It went from snow pile to no pile in just under four weeks. We launched our “Guess When the Triangle Snow Pile Will Melt Contest” in our March 26 issue, but the Triangle snow pyramid had been huge, and growing, since late January. It melted from a height of — well, we didn’t measure it, but it was humongous, maybe 12 feet, spanning at least half a dozen parking spaces — to a six-inch pile of dirt-encrusted slush, and then, quickly, to nothing but a wet parking spot.
We got dozens of guesses, ranging from early April to the end of May. Some were general (May 17) and some were very precise (12:11 am on April 25).
As reported two weeks ago, we routinely checked the snow pile for melting progress, noting that the dirt encasing it might lengthen the melting process (this was an unscientific theory).
On Monday, April 20, photographer Michael Cummo stopped by the Triangle around noon and noticed that the snow pile had gotten quite small, though not so small that a car could park in the spot it inhabited. With heavy rain and warm (ish) weather predicted, we knew it was a matter of days.
It turns out, it was a matter of hours, or maybe minutes. By early the next morning, the pile was gone. We scanned the spreadsheet that Times intern Elie Jordi created to track all the contestants.
Luckily for us, as we weren’t monitoring the pile with one of our webcams, there was a clear winner. Steve Parachini of Edgartown, ironically one of our very first guessers, had guessed 4:20 pm on 4/20. No one else was within a day of him. He’ll receive a gift certificate to Edgartown Meat and Fish Market.
The pile, we guessed, was ushered out of the parking lot and into the Edgartown-Vineyard Haven Road at some point during the storm on the night of April 20.
Good riddance, almost-never-ending winter of 2015, and congratulations, Mr. Parachini.
