At home rinks, ice in short supply - The Boston Globe
I’ve been complaining for weeks about the unseasonably mild weather and now the Boston Globe has an article about EXACTLY my problem!
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At home rinks, ice in short supply
January warmth has skaters on bench
By Christopher L. Gasper, Globe Staff | January 29, 2006
Brian Armand estimates it took him 15 hours to construct a skating rink in his Danvers front yard this year. Everything was in place by Jan. 12. There was just one problem — no ice.
The high that day was 53 degrees and the average temperature was 43 degrees, according to the National Weather Service station at Beverly Municipal Airport. Last Saturday, as the thermometer reached 60 degrees, Armand could submerge a hockey stick in his sheet of ”ice.” He figures that his 15 hours of work have resulted in just two hours of ice time for his children, Justine, 9, and Trevor, 6.
”It’s more of a pool than a rink,” said his wife, Brenda.
For backyard rink builders, this has been the winter of their discontent. Unseasonably warm temperatures have left some families skating on thin ice — or, more accurately, no ice at all. While most people have been celebrating Mother Nature’s warm embrace this heating season, homemade-rink rats are feeling frozen out of a favored winter activity.
Kevin Horrigan of Wakefield, who grew up skating on a backyard rink and first built one for his two children four years ago, said he has been commiserating with other ice palace architects over the mild winter weather.
”It’s like a joke. We say, ‘How’s the swimming pool in the yard?’ ‘How’s the frog pond?’ ” said Horrigan.
”Everyone is in the same boat. Once you put it up, you’re stuck.”
Horrigan opened his rink the week before Christmas, and he has yet to skate on it. His children, Colin, 10, and Megan, 6, have skated once and twice, respectively. Even when temperatures dipped into the single digits on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Horrigan couldn’t join his children on the ice.
”If I put my weight on, it would start to crack,” said Horrigan. ”So they skated and I just watched from the side. It was kind of depressing.”
As of Tuesday there had been just four days this month when the high temperature was freezing (32 degrees) or below at Beverly Airport, according to National Weather Service figures, and the average daily temperature for the month was 34.2 degrees.
In a normal January, the average daily temperature would be in the high 20s, according to Charlie Foley, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Taunton. He said average daily temperatures for the month are running about 7 degrees higher than normal across Eastern Massachusetts.
”If we stayed on this course, this would be the seventh-mildest January on record, dating back to 1872,” said Foley.
You might think the 4 to 6 inches of snow the region received Monday would aid the rinks. But it’s actually the opposite. While cold weather is good for ice, snowfall is not. It can turn the surface unskateable if it is not removed right away.
Peter ”Pip” Winslow, who has a 100-by-50-foot rink in the backyard of his Newbury home, said he cringes when he sees a forecast for snow.
”The biggest trick is to get the snow off the ice as quick as you can,” said Winslow. ”Number one, it insulates and melts the surface, and number two, if the ice isn’t frozen solid, it weighs it down and water comes back up over the edges and mixes with the snow and you have slush.”
Winslow said that he and his family have been fairly lucky this year: They’ve been able to get good use of their rink despite the abnormally high temperatures. The Winslows’ rink went up in early December and benefited from a midmonth cold spell that saw temperatures dip to 10 degrees and below at night for three straight days. Coupled with a sprawling sugar maple tree that helps shield the rink from the sun, the Winslows’ ice surface has held up better than most. But Winslow still said this has been the worst January he’s seen in the 12 years he’s built a backyard rink, calling the warm weather ”a bummer” for his family.
”It’s definitely not as good as years past,” said Winslow, when the kids ”could hop out there any night after school. With these warm weeks in January, they can’t do that. We’ve gotten good time on the rink, but not as much as we normally do.”
One of the advantages of having a backyard rink is unlimited ice time as long as Mother Nature cooperates. This season’s uncooperative weather has forced some families to find ways to make up for lost skating opportunities.
Horrigan said that he is now taking his son, Colin, to optional Wakefield Youth Hockey skill sessions just to get him some ice time. Colin, a second-year Squirt-level player, didn’t attend any of the practices last year. Horrigan said he is concerned that his daughter, Megan, is not progressing as a skater because her only ice time comes from the home rink.
Armand’s son, Trevor, skates three times a week with Danvers Youth Hockey, and his daughter, Justine, is a figure skater. The Winslows’ four children — Emily, 17, Timothy, 15, Madeleine, 10, and Mason, 8 — are all either involved with organized hockey or figure skating.
Despite a disappointing January, all three home rink owners said they’re not giving up on getting good use of their hard work this winter. Horrigan said he is hoping a batch of arctic weather that hit Russia will make its way here and provide a good freeze. Winslow said the season could be salvaged with a cold February and March.
Armand said: ”I don’t want to give up, because that first evening when they were out skating they were so excited. It was a cold night, and they were having a great time skating. I got on the ice and shot the puck with my son for a few minutes. It was great. That’s why we have the rink — for moments like that. Hopefully, we’ll have a few more . . . this winter, if nature is willing.”
And if it’s not? Horrigan said there is an upside to the mild weather responsible for the reflecting pool in his yard at the moment.
”Every time I complain about the rink, somebody says, ‘Oh, but your heating bill is lower than last year.’ “
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