Ski areas, resort communities across Montana struggling with warm and dry winter

“Pray for snow.”  Those three words are familiar to anyone who has lived in a ski town; you see them scrawled on dirty car windows or you hear them uttered at local watering holes. But this winter, that prayer is being uttered with more urgency than normal as ski areas across the state struggle to open amid a stretch of unusually dry and warm weather. And while such conditions may seem trivial to non-skiers and riders, they are a concern for communities that rely on winter tourism.  As of this week, some ski areas in Montana that normally have most or all of their terrain open to visito