Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, March 9, 1992                   TAG: 9203090064
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A1   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium

WARMEST WINTER HAS `BEEN VERY KIND TO US'

In the 97 years Uncle Sam has been keeping records, never has a winter been so warm as this December, January and February, the National Climatic Data Center says.

In many parts of Georgia, daffodils and Bradford pears are blooming "two to three weeks ahead of schedule," said Randy Drinkard of the Fulton County Extension Service in Atlanta.

"The winter's been very kind to us," said William M. Denihan, who's in charge of Cleveland's 85 snowplows.

In the Roanoke Valley, temperatures reached 80 degrees last week, breaking records.

Oregon's nursery business is coming to life a month early with fruit and shade trees already being shipped across the country, said Bob Obermire of the Oregon Department of Agriculture.

"Just about everything we grow here is on the move," he said.

A beneficiary of South Dakota's warm winter has been the program that helps low-income people pay their heating bills. Last winter, more than 20,000 households in South Dakota received such aid; this winter there were 1,300 fewer applications, said program director Abbie Rathbun.

Perhaps not so delighted are Pittsburgh's youngsters, who'll put in two extra days of school. The two "snow day" closings planned into the school schedule weren't needed, said Janet Lochner of the Board of Education staff.

Preliminary figures for the 48 contiguous states showed the average winter temperature at 36.87 degrees, said meteorologist Richard Heim of the Climatic Center in Asheville, N.C. That topped the previous record, set in 1953-54, when the nation averaged 36.

It's not a sign of global warming - just the usual cycle of nature, said Steve Nogueira, National Weather Service meteorologist in Concord, N.H.

How people perceive winter is a matter of perspective. Someone who remembers the harsh winters of the early 1980s may consider the current weather mild, he said.

"Think of somebody who was growing up during that stretch and saying, `God, it used to snow like crazy,' " he said. "You remember the outstanding years. . . . Plus, you were a lot shorter back then."