REMEMBERING MAY 18th, 1980

Mt. St. Helens - Then & Now.

The May 18th, 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens fluctuated in height and veracity for 9 hours straight; the thickest layer of ash blanketed the areas closest to the volcano, as the powerful blast blew away a mile of the mountain's summit, sending a thick layer of ash east and north across Washington, northern Idaho and western Montana … and some traveled as far as Bend, Oregon – 150 miles away. As the ash fell, entire communities went indoors - and stayed there.

Harry Truman with his beloved Mt. St. Helens in the background: before she blew her top in May 1980.

Toutle River Bridge before Mt. St. Helens’ pitching a fit took it out.

Log jam debris (which included house, barns, animals, ect.) – and a powerful mud flow took out the bridge on the North Fork of the Toutle River.

Log jam & mud flow on I-5 Cowlitz River.

Ashy downtown Longview. A speed limit was imposed to keep the ash kickup as low as possible. People wrapped their vehicle’s air filters in pantyhose to guard against the gritty ash: it did not help.

Measuring the height of the mud flow as it raced across the landscape; following the devastating volcanic eruption of May 18^th, 1980.

We had significant earthquakes following the eruption; and ash falling in Cathlamet – the kids got a bang out of watching the “dirty snow” drift past their bedroom windows

In the early morning hours of May 19th, the eruption had for all intents, and purposes, stopped.

And the gray course, sooty, ash had drifted into the central region of America: and within 2 weeks tome, had drifted completely around Earth’s atmosphere.

Mt. St. Helen’s Eruption (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ifohb8_2WhE)

Bob was working for Durrah & Martin’s Logging Co, Inc., then – and was one of the first loggers to go into the Red Zone, when it was opened up for timber deadfall retrieval; he even smuggled his 12-year-old son, Alex, in with him one day when he had to do maintenance work on the Yarder, and told him to “get out of sight and hunker down” when a helicopter flew into the air space – they laughed about that incident for years … even up to the day Bob was placed in Comfort Care in December of 2018.

Bob's lungs were scarred from working in the Red Zone ash.

Bob said there were different brilliantly colored lakes that had been created by the eruption (red, yellow, varied hues of blue & green).

Spirit Lake had literally been sucked up by a surging wave of volcanic momentum, and displaced miles away from where it originally had been: and it is despairingly ugly, now.

Mt. St. Helen's was Bob's Mountain; and he knew every road that cut through her forests (forests and roads that are no more - they are buried under 400 feet of muddy debris). He loved her. Even when she was just a shabby ghost of her beautiful self ...

When Mt. St. Helen's was finally opened to the public, and Bob took me into the Red Zone, it was eerily creepy: total devastation was everywhere - no life, at all: not even a breeze. Just wreckage. Ash-dredged timber lay like giant toothpicks (like the 'Pick Up Sticks' game) laid flat and spreading for miles and miles into the distance. They weren't even charred; they were just denuded and baked with coarse gritty gray ash. I couldn't wait to get out of there. For years I wouldn't go near Mt. St. Helen's because it was so unnerving.

I go back now, just to prove to myself that I can ... but I do not feel the 'love' that Bob did.

Sunday~Funday 2 (https://jeastofeden.blogspot.com/2019/09/sunday-funday-2.html)

Daytrip ~ Mt. St. Helens (https://jeastofeden.blogspot.com/2020/08/daytrip-w-trudy-ed-mt-st-helens.html)

A Walk in The Clouds: (https://jeastofeden.blogspot.com/2021/04/a-walk-in-clouds.html)

The mountain that walks in my soul is Mt. Rainier: which is also an active volcano.

Mt. Rainer peeking over Mt. St. Helens wilderness seen from Johnson’s Ridge area; August 2020.

Bob and I hiked the Sunrise Trail in mt. Rainier National Park; Mt. Rainier's top in the background; June 2015.

Mt. Rainer seen from high up on the Sunrise Trail - Box Canyon is just over that peak; June 2015.

Box Canyon – Mt. Rainer National Park; I LOVE this place. We enjoyed this place several times a year. For decades.

Mt. Rainer seen from Packwood Grocery Store; August 2020.

I know that Mt. Rainer “is alive” with unleashed chaos, like Mt. St. Helens is … and was – but somehow, I never feel threatened by that knowledge.

I suppose that is how the people, who died, in the Mt. St. Helen's blast felt.