Posted on 05/18/2005 8:41:21 AM PDT by HairOfTheDog
I've been stalking you both on FR as well as in real life for several years now.
I have two memorys of 5/18/1980
I lived in Seabeck, 80 miles from St Helens and could hear the eruption. My daughter was conceived that day.
It was quite a day.
We did not have any ash from the first eruption. There was a second eruption on Memorial Day weekend, I was salmon fishing off the mouth of the Columbia River, it was a gray-drizzly day, we noticed something was amiss when it started raining dirt(ash).
It was as dark as night by noon that day, street light were on - very surreal. We ended up w/3 inches of ash. It was fine like flour, but gritty. It really was a pretty cool experience to live through.
Moses Lake is where I later went to school in 1986, I went to the flight school at Big Bend. The ash was still everywhere.
Yeah, it's still amazes me when I drive through that area to see the ash on the ground all these years later.
So, the earth moved for you that day, eh? :)
Well, that explains a lot!
Hi! I remember sunning in my bathing suit in the back yard, green grass, sunny blue skies in Spokane. I got up to get something to drink from the house and saw a huge wall of black clouds in the distance. It looked like the wrath of God and end times coming! LOL It just didn't occur to me that it was Mt. St. Helens...
After I went inside with my daughter it got cloudy and dark. I still laugh at myself for then turning on the TV out of habit (I always watched when making dinner at night.) After all, it was still afternoon! It was then that I heard the mountain had blown.
My daughter and I went outside and little light flakes of gray "snow" began floating down and covered the yard and trees. Everything became a dull, gray color - where did ground end and sky begin?
The next day my neighbors and I were "washing" my tall trees down with a hose. Cars began to break down because of the dust and stores ran out of fresh milk, vetetables, and fruit. What a gigantic MESS! FOR MONTHS!
Sometime afterwards, my dad and daughter and I went camping on one of the opposite areas where were could look over at Mt. St. Helens. There was still ash on the ground where we camped and we were all pretty dirty - but it was fascinating.
When the new museum and viewing room was opened on St. Helens my family and I drove up. I still remember gasping at that "moonscape" when the curtains opened... It was breathtakingly beautiful in a stange way. I also think back on the frightening images like the Tudle River, as well as the colorful character Harry, who ived on the mountain. And God bless the entrepreneurship of Americans who made items from the ash. IMHO ANYTHING to get rid of that awful stuff is GOOD! LOL
An old war buddy of mine saw the eruption at a safe distance...
He didn't say "Vancouver, Vancouver, this is it!"
He said, "Holy ***!"
A bunch of my friends went to school at Big Bend CC, they are all airline pilots now. They attended a long time ago, about 1970-73. We went to a 80th B-day party of an instructor there a couple of years ago. His name was Delbert Lamb, he was probably after your time though.
Lamb was there when I was. I never had him as my instructor, but he gave me a couple checkrides. One that got interesting because the fuel switch came apart in the air. I won't forget that!
Many of my friends from there are airline pilots too. I got side-tracked career-wise and never went back. I've lost touch with many of them. I regret that sometimes.
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