Print Email

All across Salina on Tuesday, workers who don't get to spend their days in air-conditioned comfort were finding ways to get the job done anyway.

The National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for the rest of this week, warning of oppressive heat and humidity through at least Saturday in Salina and much of Kansas. Temperatures are expected to climb to 105 to 110 each afternoon and early evening.

The Salina-Saline County Health Department reminded residents that exposure to even short periods of high temperatures can cause serious health problems and warned people to take precautions. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, heat kills more Americans than any other weather condition.

But if there's a job to be done, there's someone out in the heat doing it in Salina.

Five city workers were out Tuesday using hot asphalt to repair potholes. Because asphalt hardens as it cools, hot temperatures actually help keep it pliable and usable a little longer, said Brent Buchwald, Salina's street superintendant.

When the workers pick up a truckload of asphalt, the asphalt is anywhere from 180 to 300 degrees, so the job requires gloves and protective clothing to prevent burns, he said.

"Those guys doing it deal with a lot of heat," Buchwald said. "It's a dry radiation heat that can take it out of you and makes a hot day worse."

He said the city provides coolers full of ice water and tries to keep workers comfortable and healthy. In the summer, work starts at 6:30 a.m. and ends at 3 p.m., when the heat is at its peak. That's an hour earlier than other times of the year.

"One-hundred degree temperatures are one thing, but when the humidity is high too, I don't think you ever get used to it," Buchwald said. "You just learn to deal with it."

Cooling off framers

Tuesday afternoon, workers continued to erect the frames for walls at a 32-unit affordable housing complex that is rapidly taking shape on North Ninth Street, where Hawthorne Elementary School used to stand.

Roberto Alvarado, owner of RGA Construction of Junction City, said Tuesday was his first day of work at Heritage at Hawthorne Village, where RGA employees will be putting up siding as soon as the framing is completed. He said the game plan to deal with the heat was to start at 7 a.m., take breaks throughout the day and stay hydrated.

Alvarado was actually dressed in layers, wearing a long-sleeved Nike Dri-FIT shirt underneath his polo shirt and a floppy camouflage hat and sunglasses under his hard hat. He said the Nike shirt kept him cool enough that working outdoors wasn't that bad.

"It's worse when you are doing roofing," he said. "I've done roofing. You stay on the job in the heat. It's the only way you make your money."

He said the structure he was working on was shady and cool inside, despite the lack of windows and doors.

"You could take a nap in there," he said.

A heated track

Days like this could lead youngsters who dream of growing up to work at Jumpin' Joe's Family Fun Center, 1634 Sunflower, to re-evaluate their career goals.

Darren Johnson, go-kart attendant, said employees try to keep up a rotation so that no one gets stuck outside in the sun responding to go-kart crashes for too long at a stretch.

"We keep a five-gallon water cooler out there constantly," he said.

Jumpin' Joe's visitors want to drive the go-karts even in the blazing heat.

"They still like to come out and have fun," Johnson said.

The wind cools drivers down some while they're winding around the go-kart track, and then they can return to the air-conditioned fun inside.

The go-kart attendants are out there longer -- the longest period he had heard of was four hours -- but Johnson said they rarely end up having to push a go-kart back to the pits.

Dealing with extremes

"We're in Mother Nature's hands," said Kris Beaman, general manager of Earthcare Services, a division of Waters Inc., 1777 E. Old Highway 40. "What she wants to deal us is what we get."

For the last couple of years, what has happened locally is extremely hot summers and extremely cold winters, he said. The ground has frozen so hard in the winter that no trenching can be done for irrigation system installation, so the company's winter occupation is snow removal.

Beaman said landscapers can't really move their work hours forward because most of their jobs are in residential areas.

"We don't want to fire up the motorized equipment even if the homeowner we're doing a project for has given us the go-ahead to start early," he said. "You've got to take into consideration their neighbors."

Beaman said if crews were to wake somebody up at 6:30 a.m., he or she would look out the window and see the red Earthcare truck with the phone number on it and call.

"It's not worth it," he said.

Instead, employees in four landscape crews, two irrigation crews and three maintenance crews end up working in temperature extremes, he said.

"All of our guys and gals here know the heat's here, and you make sure you bring your water," he said.

Beaman said he recommends that customers who do not have an irrigation system or aren't installing one not plant new shrubs at this point and instead wait until late summer or early fall, when temperatures have cooled.

"You don't want to come home from work and have to stand out there in triple digit temperatures watering your new shrubs," he said.

Cars a hot commodity

Car salesmen may be the best dressed group of hot-weather workers.

Bruce Dedonder, sales manager for Marshall Automotive Group, 3500 S. Ninth, said eight members of his sales staff had each accompanied a customer into a hot car for a test drive three or four times by Tuesday afternoon.

When it's 100 degrees outside, it's 115 to 125 degrees inside the cars parked on the lot. That hasn't really seemed to slow down shoppers, although they are mostly coming in the morning or early evening, he said.

"It's been really busy this last week," he said. "The sales staff are constantly in and out of the heat showing cars. They'll come from inside the showroom where it's 70 degrees to 100 degrees outside."

The lot employees who wash the cars are also out in the heat, but they can cool down quickly with a spray of water, he said.

He said customers looking for a used car have the opportunity currently to really test the air conditioner.

Tractors even hotter

One wouldn't generally think of employees of Tractor Supply, 3120 Riffel, as having a hot job, but this month they do. The store's air conditioner went out on July 4 weekend, and so far they are still waiting to get to the top of the air-conditioning repair company's to-do list, said store manager Justin Blew.

"It's 90 degrees in here today," he said. "We've got a lot of fans running, and it's not too bad. We've all gotten kind of used to it. I guess we've grown camel backs full of water."

Blew said he hopes the much-anticipated arrival of the repairmen will happen any day, and despite staff jokes to the contrary, he said he is not just being a tightwad and choosing not to run the A.C.

"When it's our turn, they'll get us fixed up," he said.

n Reporter Erin Mathews can be reached at 822-1415 or by email at emathews@salina.com.

Discuss This Story:

Email this story to a friend:

Subject:

Recipient:

Sender's email (required):



Enter text seen above: