December 31, 1997: New Year's Predictions

Art Bell rings in the New Year with a final night of open lines dedicated to listener predictions for 1998. Broadcasting as midnight sweeps across the nation's time zones, Art manages to connect with a caller standing in the freezing cold of Times Square, where half a million people braved wind chills of five degrees below zero to celebrate.

Callers offer a wide array of forecasts for the coming year. One listener predicts the Hong Kong chicken flu was biologically engineered by the Chinese government as a test. A man locked in his basement shower in Lake Charles, Louisiana, nervously warns about chemical testing contaminating local groundwater and causing seismic activity. Another caller predicts tainted vaccines will be distributed as a population control measure. Art shares his own prediction that 1998 will be one of the most tumultuous years in recorded history.

Between predictions, Art reports on a mysterious illness overwhelming emergency rooms across the American Southwest, from Southern California to El Paso. Callers confirm packed hospitals and confused medical authorities unable to agree on whether the outbreak is influenza or something else entirely. The broadcast captures the anxious energy of a nation entering an uncertain new year.