TAMPA, Fla. — Early Friday morning with the temp in Tampa at a balmy 39 degrees, JD Lewers prepared for his daily route.
He’s a USPS letter carrier, embracing, whether he likes it or not, the chilly temps in the Tampa Bay area.
“It almost looks like I’m dancing at the mailboxes trying to get the mail in there,” said Lewers.
Keeping warm on the job is crucial.
“Usually when I’m carrying mail, I use all my fingers, sort of like a filing cabinet, so one, two, three, so basically when I’m doing that, if one drops, I go like this, something else might drop, so I literally have to keep control of my hands all the time,” said Lewers.
Layers come in handy, though you might see some mail carriers acting business as usual.
“Even if it was like below zero, they would still wear shorts,” said Lewers.
“Whatever you have on, you’ll feel the cold go through your clothes,” said Angel Rosa, who works at Tampa International Airport.
Out at TPA, Rosa bundled up, too, while painting touchdown markings on the runway.
“If we have to get back in one of the vehicles for five minutes in the heat, I mean, we get back in, warm up a little bit, and then just come back outside and keep on working again,” said Rosa.
ABC Action News first met Rosa in 2023 during a scorching summer day when the ground clocked in at about 103.
More than 500 days later and roughly 50 degrees colder, we asked him how it felt out there on Friday.
“It’s breezy. It’s cold,” said Rosa. “At least it’s not rainy today.”
And if you’re wondering which extreme is tougher to brave and what they’d prefer, the two workers said this.
“I’m not a cold-type person,” said Rosa. “I like the heat.”
“I’ve had people that have passed out from the heat, stuff like that, so I’m glad that the cooler weather is here in Florida, but hot weather has always been the worst for me, but cold weather, it definitely has it’s challenges too,” said Lewers.
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