Snow, rain, sleet or hail, for the past 20 years Bill Miller has played an integral role in delivering the weather forecast to Yukoners.

Today marks his final day on the job as the client services manager with the Yukon Weather Centre as he retires and gets set to simply enjoy whatever weather comes his way. Most immediately, he's envisioning the warmer summer temperatures when he can golf and garden.

Miller's career in Whitehorse began when he took a job, that has since gone to the flight services branch at the Whitehorse airport, telling pilots what weather they'd be encountering on their flights into the capital.

While most of his work with the weather office has been spent in Whitehorse, Miller's 35-year career with Environment Canada has taken him through much of the country.

His career began in Victoria, when he answered a job ad in the paper from Environment Canada.

"It sounded like a really interesting job," the former cab driver said this week, pointing out how much Canadians love to talk about the weather.

From there, Miller was sent to Ottawa for nine months of training.

Specific training sessions followed, including three months of learning to be an upper air technician, who sends up the weather balloon.

Later in his career, he spent six months learning to be a weather briefer, his initial job when he came to Whitehorse. His duties included telling pilots and the media the weather forecast.

His career with Environment Canada saw him work for stints in Toronto, Edmonton, Cambridge Bay and Yellowknife before he arrived in Whitehorse.

"That's just the way it works with weather offices," he said of his several moves, noting that being promoted often involves moving to another location.

As Miller had predicted when he answered the ad in the paper, he found the job "really interesting."

While there are aspects of the work that are the same day-to-day, constant changes in the weather have made the work different every day.

"I found I really liked it," he said of his various jobs over the years with the weather office.

By the time Miller came to Whitehorse, he was beginning to reach the limit in how far he could go in being promoted.

"I was able to stay," he said.

It was a much different office at that time, with 29 other staff working there.

Today, Miller is the lone worker in the office and it has yet to be decided whether the position here will be filled.

There were no computers on the office desks in the old days, and the Internet was unheard of.

"That was a major change," he said of the computer age.

It was earlier in Toronto that Miller was first introduced to working with a computer when one was brought to the office for map potting in the mid-1970s.

"It was literally the size of a small room," Miller recalled, noting it often took just as long to plot a map by hand as to do one on the computer at that time.

The technology was here to stay though, and despite the major changes between the computers of the 1970s and today's technology, Miller has adapted like most.

"Sometimes you start pulling your hair out," he said, noting the changes have come incrementally.

Among the more recent technological changes is the Internet. Weather information that Miller was previously in charge of selling is now available for free on the web.

On more than one occasion, Miller has found technology taking over his position, from the automatic system that now sends up weather balloons to flight services staff briefing pilots on conditions as they fly into town.

For Miller, the changes have meant opportunities to train for something new and to take on new challenges throughout his career.

"I've been quite lucky," he said.

He most enjoyed working with pilots and members of the media, who relied on his providing forecasts, getting to know people and learning what kind of weather information was most important to others, he said.

With the advancements in technology have come the significant changes in weather - one of the constants in his job. This past winter, for example, the territory saw a record snowfall since records started being kept in the 1940s.

Asked about global warming, Miller is quick to note he's seen major changes in the weather in the past 20 years, but whether it's a natural change or caused by something else, he doesn't know.

After many roles with the weather centre, Miller will end his career this afternoon in a position that sees him maintaining a data base of weather that's e-mailed across the country, as well as dealing with media.

Environment Canada has yet to make a final decision on whether the position will be filled here. If it is though, Miller wouldn't be on-hand to train the staff.

After 3 1/2 decades with Environment Canada, the 60-year-old is eligible for his pension, so has opted to retire.

"I just decided I didn't have to work so why (would I?)," he said when asked why he decided to retire now.

With his wife still in the work force, Miller is setting his sights on the summer for golfing, gardening and perhaps some travelling.