As the American University community dreams of warm sunny days to bask on the quad, one hardworking group of staffers is keeping an eye on the possibility of one last winter blast.

“We’re ready for anything,” said Ruben Chavez, a grounds maintenance zone supervisor who has worked at AU for 35 years.

While rare, it’s not unprecedented for DC to get snow this late in the season. If it does happen, a dedicated crew of 45 staff from AU Facilities Management will be prepared to spring into action again to clear campus clear and keep it safe from snow and ice.

Already this year, Facilities Management staff cleared upwards of 15 inches of flurries on campus—the most snow DC has seen in a single season in the last five years, according to WUSA9.

“It’s a service. It’s something we all find important,” said Ransom Schutt, assistant director of grounds, vehicle maintenance, and support services. “We know coming into the job that this is part of it. This is what we signed up for. We know what we’re doing, and that’s to make campus life as smooth as possible.”

Each winter starting around Thanksgiving, equipment and staff are ready to deploy at a moment’s notice. When snow is forecasted, teams begin spreading salt across high-traffic areas from flatbed trucks and Kabota ATVs.

When the flakes start to fall, crews fan out across seven snow zones to ensure sidewalks, roads, and buildings are safe for the community to traverse. The team is responsible for brushing, plowing, and salting main campus, the Spring Valley Building, the Washington College of Law, AU House, and the WAMU building.

It’s work that requires early mornings, late nights, and sometimes crashing on air mattresses and cots. Facilities staff sacrifice so that others can stay home with hot chocolate and students can safely take part in snowball fights, building snowmen, or their normal campus activities.

“That’s what we’re here to do,” said Dave Wilson, a grounds maintenance zone supervisor who has worked at AU for 39 years. “We’re here to support all activities of the university. We make it where they can move, and we take pride in that.”

Working snow days over the years helps the team build camaraderie and creates memories.

“We’re a tight-knit group,” said Leon Nixon, a senior groundskeeper who has worked at AU for 27 years. “We care about each other a lot. It takes a family-type group to come together when these things like this happen.”

During the blizzard of ’96, a category five winter storm, about a dozen staff spent 13 straight days on campus clearing feet of snow. A record 23.9 inches was measured at Reagan National Airport, but staff who were on campus said Northwest DC saw about 33 inches over nearly two weeks.

After that experience, those who dutifully kept campus safe bought dark blue sweatshirts that read “We Survived the Blizzard of ’96” to commemorate the storm.

“You couldn’t go anywhere because the two-lane roads were one-lane roads,” Nixon said. “If you were trying to get here, the snow was piled up like walls from the street to the sidewalk.”

 “Snowmageddon” in February 2010 dropped a record 20 inches of snow in two days, knocking out power to more than 200,000 homes and businesses and disrupting the spring academic calendar on campus.

As busy as winter can be, it’s only one small part of what facilities staff do to ensure the grass is mowed, flowers are planted, leaves are collected, and other projects continue across the seasons.

“It helps that we have people we like and we get along [with],” Nixon said. “We pray for each other, we cry with each other, we laugh with each other. We do it all.”