Massachusetts homeowners call in the pros from Minnesota to remove ice dams

Residents in Massachusetts have been dealing with a record-setting winter, and now homeowners are calling in the experts from Minnesota to help.

This mild Minnesota winter has left Hopkins-based Ice Dam Company with little to do in the Land of 10,000 Lakes, so it sent eight crews to Massachusetts to remove damaging ice dams from residents' roofs, the company's website says.

"The demand in Boston right now is absurd – we've gotten hundreds of thousands of emails, phone calls ... we just can't keep up," an employee with Ice Dam Company told WCVB in Boston.

Another Minnesota-based ice dam removal company – Roof-to-Deck Ice Dam Removal – set up shop in Dedham, Massachusetts, just outside of Boston, to respond to the demand – but removal comes at a steep price of about $595 per hour, the Boston Globe reported.

“It comes to a point where you can’t keep up with it,” Andrew Connors, a homeowner who called Roof-to-Deck Ice Dam Removal to his home, told the newspaper. “I’m relieved that it’s gone. ... I’m also a little sick because of the price. That’s money that we couldn’t really afford to use."

These companies use steam to temporarily remove the ice blockage, and as many Minnesotans know from last winter, if it's not removed, water can back up behind the dam can leak into a home and cause damage to walls, ceilings, insulation and other areas.

The Boston area has received over 100 inches of snow since January, making it one of the snowiest winters on record, AccuWeather notes, while many Minnesota residents can see the grass, the Star Tribune reported.