30 years ago today - Mount St. Helens

[Woodman in MO]

I can't believe it has been 30 years...
more pics here (http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/05/mount_st_helens_30_years_ago.html)
http://inapcache.boston.com/universal/site_graphics/blogs/bigpicture/msh30_05_18/m01_l80S3141.jpg

[turbothis]

i was still in diapers.:airtight:

[jdub3]

I remember when it happened. I was like 3 but I still remember.... They made a movie about it very shortly after if I recall. Man thats a trip..

[Allwater]

I was 9 - we lived 2 hours north in Monroe - I have a great pic lying around here somewhere of me writing my name in the ash on my moms celica - it was so weird - we had a complete dusting - not a ton, but everything was gray... it was so fine and abrasive that you could still see my name in the clearcoat every time the celica got wet - she was pissed - oops! hahaha

[brewskzilla]

Wow... I remember that. I was almost 10. We were watching a special about childbirth that my mother felt a 9 year old ought to see... (VERY GRAPHIC! Horrifying when it isn't your own child and did I mention I was NINE?) and they broke in with the story that the mountain had finally blown. I remember seeing the pictures the preceding week and then seeing the aftermath and thinking "that's not the same place... There's no mountain there..."

[CaptMax]

I remember it clearly, then again I was older than the rest of you guys, and still am now. :eek:
CaptMax

[Paperpuncher]

Unbelievable how fast time flies by! :eek:

[Otis61]

I was at McChord afb in Tacoma. Its over 100m away. I could still see the plume clearly from there. Grounded all the flights for a while.

[jef1911a1]

"Can't fool the mountain son, mountain got its own ways."
Bearclaws Chris Lathum, from "Jeremiah Johnson"

[Old Grump]

Holey Moley, 30 years already, I still remember the way it used to be, come to think of it it has recovered quite nicely compared to what a lot of people feared would just be a rocky desert in its place. I have friends not far from there but they were on the West side so they were okay. Good googly moogly time do fly when you're having fun...even if you aren't having fun.

[Allwater]

Yeah - it's looking better all the time - we drove up there two years ago -greenery popping up here and there - but the thing that really gets you is seeing the lake still half-filled with logs after all these years...

[vmkeith]

I was 5, almost 6 when she blew. My dad was stationed at NAS Alameda and had gotten orders to NAS Whidbey. We drove through the area the day before she blew.

A couple of years later, on a trip down to San Fran, we stopped at one of the many tourist shops for St. Helens and I remember walking through an "A" frame building that had been in the path of the mudslide. The owners left the building as it was, with chest deep dried mud throughout the inside, with walking paths cut through. The furniture in the rooms was left alone also...I couldn't even begin to imagine something like that.

[Buddymack]

I was joining the Airforce off of Whiskey Rowe in Prescott Arizona, I can remember thinking how awful and what was all those people thinking that lived near a Volcano....
30 years later....I live right next to it...I will send a pic this week I go on vacation.

[nonleathal]

30 years?....my kids are right, i am getting old.

[okie shooter]

My highschool ceramics teacher got some ash from that, made great glaze for sure.

[Buddymack]

This is about 11 miles from my house, I thought I would show this to show much of it has recovered, I will also add some of the direct blast area when I get the chance.

Yeah we had to have some fun too....wish you were here!

[Norton]

Great pics Buddy.. My wife told me the ash came down on their laundry clothes line when she lived in a small town west of Fresno Calf

[Buddymack]

From what I understand it actually changed the climate,....it was actually cooler ....hmmmm

[Norton]

From what I understand it actually changed the climate,....it was actually cooler ....hmmmm

Cooler? Hmmmmm Former VP Albert P Gore says smoke or ash in the air makes things get warmer Hmmmm
You don't suppose he was lying to us?

[Buddymack]

Cooler? Hmmmmm Former VP Albert P Gore says smoke or ash in the air makes things get warmer Hmmmm
You don't suppose he was lying to us?

:icon_biggrin:

[vmkeith]

For those that don't know, the ash travelled across the US in about 3 days, and around the globe in about 2 weeks. It was rumored that during the Cold War, the Pacific Northwest was a stragetic target for the USSR because of the potential for nuclear fallout, as depicted from the results of the Mt St. Helens eruption.

I also found a pic that looks pretty cool...it's a satellite image of the 1980 eruption.