BAXTER, Minn.- More than 100 new employees will complete an intensive training camp Oct. 31 that will prepare them to plow snow this winter with the Minnesota Department of Transportation.

The two-week camps stress safe plow operation, plowing techniques and using systems that determine best mix and amount of chemicals to apply for maximum effectiveness as well as environmental protection.

The program is known as SPOT, short for snowplow operator training.

When the current session ends, MnDOT will have trained nearly 600 employees at the SPOT training facility at Camp Ripley near Little Falls, Minn.

SPOT began in 2004.

MnDOT maintenance supervisors and other staff provide hands-on training and share their experience and insights with the training class members.

“The SPOT curriculum also provides trainees with updates on new equipment, policies and procedures related to winter highway maintenance operations,” said Rick Shomion, a trainer with MnDOT.

“This year, for example, we’ve added training in gang plowing-the use of several snowplows working blade-to-blade to clear roads such as interstate highways in the Twin Cities metropolitan area and in other high-traffic areas,” Shomion said.

Trainees also receive instruction on using MnDOT’s weather forecasting system.

Most of the trainees are new employees, Shomion said, but others include MnDOT veterans who want to improve their skills as well as participants from township, city, county and tribal governments and nearby states.

“The sessions taught by skilled MnDOT employees provide a low-cost and effective way to meet short-term training needs that will lead to long-term improvements in all of our winter maintenance operations,” said Steve Lund, MnDOT’s state traffic engineer.

“SPOT enables us to continually adapt our training efforts as technology and tactics change which help educate all of us provide the most effective service to highway system users,” Lund said.