RUMFORD —  Members of the Rumford Polar Bears Snowmobile Club remain optimistic that they’ll have a good riding season to offer sledders in 2014 on nearly 90 miles of trail.

All they need is 10 to 15 inches of snowfall to create good riding conditions.

“We’re just a storm away,” Bob Stickney, vice president, said early Friday evening.

Club President Ron E. Russell said late Friday afternoon that traditionally the club’s trails don’t get snow until the first of the year. But sometimes it’s not until the end of January. This year, however, snow came early in December, but then tapered off.

“We need 8 to 10 inches and we’ll be in pretty good shape,” Russell said.

As of Christmas Eve when rain, sleet and freezing rain stopped, there were about 9 inches of snow left on trails, which are passable but rough, he said.

“People can ride if they choose to, but riding is definitely not recommended,” Russell said. 

He said there are many exposed rocks and stumps and others just under the surface on trails. Additionally, there are water bars that haven’t been completely filled due to lack of snow.

“People are riding, but it isn’t good riding yet,” Russell said. He urged caution and slow riding.

People who want to ride the Rumford club’s trails right now should use “old, dinged-up equipment” until an additional 10 to 12 inches of snow arrives, Stickney said.

“But we’ve got a really good base, so I’m optimistic about the season,” he said. “We’ve been working on (the trails) since September. Now we’re just waiting for Mother Nature to provide us with snow.”

Tom Reed, a club trailmaster, said Friday evening that volunteers have been out with the groomer and packed and pushed snow into waterbars and frozen-over brooks and streams.

“You can ride, but we don’t advertise our trails right now,” Reed said. “They’re not going to be smooth or groomed. They’re still pretty rough, and people need to use caution.”

All three said the Rumford area didn’t get much ice from the storm that began on Dec. 20. Still, they advised caution for possible ice-laden trees and branches drooping into trails and felled woody debris.

“We’re way ahead of where we were last year,” Reed said of work on trails. “In the past few years we haven’t gotten out until the last of January, so we’re optimistic this year. All of our waterholes are iced over and the ground’s frozen.”

Stickney said it’s unusual that southern Maine has received more snow than western Maine.

“I was down to Falmouth a few days before Christmas, and there was so much snow down there,” he said.

More snow is forecasted to fall in southern than western Maine in Sunday’s storm.

Trail quality in Rangeley “is quite good, notwithstanding a few thin or icy spots,” Steve Dudley, a director of the Rangeley Lakes Snowmobile Club, said early Saturday evening by email.

“I am pleased to say that we should be in good shape (with) 90 percent of our trails open and packed by tomorrow,” he said. “Most were open today. We had riders here Thursday, and it was busy today. We expect a good crowd tomorrow.”

The Rangeley club has 150 miles of trails in its grooming district.

As with Rumford trails, the Rangeley club’s Dec. 25 trail conditions report states that trees may be in trails or hanging into them due to the ice storm. Sledders are urged to “be very cautious.”

“We are certainly reacting to the ice storm,” Dudley said. “We have spent many hours since the storm trying to break up the ice crust on the trails and removing trees and brush that was brought down by the ice weight.”

He said members of the Arnold Trail Snowmobile Club of Eustis and Stratton were finishing up opening most of their trails on Saturday.

“We groom to three connections with them,” he said. “To our west in New Hampshire, the Pittsburgh Snowmobile Club has its trails open. We connect to their trail system up near Bosebuck Mountain.”

The Rangeley club’s other connection is to a trail maintained by the Slippery Sliders Snowmobile Club in Byron and Roxbury, Dudley said.

“I do not know yet if they had cleared their trail up to ours,” he said. “Their trails I can see from Route 17 appear to all be packed and groomed.”

According to the Slippery Sliders website, they began packing snow into trails on Dec. 18.

Dudley said Rangeley trails received 4 inches of snow since the ice storm and 2 inches on Friday. Another 2 to 4 inches was expected from Sunday’s storm.

In light of last year’s tragedy on Dec. 30 when four sledders rode into open water on Rangeley Lake and perished, the Rangeley club is erecting new signs warning snowmobilers about the dangers of lake riding and open water, Dudley said.

In two incidents on the lake that night Dawn Newell, 45, of Yarmouth and Kenneth Henderson, 40, of China, Glenn Henderson, 43, of Sabattus and John Spencer, 41, of Litchfield became the first snowmobile fatalities of the season.

“During a memorial motorcycle ride that started in the towns where the people were from and ending here, the organizers collected money that they asked be used for trail and lake safety,” Dudley said.

They collected an impressive $2,000, he said.

“The club had 15- by 24-inch, all-weather signs printed warning of the dangers of lake riding and open water,” Dudley said. “We are placing these at each location where one of our maintained trails ends on Rangeley Lake or Mooselookmeguntic Lake.”

Additionally, he said the club, along with others, are considering how else they can use the money to raise ice safety awareness.

“Fortunately, this year we have had a very early freeze, and the lakes have impressive ice thicknesses,” Dudley said. “Still, we tell people in several message formats, ‘If you are not sure of the conditions, don’t go.'”

He said the victims’ families donated a memorial granite bench with the names of the sledders inscribed that was placed in the Town Park.

“All of the memorial events have occurred here, and the families wish to move on,” Dudley said.

The Rangeley club’s website always warns people about riding on lake ice. Its Dec. 25 conditions report states that “the lakes may be dangerous at this time as it was above freezing here for three days.”

“No lake is ever ‘safe,'” the report states.

“Please do not attempt to walk, ski or ride snowmobiles on the lakes unless you are absolutely sure that the ice conditions will support you and your equipment. Rangeley has plenty of trails on land for snowmobiling, skiing, snowshoeing and walking. If you must ride on the lakes, use caution.”

tkarkos@sunjournal.com

AUGUSTA —  At 1 p.m. Monday, Dec. 30, the Maine Warden Service and the Maine Snowmobile Association will hold a joint media briefing to review the rules of riding safely. It will be held at Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife headquarters at 284 State St. in Augusta.

“With a new snowmobile season getting underway, the need to remember the rules of safe snowmobiling is a must,” warden Col. Joel Wilkinson stated in a Dec. 26 news release.

“We don’t want another situation like we had last year to cast a cloud over the entire season,” Wilkinson said.

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