Jeff Caplan’s Minute of News: Tumbleweed terror

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SALT LAKE CITY — When we build like mad, as we’re doing up and down the Wasatch Front, you get unintended consequences.

In downtown Salt Lake, they’re building a 31-story skyscraper with a facade covered in slats.

We learned on Saturday that when the wind kicks up, the building whistles. Cool feature, or annoying? I guess it depends if you live next door.

Another unintended consequence of construction: As the wind was howling in Eagle Mountain and South Jordan, tumbleweeds rolled off the open range, bouncing and dancing their way into a newer subdivision.

South Jordan residents react to waking up and seeing thousands of tumbleweeds in front of their homes

Maybe you’ve seen the video of hundreds of these spindly four-foot balls making a beeline for one lovely house as if it were a magnet.

The result is impressive, the entire lawn is covered by tumbleweeds. Twelve feet deep in tumbleweeds. And then the mess was coated by four inches of snow.

How do you clean that up? Pitchforks and plastic bags? A chipper, shredder and a shovel?

But I do know construction always brings surprises. And, as we learned this weekend, sometimes unintended consequences blow in on a stiff breeze.

Jeff Caplan is the host of Jeff Caplan’s Afternoon News on KSL NewsRadio. Follow him on Facebook and X. 

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