By midday Monday, not a single snow shovel could be bought in Port Angeles. Neither lamps nor lamp oil were in stock in Forks. SnoMelt was gone from store shelves in Sequim, and scores of people waited to buy snow tires in Port Townsend.
The first winter storm of the season turned ordinary items into treasures as people across the North Olympic Peninsula rushed into stores seeking tools to battle the weather.
Some folks were on happier quests: Sleds were sold out at Swain’s General Store in Port Angeles and the Clallam Co-op/True Value in Sequim.
At the co-op, said manager Paul Creasey, the last three snow shovels in the store went out the door within minutes of opening.
Making makeshift shovels
At Hartnagel Building Supply in Port Angeles, employees rose to the occasion, fashioning snow pushers from 5-foot lengths of 2-by-2-inch lumber and sections of oriented strand board — better known as OSB — fitted with a metal edge.
The pushers were sold for $8.99 as fast as employees could make them.
“We had people just watching us build them,” said Bill Sommers, sales manager.
The makeshift shovels proved their worth when Hartnagel employees used them to clear their own parking lot at Front and Race streets.
The Forks Thrifty Mart/True Value store had stocked up on necessities after floods and wind battered Clallam County’s West End earlier this month.
Despite doubling its orders, the store still sold out of lamps and lamp oil, although it had several shovels, according to saleswoman Maggie Hultenius.
“Our big thing has been batteries and propane,” she said.
New shipments of shovels and other cold weather hardware are expected on Wednesday.
Tire dealers swamped
While shopkeepers watched their inventories dwindle, tire dealers were struggling to keep up with the hundreds of people buying snow tires and chains.
“We’ve been running 30 cars or more behind most of the day,” said Pat Kelly, manager of the Les Schwab Tire Center in Port Townsend.
At Perry’s Tire Co. in Port Angeles, saleswoman Susan Hickman said, “It’s been nonstop. We don’t have much left to sell, actually.”
And at Les Schwab in Port Angeles, Tina Pavlak said she sold 50 sets of tire chains in her first four hours at work to customers, who lined up through the showroom and out the door.
Emergency rooms at two Peninsula hospitals reported few weather-related injuries.
Olympic Medical Center had treated three patients, said spokeswoman Rhonda Curry: one with a twisted knee, one with bruised tailbone from a sledding mishap and a person with minor injuries sustained in a fall while shoveling snow.
Jefferson Healthcare hospital in Port Townsend, where snowfall was lighter than in Clallam County, hadn’t seen snow-related injuries — yet.
Brandy Cate, R.N., said that Monday night’s subfreezing temperatures would turn slush to ice, and the ice would cause falls.
“As the temperature drops, we will have those,” she said.
