Elementary students name Lethbridge snow plows

It’s not every day that kids get the chance to be part of city affairs. But, in a fun turn of events, elementary students got to flex their creativity and come up with names for the city’s team of snow plows.

“Mr. Plow is a pretty classic good name. Darth Blader is good, but honestly they named 12 trucks and all 12 trucks were great names,” said Quinn Sproule, Lethbridge transportation operations foreman.

The city received more than 100 submissions from students and took one of the winning plows – ‘Darth Blader’ out to a pair of schools on Friday to show off its new moniker.

Sproule said it’s been a rewarding process.

“It’s kind of cool if you can go to a school and kind of spark some imagination in a kid. And maybe he’ll end up being a snowplow driver in years to come,” said Sproule.

Lethbridge Mayor Blaine Hyggen said it’s great to see the kids learn about snowplowing and the hard work the teams do to keep roads safe.

“You might get up in the morning and you don’t have any snow on the road — it’s because these fellas are out through the night. Having that understanding of what they do has been great for these kids to be able to see,” said Hyggen.

Snowzilla, Frosty the Snowplow and Snow King are among the list of other winning names.

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Grade 3 students said they put lots of thought into their entries.

“Godzilla is a very strong character and also snowplows move a lot of snow, and they’re strong,” said Ben Reed.

“In the movie (with) Darth Vader, there’s snow in it,” said Jackson Hyland.

“My dad said to put it in,” said Liam Procee.

“I was really excited that I got picked as one of the top people and it’s a really great experience,” Jackson Hyland.

Darth Blader and the rest of the newly named team now await the next big snowfall.