Summer in the Northeast, Thoughts Turn to Deicing

  Flying out of Boston Logan this morning, I saw a line up of about 20 deicing trucks. It was obvious the equipment hadn’t been moved for quite some time — under-inflated tires, windows caked with soot, the usual signs that equipment left outdoors has not been used. It got me thinking of the days when I was running my FBO and had to worry about things like deicing trucks and deicing fluid. When everyone else was talking about summer vacation plans, I was busy making plans for winter. And winter in Boston can be brutal.   Even though the equipment had sat unused for months, we all know that lack of use can sometimes be harder on equipment than daily use.  Hard as it was to work on winter issues in the middle of the summer rush (and we used to have a summer rush in those days!), I knew that I needed enough lead time to order any worn parts. Winter can come as early as October up here and it’s much easier to replace belts and hoses in the warmth of summer than the middle of the first unexpected snow storm.   My August plan was PM checks on all the deicing equipment and checks on all the pumps and hoses for the storage tanks. Sounds easy but we know how hard it is to focus on preventive maintenance when we have the crisis du jour to worry about. But I learned the hard way — parts of me are still smarting from the memory of unhappy customers lined up waiting to deice because of broken equipment.    So — for those who don’t have summer all year round — my advice is plan early and stay focused on getting everything in shape to avoid the grief of the first icy day.