May 18th 1980 - Mt St Helens - where were you or what do you remember?

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Matt²

On tuesday, it's the 30th anniversary of the eruption of Mt St Helens. If you were alive, where were you, what do you remember of it?

I was 7, and I lived in Oregon (still do) at the time, and I remember it already being a cloudy day, getting up early, then my sisters telling me not to go outside because it wasn't SNOWING as I thought, it was ash and that it would hurt my lungs (now I know it turns to concrete in the lungs).
 
Krisken

Krisken

May 18th 1980 - Mt St Helens - where were you?

Yeah, I was 3. Didn't exactly stick in my brain as a major event.
 
Cheesy1

Cheesy1

May 18th 1980 - Mt St Helens - where were you?

I was two years old, living in igloos and learning to hunt moose in the wilds of Alaska.
 
David

David

May 18th 1980 - Mt St Helens - where were you?

That was 9 years before I was born. My dad wasn't in high school yet.
 
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Wasabi Poptart

May 18th 1980 - Mt St Helens - where were you?

I was 8 years old. Since it would have been around 11:30am on a Sunday, I was probably getting ready to eat lunch at my grandparents' house after church. I was in New Jersey, so it's not like the actual eruption had a direct effect on me. I do remember reading about it in National Geographic later on and being both frightened and amazed by the pictures of the devastation.
 
M

Matt²

May 18th 1980 - Mt St Helens - where were you?

Wasabi Poptart said:
I was 8 years old. Since it would have been around 11:30am on a Sunday, I was probably getting ready to eat lunch at my grandparents' house after church. I was in New Jersey, so it's not like the actual eruption had a direct effect on me. I do remember reading about it in National Geographic later on and being both frightened and amazed by the pictures of the devastation.
Click to expand...
Just watched a documentary on the anniversary and a lot of before and after photos, and how the forest has been made to live again thanks in help to human assistance. Those photos of the forest of trees, blown over by the pyroclastic blast of the mountain's eruption, have always astonished and amazed me. I am very glad I wasn't anywhere NEAR the mountain when it blew, and am sad for the people (57) that were caught in it. One thing I didn't realize (until I watched the documentary) was that Spirit Lake, the lake directly below the blast zone, was uplifted and emptied by the blast, about 300 feet. The Spirit Lake that exists now is above the top of where it was before. Also there are many more (I think they said hundreds?) lakes and ponds that have been created since and because of the eruption - Cold and Clear Lakes to name just a couple large ones.

All in all, very fascinating stuff if you're into the study of volcanoes.
 
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Dusty668

17 years old, studying hard for my upcoming part in the High School play a treatment of My Fair Lady. I was very nervous about my upcoming part, as I was convinced I'd have horrid stage fright.

The day Mt. St Helens blew, I was admitted instead to the emergency room when I collapsed in school from walking pneumonia. I spent a week on oxygen, and it came back 3 times that year. I do remember being outside the hospital later that year and smelling faint whiffs of sulfur like 4th of july.

When ever I see the picture of those trees all lying in the same direction I remember a shot from a newsfilm of a moose picking it's way among them. I don't think things looked good for that particular moose. And the sound of air hissing.
 
DarkAudit

DarkAudit

I was 11. Nat Geo did a big article on the volcano. What stands out was a guy living near the mountain named Harry Truman refusing to evacuate.

He's dead now.
 
sixpackshaker

sixpackshaker

I was close to 11. I remember my Aunt that moved back to Texas from New Mexico felt that A/C was barely needed, she left her windows open that summer. She ended up with a fine grain ash-dust on her furniture. It left marks on the furniture where it did a sandpaper effect when she tried to wipe it off.
 
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Chazwozel

I was T-minus -1 years old.

But on the bright side on the day of my birth there was a thunder storm over NYC...while it was snowing!!!!!!

I am the Anti-Christ.
 
Tinwhistler

Tinwhistler

I was in 5th grade. It didn't really affect us, that I recall. I made a paper mache representation of the eruption for science class, using toothpicks to show all of the dead and blown down trees that we saw on the news.
 
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