Posted on 05/18/2020 4:09:27 AM PDT by C19fan
On the morning of May 18, 1980, an earthquake shook Mt. St. Helens and the mountain's north face collapsed in one of the largest debris avalanches ever recorded. The slide uncorked the volcano, baring magma that exploded with 500 times the force of the Hiroshima bomb in the most destructive eruption in U.S. history. The cataclysmic chain of events killed 57 people and thousands of animals, took out 250 homes, 47 bridges and 185 miles of highway, clogged rivers with sediment, flooded valleys and blocked the Columbia River shipping channel. Forty years later, the destruction may not be over.
The landslide remade Spirit Lake — once a beloved recreation spot at the volcano's base — raising the lake bed by 200 feet and dumping debris that functions as a huge dam holding back 73 billion gallons of water.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
a marvel and a threat...
That’s what the ladies call me...
ROFL!!!!
even I couldn’t keep a straight face.
Maybe once.
Now i’m a mountain and laugh!! :)
The story reeks of environmental elitism. “What’s ‘pristine’ for thee, is allowable for me”. The so-called ‘relief tunnel’ is not ‘pristine’. It is a man-made structure designed to prevent natural erosion of the debris dam. A ‘pristine’ solution would allow the earthen dam to erode naturally.
So, who’s to decide what can and cannot be done. The ‘experts’ have already totally misjudged the rate of restoration of plants and animals. I’m quite sure that their judgement is suspect on any other decisions they will make, as well. I certainly suspect it.
A pyroclastic flow doesn’t discriminate.
That’s racist.
In 1996, I sat on a downed 90 foot long tree trunk. The soil was still alight battleship grey. There was a gully with standing burnt trees. There were some weeds growing about, but no sounds of life. None. Looking straigh ahead, across from Johnson Ridge, you look square into the blown open side of Mt..
St. Helens, using your thumb and next yhree fingers gauging the width at distance of the gouge rendered. Again, no sound, but seeing that, your gut says, “its too quiet tick tock”. You see the depth of the ash carpet in the valley from the small stream cutting through it. And in all of this ... you realize you ain’t that big.
“Just lava, bro.”
200mph+ wind, white hot lava, rock, ground soil etc and nothing survives it. Can’t outrun or outdrive it, either.
Tie me to a tree and flog me.
They called it ‘a stone wind’.
I’ve been to St. Helens a few times in recent years. You’d be surprised at how much plant life has grown back. Yes, there’s a huge mountain with it’s side blown open in front of you, but there’s a lot of beauty in the area again.
This morning, I was remembering what I went through as a teenager in Spokane that day in 1980.
I had gone to Fairchild AFB for their then-annual Aerospace Day open house to close out the Lilac Festival week. I took Spokane Transit out there. After I arrived, I was going through one of the huge hangers and looking at exhibits. I came across a MARS (Military Affiliate Radio Service) ham radio booth. The guy was talking to someone in Randle, WA, not too far from St. Helens. hge was writing something down on a clipboard. When he finished, he put it up on the wall of the booth. It read “Mt. St. Erupted, 8:30 this morning. Top mile of the mountain is missing.” I thought that was cool, but didn’t think anything of it. After all, St. Helens was 200 miles away to the southwest of me. How could it possibly affect me?
I went on, looking at planes. As I walked around, I noticed that people were gathering near radios and boomboxes, listening to news reports coming out of the area. Someone had mentioned that the sky looked strange to the west. It looked like a far-of line of thunderstorms was approaching. At around 11:30, the public address system said they were cancelling the airshow part due to approaching weather. About 30 minutes later, thge base security threw up a security cordon around the SR-71, which had come up for a visit to the airshow. They attached a tug and started moving it toward a hangar. I asked an airman nearby what was going on, and he said “It’s to protect the engines from the ash”. Ash? Huh?
About 12:30, the PA announced that the base was closing due to the eruption and urged everyone to go home. I was in a pickle, since the bus to take us back wasn’t arriving for another 3 hours. The Air Force set aside some school buses which were going to take those who took Spokane Transit out to the base over to the Rec Center to wait for the STA bus to come get us. As I was sitting on the Air Force bus, I noted that the sunlight on the buildings around us looked different. I looked up at the Sun.
It was light blue. My stomach felt a chill like I’d never had before.
After a while, STA showed up and we boarded. As I looked overhead and to the west, it was pitch black. No lightning, just a blackness like nightfall. The driver got us out of the base to face bumper-to-bumper traffic all the way toward Spokane on Hwy. 2. The driver said he knew shortcut and we took it to get into downtown Spokane. As we were going down the Sunset Hill, I looked to the east. There was a thin line of orange light on the horizon. By the time we got downtown, there was no more light. They dropped us off, told us “you’re on your own”, and took off for the barn. I was stranded in downtown Spokane at 2pm, with the sky black as night, and stuff that looked like snow by smelled like sulfur falling from the sky.
I managed to get my dad to come down and get me. We went up to the Sambo’s on Division. My little transistor radio happened to be in the car, and I brought it in. People crowded around our booth to listen to news. Finally, the mayor ordered everyone to go home. Which we did.
We didn’t see daylight again until the next day, but it was overcast. We had one hell of a mess to clean up, and it pushed my graduation back a week. It was my first natural disaster (and not the last), and I’ll never forget it.
I have been to Mt. St. Helens once, seven years after the eruption. Very interesting. There were trees which had survived the blast because of being under a blanket of snow at the time.
a Pinatubo and Mt.St Helens can ruin all the global warning actions anyone can come up with.
Mother Nature is nothing, if not determined to survive. I saw pics of the North Slope a few years ago, and except for the felled trees lined-up like regimented pick-up sticks, it was an amazing recovery. The destruction was vast, but the recovery continues and is beautiful and inspiring.
Chris Strebig, Spirit Lake project manager for the Forest Service, said a massive surge of water, mud and debris could inundate cities below and disable four Columbia River ports: Longview, Vancouver and Kalama in Washington and the Port of Portland in Oregon.
-snip-
If the managers decide to go ahead with the road after reviewing a final round of objections, and if opponents don’t sue, construction could begin next year. The multimillion-dollar project would take about two years.
Save the pocket gophers!!
In less than a George Soros heartbeat, not to mention the sudden need for an adult diaper!!
Aren’t women and minorities usually hardest hit?
And they are still calling it a ‘fragile ecosystem’ . It has returned quicker than anyone thought so it is a lot stronger than these nimrods from Evergreen state college. are you kidding me?
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