hibernation. Cold, fog, biting wind and blowing snow.  I had all I could do to force myself out with Buddy for an afternoon walk.
   I watched traffic on the Ice Road for a moment in the morning and the fog and blowing snow seemed to me to create the hazard of getting lost out there, even with the Christmas tree markers and the ridges of plowed snow.
   The scenario brought back memories of a hike to the top of Mount Washington in New Hampshire many years ago while helping to host a group of visiting Soviet scientists. The popular trail is marked at intervals with tall rock cairns to keep hikers from getting lost in blizzard and fog.
   Four hikers to the top of the mountain were rescued last Sunday after they got lost in bad weather and missed a critical junction on the trail.  At over 6,000 feet in height, Mount Washington is the highest peak in the eastern half of North America, and is notorious for its hurricane force winds and rapidly changing weather conditions.
   I read today that the southern portion of the Keystone XL Pipeline is now completed from Oklahoma through Texas to the Gulf, and flowing with oil from various sources.  I predict the entire pipeline is going to be substantially  built within the US despite the Obama Administration obstructionism.  It will join the web of existing pipelines that already criss-cross the United States, awaiting only the cross US /Canada border portions for completion to the Canadian oil deposits.  In the end it will be far safer and more economical than the transportation of crude oil by rail and truck as is necessary presently from many oil fields, such as the Bakken in South Dakota.  The only thing the Administration will have accomplished will be to have made the entire undertaking  far more costly in money and diplomacy than was necessary.