By Armchair Mayor

ROTHENBURGER: The Pinantan chicken and other tales of being grounded in the polar vortex

Feb 16, 2019 | 6:00 AM

WHEN EVEN winter-hardened veterans from our neck of the woods complain about the weather, you know things aren’t normal. I haven’t heard this much bitching since Tim Hortons put chicken strips on the menu.

We in the colonies still get a good laugh at the moaning and groaning coming from the Coast and over on the Island, where they’ve never heard of snowplows and winter tires. But anyone travelling from here to Vancouver and Victoria, or returning from either of those cities during the past two weeks, wasn’t laughing.

Sure, the weather looks better today, but it’s been hell for the past while. A reliable source who was trying to return home after a business trip to Victoria last week tells me that, at one point, all flights were cancelled for the day because the airport’s de-icing truck was broken. (Maybe the other one was already in the shop; I can’t confirm how many trucks the airport has, but it’s not enough.)

Travelers had the option of cabbing it to the BC Ferries terminal and hoping they could find a plane from Vancouver to Kamloops, or waiting it out in Victoria. A trip that should have taken a couple of hours took a couple of days. Shortly after that, the airport lost all its power. Seventy people slept on benches in the terminal after a round of flight cancellations because nearby motels and hotels were full up.

It was especially bad timing with the opening of the new B.C. Legislature session in Victoria. Local politicians including Coun. Arjun Singh and MLA Todd Stone were among those having to run the winter gauntlet getting back and forth from Kamloops to Vancouver and over to the capital.

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For them and others like them, checking flight-status apps became a way of life.

As the week progressed, it went from bad to worse. Here at home, at mid-week we were waking up to crisp, clear mornings with sun sparkling off the snow. Down at the Coast, it was a different story.

If you managed to get down there, there were no guarantees you were going to get back. Thursday night, as a planeload of homeward-bound Kamloopsians was waiting for their Dash 8 to taxi out onto the runway, the announcement came that the flight was being cancelled. Visibility problems. Back into the terminal they went, standing in line to try to get another flight.

Flight crews were no better off, milling about the gate areas waiting to see if they were going to be needed. “I’ve never seen so many pilots in one place,” one Kamloops traveler told me.

When the hapless passengers got to the customer-service counter an hour later, they were told they were being relegated, in effect, to the back of the bus. Any flights that were getting out were full and weren’t being opened to anyone who had the misfortune of having been booked on a cancelled flight. Happy Valentine’s Day.

And Air Canada, bless them, wasn’t adding any flights to take the pressure off. A few lucky ones made it on to a plane later that night or next morning; some were told they might have to wait until Sunday night. Yup. Three more days. Happy Family Day weekend. There are probably still people there, living like Tom Hanks in The Terminal, waiting for a flight to Kamloops.

Anyone thinking they might be able to get a flight to Kelowna and rent a car could forget it. Kelowna airport was no better off than Kamloops.

Similar horror stories are told in airports, subways and highways all across the country. Toronto airport was described as “a total nightmare.” Even in Calgary, where they know a thing or two about snow and frigid weather, dozens of flights were being cancelled or delayed.

There can be no more sinking feeling than seeing the word “Cancelled” come up on the flight-status screen when all you want to do is get home and get warm. Well, one thing — when you get boarded onto an aircraft for a second time, sit there for two hours waiting to be deiced and then are told to deplane because the air crew has timed out its shift.

Meanwhile, on the streets of Vancouver, the circus continued. A Vancouverite’s answer to snow is to stay home. Those who do go out avoid driving, but the usually reliable Skytrain couldn’t figure out the snow either —sensors kept stopping the trains every time snow built up on the tracks.

I shall end this tale of woe on a brighter note. At times like these, stories always emerge to gladden our hearts. So it is with the case of the Pinantan chicken, another weary traveler who lost her way in the polar vortex.

One night this week, the chicken in question flew the coop and was found shivering (or whatever chickens do when they get cold) in front of the Pinantan General Store.

After a resident wrapped up the bird and put it on the hood of a running vehicle to help warm it up, the social media telegraph kicked in and people began counting their chickens (literally) but nobody could figure out who the chicken belonged to. So somebody took it home. Offers of adoption were exchanged.

Last I heard, she has been placed in a new forever home until and if the original owner discovers that one of his or her chickens hasn’t come home to roost.

This is what is meant by the kindness of strangers. It remains unclear, however, why the chicken crossed the road.

Mel Rothenburger is a former mayor of Kamloops and newspaper editor. He publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a director on the Thompson-Nicola Regional District board. He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or the Jim Pattison Broadcast Group.