Seattle to Oregon

After leaving Seattle, we stopped and learned and gawked at Mt. Saint Helens, the only active volcano in the lower 48 states. Once again, the scenery, landscape, history and nature of this country amaze me! I think the impact and devastation of May 18, 1980 has been forgotten by those of us from the East Coast. The entire side of a mountain - a mountain - was blown off and sent hurtling through the forest. Winds in the blast site reached 700 miles an hour. Trees were sheared off of the ground, leaving only twisted, shredded stumps. Glacial ice blocks were thrown thousands of feet in the air. An entire lake, Spirit Lake, disappeared and a new one, Cold Water Lake, was formed. Ash - which we could still see 26 years later - covered the landscape. Our good friend Cas, who lived near Portland Oregon in 1980, remembers shoveling the ash like snow.

It is steaming and reforming the mountain today - see the plume of steam coming from the new volcanic cone?