BENTON COUNTY (KFSM) -- With our first snow of the season to likely be on Monday (Nov. 12) many counties and cities are preparing to make sure they keep roads clear and safe where you live.
The Benton County Road Department started working ahead of the weekend to prepare with some new equipment they will be using if the weather gets bad.
Earlier this year they got a salt brine generator that creates the mixture the department treats roads with.
After being plugged in for just an hour on Friday (Nov. 10) they made 150 gallons of salt brine mix to use if the roads get bad.
Benton County Communications Director, Channing Barker said they have one bay full of sand and one full of salt.
They also use a lot of magnesium chloride to pre-treat roadways, but Barker said with winter weather comes the chance of rain making pre-treating roads difficult.
“Any kind of pre-treatment we put down, it could easily be washed away. So we are very commutative and very aware of the conditions that are going on. You know we have our whole road department on standby. Everybody in the east corridor and everyone in the west corridor of the county they are on standby this weekend and Monday,” Barker said.
Since there are thousands of miles of roads in the county, they will do their best to get to the heavily traveled ones first if they get bad.
Monday (Nov. 12) is a federal holiday and county offices will be closed, but the road department is on standby.