Rogers Centre’s Lord Of The Roof Talks Dome Sweet Dome

Sitting in an office way up high, surrounded by all those screens, buttons and levers, it would be hard to blame Dave McCormick if he sometimes felt a little like a god.

After all he helps decide when the sun shines and on occasion stops the rain, that is, at least as far as the Rogers Centre is concerned. Still, McCormick and his crew have the power to say “let there be light,” and literally make it so for thousands in one way or another.

You see, the  Supervisor of Engineering for the nearly 20-year-old building once known as the SkyDome oversees its most unique feature – possibly its only unique feature – the massive retractable roof that was once state-of-the-art and the remains the first of its kind.

So even if you’ve never heard of him, you’ve likely thought about him at least once because  if you’ve shivered your way through an April evening watching the Blue Jays or were kept indoors during a crisp September afternoon with the Argos in the last few years you’ve probably wondered why.

Well McCormick’s heard all that before, but he’d like people to know it’s a little more complicated than say, popping the top on a convertible.

“It takes about 25 minutes from the time we start opening to the time it’s fully open,” McCormick says, surveying the sprawling mass of metal and space age materials that covers the empty, cavernous stadium on one rainy April afternoon.

“When we open, my team’s up on the roof itself to listen for noises, to watch switches. There’s a whole protocol,” he promises.

At least in terms of Blue Jays baseball that protocol all starts with VP of Stadium Operations Mario Coutinho, who makes the call on the day’s weather from his office and sets McCormick and his crew into motion like an elevated grounds crew.

“Mario usually makes the final decision,” McCormick confirms, a surprisingly passive admission given the myriad computers and televisions he constantly has at his disposal.

“But there’s nothing written down on paper, it’s more so that the people that are doing it have been doing it so long we know, temperature wise, what’s good for the people.”

Fans that recall life at Toronto’s old Exhibition Stadium surely have memories of frozen seats and whipping winds strong enough to send your Meester Mike’s fries across two rows. The very purpose of the SkyDome upon construction, and therefore the very purpose of McCormick’s job to date, is to keep all that a memory.

“Personally I love this ballpark when it’s open,” McCormick states, gesturing towards the roof he’s dedicated five years of his life to opening and closing.

“But I know the demographic for our fans here and I’m sure most of them would be happy to be sitting inside.”

That much is debatable, at least during the warmer stretches of each year, but McCormick’s point – that it’s better safe than sorry when it comes to matters of roof and weather – is quite legitimate.

“We predict weather a lot better than we did years ago, but weather is still unpredictable,” he says with a shrug.

“This building is not designed to take any weather so if it rains it would cause a lot of damage … a lot of money and downtime. Games could be cancelled.”

And that’s where the pressure kicks in. McCormick and his staff do more than just oversee a retractable roof. They oversee the continued operation of a very valuable piece of property, the teams that play in it and every fan that comes through the doors.

It’s not exactly air traffic control, but there are definitely stakes.

“We try to create the most comfortable atmosphere possible for the fans, but from time to time that’s hard to achieve,” he acknowledges.

“If you’ve got a full house in here, you close the roof and now you’ve trapped all that humidity in. And we’ve had nights where it’s been clear, but it’s not comfortable and we’ve literally closed and a couple of minutes later it hit us like a tap opening.”

The mere thought of watching the building’s more than 50,000 seats flood or sitting helplessly while its fancy field turf is submerged is clearly stressful for McCormick, who constantly walks a fine line between protecting the site and appeasing all of those who pass through it. And of course everyone has an opinion.

“When Mario makes his decision he takes the input weather-wise from us and he also has the input on the baseball side of things, and that could be a pitcher not wanting it open,” he admits, stopping short of naming names.

“The umpires also have a huge say. They can stop us from opening if they don’t feel it’s right.”

Early in the Blue Jays’ 2008 campaign that hasn’t been an issue. As of Thursday – the warmest yet in 2008 – that roof still hadn’t been cracked, a fact certainly not to the Domekeeper’s liking.
 
“Last year we had a near-record number of openings but we had a hard winter this year and it really killed us with snow,” McCormick says in obvious frustration. “This is the first year, I’ll be honest with you, where we have not been ready by opening day.”

That’s an especially sore spot, since just like the ballplayers he looks down on from above left field, his team needs to get its practice in. Even the roof itself – the star of the show – doesn’t just leap into mid-season form.

“We’ll probably open and close it at least 15 times,” he says of the procedure that comes ahead of actually dropping the top for a game. “Back and forth, back and forth.”

And yet all those levers and buttons that send the famous Dome’s three parts back and forth, folding and unfolding into and out of one another, never cease to fascinate this crew, which brings us back to that god bit. The acceptance of power and responsibility surely fuels McCormick and his team in their search for perfect balance.

Consider this: most people can’t even decide whether to take a sweater along when they leave the house. They’re constantly picking out sweaters for tens of thousands.

And even in a job that McCormick admits can at times be simple enough, that’s the constant rush and the risk.
 
“It definitely keeps you on your toes and I’m not going to lie, every time the roof opens I’m always a little bit nervous,” he says with a smile. “But that’s because I care about it.”
 
And he cares about you too, which is to say as long as you’re inside the Rogers Centre, McCormick and company are doing everything possible to keep the rain off your back, and the sun on your shoulders.

Is there something Blue Jays-related you want to read about? Email aaron.miller@chumtv.com