Didn’t Washington have to completely rebuild the highway over Snoqualmie due to a huge mass of snow and ice back in the ‘90s?
They are always working on that road it seems - but I don’t recall anything with specifics to large snowfalls. Other than perhaps more downtime for avalanche control.
I seem to recall some story from a LONG time ago (80-100 years???) where a train got caught up in the one of the passes (Stevens Pass?) and they had to wait for a few days to be rescued during a huge snow storm.
The way you worded that makes it sound as though there was a massive overhanging cornice of snow in those years. In fact, there is snow every year, some more than others, and the rebuild of the westbound lanes of I-90 made avalanche control and routine road maintenance easier and safer.
Check this west summit webcam in the morning.
http://www.kirotv.com/s/weather/snoqualmie-pass-cam/