[Sailor Steve]

I vividly remember the winter of 1977-78. New Englanders were calling it the worst winter on record. People in rural areas were dying due to the lack of oil and coal.

Here in Utah, however, we were asking "What winter?" Salt Lake City got no snow at all that year, and temperatures rarely dropped below 50. We have seven ski resorts, and all of them were suffering. Snow-making equipment wasn't fully developed yet, and we had none. A couple of hotels in Park City went out of business. In a sense it was a terrible winter for us too, just not the same way.

This winter has been pretty good for us, so it's not a repeat of that year. I just hope people in the rural northeast are alright.