Blazing trails with heroes of the blizzard of 2011

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Updated: August 4, 2011 4:20PM

Sure, there are jokes about the Green Bay Packers Super Bowl victory parade last week being a caravan of snowmobiles that started in Madison, hit Milwaukee, then made its way along Lake Michigan to Lambeau Field.

But the recent blizzard showed just how handy, even life-saving, these winter machines can be.

Pete Dall, of Kaneville, serves as an example of the latter. Dall was among snowmobile riders out during the Feb. 1-2 storm helping rescue stranded motorists.

He worked with fellow riders Jerry DeBruyne of Maple Park and Bert Veldhuizen of Aurora in an effort coordinated through Leesa Hansen of the Elburn-based DeKane (short for DeKalb and Kane) Sno-Trackers and the Kane County Office of Emergency Management. The trio worked from 9 p.m. Feb. 1 until 3 a.m. Feb. 2 along and around Route 47 from the heart of Elburn north to Silver Glen Road in Campton Township.

Those who were aided included a woman who was just a quarter mile from her home and a tow truck driver who got stuck after coming to help a woman and her young son, who was dressed in just pajamas.

“We bundled him the best we could,” Dall said.

Dall recalled conditions as being so bad that at times the winds made for zero visibility. The snowmobiles occasionally would catch snowdrifts, go airborne then land on pavement. Those drifts buried parts of Route 47, and at one point an IDOT plow was stuck along Router 47 north of Route 38, Dall recalled.

Ready to help

Dall and his friends’ good Samaritan duties were part of a loosely organized effort involving public safety offices throughout the area and members of snowmobile clubs who could reach places even SUVs and trucks couldn’t, to get stranded motorists and others impacted by the weather to safety.

Sometimes it was just to standby as needed.

“The Elgin Cold Ducks were contacted by Sgt. Dan O’Shea of the Elgin Police Department about helping out with our snowmobiles during the storm if needed,” said Ducks spokesman Larry Ratzlaff. “We agreed but never got a call from Sgt. O’Shea to come out. Individual members helped out where needed but not as a club function.”

The Genoa-Kingston Trailblazers helped their local police, and making the most news were the good deeds of the Hampshire White Riders Snowmobile Club.

“They are to be applauded,” Ratzlaff said. “They did over 60 car rescues including three Kane County sheriff’s officers.”

All this noted volunteerism draws attention to the Marseilles-based Illinois Association of Snowmobile Clubs (www.ilsnowmobile.com), an umbrella organization that divides Illinois into 11 regions, each holding local clubs. The group claims that snowmobile tourism and ownership contributes about $81.6 million each year to the Illinois economy.

Dall’s father, Jim Dall of Carpentersville, heads Region 5, which includes the aforementioned DeKane Sno-Trackers, Elgin Cold Ducks, Genoa-Kingston Trailblazers, Hampshire White Riders, Kishwaukee Super Sledders, Marengo Snowgoers, Prairie Riders Snowmobile Club of Belvidere, and Huntley Penguins, of which Peter Dall is president.

Jim Dall, a house painter by trade, noted that Region 5 was established in 1972, has marked more than 200 miles of trails, supplies orange signs to mark those trails to its clubs, and puts out maps of where those trails are located.

Lots of experience

Jim and his family have been snowmobiling for almost 30 years, and “We raised our kids on them.”

For Pete Dall, that means he’s been riding since he was about 6 months old.

Pete Dall works as a restoration technician for the Kane County Forest Preserve District, which maintains its own set of free-to-use snowmobile trails (www.kaneforest.com/recreation/winterActivities.aspxwebsite). The Dalls and others do volunteer duty with the forest district patrolling those routes. Both the Hampshire Preserve off Allen Road and the Campton Preserve at Route 64 and Town Hall Road in Campton Hills are park-and-ride locations.

Last week, the Dalls attended meetings of the forest preserve volunteers and a separate session with representatives from Region 5 clubs, where the blizzard was one of the topics of discussion.

While grateful that the Region 5 clubs had contacts and were able to assist during the blizzard, Jim Dall said there was talk of how to better coordinate the clubs’ roles in coming to aid in future emergencies.

Join for fun

For those interested in taking up the cold-weather recreational pursuit, Jim Dall noted that snowmobiles, like boats, must be registered with the state. Expenses are similar to having a small boat, too, with basic machines running $6,000 to $9,000 or more and engines getting 12 miles or so to the gallon. Come April, snowmobile owners, like auto owners, must have insurance coverage.

As the snowmobile association website notes, “A prime reason to join a snowmobile club is not just the sense of responsibility of doing something positive for the sport. The best reason to join a snowmobile club is to have more fun.”

To that end, while the Packer parade leading this story was fictitious, the Dalls actually are taking part this week in Region 5’s annual trip to Boulder Junction, Wis., which is about 350 miles from Kaneville. According to the Travel Wisconsin website, the Dairy State has about 25,000 miles of groomed trails.

Weather permitting, the men were planning to ride Region 5 trails to Wisconsin, then take trail routes 13 and 15 north to their destination in what would be a three-day trip.

“But it may be too warm down here, where it’s supposed to be in the mid-40s by midweek, and it might rain,” Pete Dall said.

For anyone who would like to learn more about the Huntley Penguins and snowmobiling, the Dalls will be at Huntley’s Snowflake Festival from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. today in the Rec Center Gym, 12015 Mill St. and in Deicke Park. Other attractions will include horse-drawn wagon rides, snowman and sled building, mechanical reindeer, and the Free Spirit Siberian Husky Dog Rescue group.