Get used to it: America's winters will be a lot less snowy from now on

Mon, 02/19/2024 - 05:43

Outside a window, a child tries to muster up enough snow for a snowman but can't quite. Inside, a photo frame with the same child next to a giant snowman in a snowy version of the same landscape. — Last December was the warmest on record for much of the Midwest. It's the beginning of a new normal.
Tara Anand for BI

Jocie Nelson has been cross-country skiing for as long as she can remember. When she was growing up, the sport was her way of connecting with nature during the long, harsh Minnesota winters, where temperatures often reach the minus 30s. Thousands of Americans share her enthusiasm: Since high school, Nelson has joined nearly 15,000 other skiers in the American Birkebeiner, a 50-kilometer cross-country ski race through the small town of Hayward, Wisconsin. The crowds of spectators line several people deep.

"Everybody is cheering like crazy," Nelson said of her first time crossing the finish line, "and it seems like they're all cheering for you."