It was 30 years ago today.
A huge ash cloud moved across the country over the following days, reminding anyone who cared to look up what had happened.
Many considered it a disaster. People had died. Property was just plain gone. After all, a forest had been destroyed. Surely life would never get back to normal with the ecosystem blown up. Those experts were wrong; the aftermath offered a tremendous opportunity to study life returning to the area, cleansed of what had come before.
And now, 30 years later, Mount St. Helens is still clearly an active volcano, still part of a chain of volcanoes that includes Mount Hood overlooking Portland and Mount Rainier sandwiched between Seattle and Tacoma. Rainier is considered by the Federal government to be “one of the Most Hazardous Volcanoes in the United States”. The last time it erupted, a tsunami raced across the Pacific Ocean, immortalized in this famous painting.
Comparisons between America’s biggest volcanic disaster at Mount St. Helens and the current volcanic eruptions in Iceland are irresistible. And while Eyjafjallajökull is likely to be full of sound and fury for months to come, today we remember the events of 30 years ago, when a mountain blew up.
Cross-posted on The Moderate Voice.
In Closing: Damn you, Karate Kid!; at least this family in Detroit whose home was raided in the middle of the night by cops who, seeking a murderer, lit their grandchild on fire before fatally shooting her will get something like justice, because Geoff Feiger is on the case and cameras were rolling for a reality TV show; “Airline fees are only bad when the government imposes them”; Mexico’s President wants to talk seriously about immigration; Homeowners (or is that home”owners”) need an advocate with the banks; apparently an Arizona drivers license is proof of citizenship, but the rest of us need passports and birth certificates (BTW this means that you have lots of unlicensed drivers in AZ who don’t want any trouble about their papers, so that should make you feel really safe); “Fetuses are more important than their mothers” says Bishop (and the Church wonders about their decreasing relevancy); 15 companies with biggest job cuts; and fewer people, thankfully, are falling behind on paying their debts.