HS On the arm | NATO troops are going to Finland along a “terrible” road

“It will come a little hard”, says Leea Vältalo-Posiowhen the special transport combination carrying the Finnish main battle tank slows down at the intersection.

She follows the course of the combination with her husband Risto Posion with on Sunday on a day run in the village of Palojoensuu in Enontekiö.

“Many trucks have gone too far at that intersection. Those signs have been overturned once,” says Posio.

The couple's second dog, Unna, jumps onto the snow bank and doesn't seem very interested in heavy military equipment.

The combination carrying the main battle tank smoothly ends up on the road leading to the church village of Hetta.

Armours are on their way to the NATO military exercise starting on Monday in the northern parts of Finland, Norway and Sweden.

Letka speeds the civilian cars waiting behind the department with their ski boxes from the crossing area straight north towards Kilpisjärvi.

A large part of the troops arriving in the Heta region have traveled along highway 21. It slides along the western border from Tornio to Kilpisjärvi.

The section continuing north from Palojoensuu is in poor condition and narrow.

Highway money for the renovation has been requested for years.

Some of the people of Enontekiö believe that increased military traffic as a result of NATO membership could bring repair money.

“Hopefully, thanks to this exercise, it will be noticed that this road would require money”, thinks Leea Välitalo-Posio.

The couple drives on highway 21 almost every day. Risto Posio often goes on business trips to Kilpisjärvi as well. He is already used to driving on the narrow highway.

“You quickly learn to remember the frosty places near Kilpisjärvi. I've let off the gas.”

Highway the repair money has not been seen yet, but the NATO exercise has brought something to the highway: tons of sandblasting sand.

“Santa has been sown with nettles [riittävästi] to this intersection. The snow was melting, and there were inches of slush at the intersection, thrown by the plow into the junction. It was a terrible job to get the mud shoveled so that the boy could get into the yard”, says Tiina Aaltonen.

He has followed the progress of the Palojoensuu crossing and dangerous situations from the parade ground for a quarter of a century.

Twenty years ago, a truck carrying salmon crashed into Aaltonen's yard.

“Come from Heta, went long and fell in this yard. Salmon was available after that.”

For the people of Enontekiö the famous intersection is reached from the direction of Heta on a small downhill.

According to Aaltonen, the downhill is too much for heavy cars in slippery weather. The hill should be leveled for him.

“This has to be fixed. There is so much truck traffic.”

When the road freezes in the winter and becomes rutted, the windows at Aaltonen's house rattle as trucks rumble by.

However, Aaltonen welcomes the increasing military traffic to Enontekiö.

“If NATO troops start moving, they will move.”

Aaltonen believes that, as a result of NATO membership, the much-needed repair money for the highway will be available.

“For years that money has been prayed for, and it has never come. Now I think that this NATO thing will change the system that much.”

There is hardly any money coming from NATO, but in December, highway 21 was tentatively included in the Europe-wide Ten-T traffic network. At the turn of the year, the EU member states, the parliament and the commission reached an agreement on a regulation that defines, among other things, the quality of the roads in the transport network.

As part of the Ten-T network, you can apply for repair money from the EU for highway 21.

In the northernmost Only individual military vehicles and no heavy transports have moved along the section of Käsivarrentie.

On Sunday, a resident of Leppäjärvi in ​​Enontekiö takes a break in the yard of the gas station in Kaaresuvanno Keijo Ojala. According to him, the northern part of Käsivarrentie is now in better condition than twenty years ago.

“The frost does warp even a new surface quite quickly. It's not worth fooling around here.”

Along the highway Rosamaria Mattila does his father Kristian Mattilan with brake repair for his car. Highway 21 has become familiar to the daughter. A native of Kaaresuvanto studying in Joensuu, he attended middle school and high school in Heta. He got his driver's license at the age of 17 and went to high school in his own car.

“I'm used to driving here and the fact that the road is terrible. Yes, you can drive quite slowly in some places. You can squeeze the steering wheel to stay on the road,” says Rosamaria Mattila.

“It's funny if the road gets more use but it still remains in poor condition.”

Lapland the weather conditions showed perhaps their most difficult side for the transit traffic of the NATO exercise. The weather cooled before the training troops arrived, and supercooled water rained on the ground.

It made the weather very slippery.

“The troop's routes have been handled more efficiently, and five tons of sand have been reserved,” says the road maintenance project manager Juha Loukusa From the ely center of Lapland.

He says that on the first night three trucks went into the ditch. The biggest of them was an empty tank wagon on the way back from Heta, which derailed in a ditch before Palojoensuu. Another Defense Forces truck slipped from the corner of the parking lot into a ditch. The Norwegian civilian truck, on the other hand, went through the guardrail and overturned.

According to Loukusa, on Saturday, the detachment of three armored vehicles continued from Palojoensuu towards Kilpisjärvi due to a mistake.

“They wanted to cancel, but were told that they had to turn around somewhere,” says Loukusa, who was there.

On Monday ely-keskus and Puolustusvoimat agree on the road maintenance for the training week.

“When a tank drives from the forest to the road, it always brings a cube of snow to it. They are plowed closely,” Loukusa says.