Mount Saint Helens is smokin! (1 Viewer)

yes, that is right, MT ST Helens has bee closed above 4000 feet or something like that. there are mini earthquakes and other signs that its coming back to life! I remember my family buying a car in the summer of '80 in oeregon [no sales tax]. Ash was everywhere!. anyway, my parents live up in portland now and im kinda worried. for those that live up there, can you see anything? anyone know more than MSN???

Hey Charlie,

Apparently the USGS has raised the level to Alert 2 (2nd of 3 levels), which means they're more concerned about a possible eruption. The earthquakes on the mountain are occuring at 4 per minute now, in the range of magnitude 2.5. Some sites people can check if they're interested in updates are:

http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/...rrentActivity/

http://www.pnsn.org/NEWS/PRESS_RELEA...H_09_2004.html

and then general news sites like:
http://www.seattlepi.com
http://www.seattletimes.com
http://www.kirotv.com
http://www.komotv.com
http://www.nwcn.com

And if you just want to see the seismic activity in the crater, there's this graph courtesy of the UW:
http://www.pnsn.org/WEBICORDER/GREEN...W_current.html

Aaron

yeah I called my parents...:"oh yeah its pretty far from us, so we are ok. oh yeah lots of earthquakes here, but California got a 6.0! the ones here are small, you shouldnt worry." Im NOT worried about the eaurthquakes, its the 1000 lb ball of lava that could rool down the hill...I know im over reacting, but what can I do? try to read the seismic graphs Aaron posted?BTW I found those myself just 10 minutes ago, I said, SHIT thats the activity!!!

AAAAA, well I just emailed the 'what to do" link to my parents. hopefully they check their email.

I'm less than an hours drive from the mountain.

On my lunch I went and got some moon boots and a large umbrella, covered it with foil, a steak soft taco and mexi nuggets. Pepsi.

Thank God I've got duck tape.

Anybody up for some volcano peakbagging?

At least there is a public warning or monitoring of the volcano unlike the one that happened back in the 80s..

Jay

Charlie,
Portland is far away from the blast area. That ball of lava would need to roll across a few major rivers in order to hit Portland. NW volcanoes don't shoot out lava anyway... the high silica (oh dear) content of the rock prevents flowing lava (NW gets deadly gas clouds and a lot of ash). Fortunately the prevailing winds point toward Eastern Washington so Yakima gets to participate in the fun. The estimated eruption size right now is small (a few inches of ash around the mountain)...

There was extensive monitoring back in the 80s. scientists from around the world were there to study and witness the explosion (some were a bit too close). The surrounding towns had been evacuated for a few weeks (IIRC) before the eruption. The large mudslide (which allowed the entire mountain to explode out the side) was an unknown phenomenon at the time.

Portland needs to be more concerned with their own earthquake threat than st helens

Wow, who knew all these members were in my area. Should we have a meet? I'll bring moon boots!

I lived here at the time, and it was nightly news coverage about how a certain idiot named Harry Truman wouldn't evacuate. His grand plan was to hide in a cave if it erupted, or to row out to the middle of Spirit Lake and wait it out there. What he wasn't counting on was a mud slide so big that it literally covered the entire area, causing the lake to disappear. I even wrote a ballad about it for extra credit in High School.

The mountain was monitored around the clock, was on the news every night, and its impending eruption was a major topic of discussion. Why would you say that there was no warning system in place?

Greg_R,

I was just out of high school in '80 when the mountain popped it's top; now that I am a LOT older, and tend to pay attention to the news more, I'm amazed at how this is being kicked to the top of the news every day. Slow news week? I mean, there just isn't much left over to blow up there.

Mount St. Helens Volcano Cam.

http://www.fs.fed.us/gpnf/volcanocams/msh/

Of course the Ash comes from deep inside the earth and not just from the mountain. The fact that much of the mountain is now missing doesn't necesarily mean that subsequent eruptions will be smaller (although the likelihood of half the mountain forming a giant mudslide is greatly reduced). Likewise, people think that any eruption of Mt. Rainier will be bigger than Mt. Saint Helens because the mountain itself is bigger, but that's ostensible reasoning.

Of course, I would expect this eruption to be smaller based on the fact that the last eruption wasn't too long ago, so it hasn't been building up pressure for the last hundred years or so.

I don't know about that pressure. A quake could quickly change any space down there.

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the bigger picture here. A few years ago some guy predicted that California would be in the ocean by now.

Ok, he was wrong, but just after his date passed they had a quake in Japan, and another in California - all on that 'ring' skirting the pacific.

Glenn

well Glenn, some lab in CA predicted back in January, that there would be a 6.4 in CA by Sept 5th. It came a bit late and a bit smaller, but its all gotta be connected on the west coast. Maybe it will blow when im up there Christmas time great pictures!!!!

I was wondering if the quakes in CA and the quakes at the Mt. were somehow connected?