Happy Mt. St. Helen's Day - 30 years ago today, I was.....

[BikeBookBread]

..... standing on the church steps watching the mountain erupt.

 

Where were you?

[Starr]

I was in Miami while family members in the Portland area were being descended on by ash.

[BridgeTea]

I was watching the news reports on our first television, holding my infant son.

[Tap]

In elementary school.

[ereks mom]

:)

[milovany]

I was waking up at my friend Janine's house (I was staying there because my parents had driven to Canada for the funeral of one of my aunts who had died tragically in a car accident). We did not feel the "boom" because apparently it arched over Puget Sound -- my cousins on Vancouver Island felt it.

[GWOB]

I was still in my mom's belly:tongue_smilie:. I would not make my appearance for another 12 days.

[Cedarmom]

We were getting ready to go to church. We heard a noise like the garage door slamming. We didn't connect it to Mt St Helens until after we'd heard it erupted.

[Crissy]

I was standing on our front porch watching the mountain erupt.

[Dandelion]

I was 8 years old and living in Freiburg, Germany. I don't remember hearing about the eruption (didn't learn about it until I moved to Portland, OR in 1989), so not sure if it made international news or not...

[Crissy]

In elementary school.

 

On a Sunday?

[rfhsmom]

At church, but I remember watching the news footage in the library all day at school on Monday.(or it seemed liked all day for a 4th grader)

Edited May 18, 2010 by rfhsmom
clarity

[Nicole M]

I was in Colorado, but when I moved to the Northwest a few years later, I learned that folks here count time in "before the eruption" and "after the eruption." Often, when folks were telling a story, they would say something like, well, that was before the mountain blew, so it must have been X year. I was fascinated by that.

[Katiebug_1976]

I was 3 years old, standing on the couch looking out the living room window wondering why it was snowing dirty snow. We lived in Burlington, WA at the time. Wow, what a memory!

 

Dh lived in Oklahoma at the time & said they even had some ash there!

Edited May 18, 2010 by Katiebug_1976
adding dh's experience

[mysticamethyst]

Honestly, I dont' remember where I was or what I was doing. I'm pretty sure I was in 3rd or 4th grade.

[dangermom]

Also in elementary school. At least, that's what I remember--I was too young to hear about it right away, I think, and we talked about it a lot at school. It's not like the Challenger, where I remember exactly what I was doing.

[Perry]

I was a junior in college in Boulder, Colorado. We had a fine layer of ash all over everything.

[TheCoffeeChick]

As my mom says ... I wasn't even a twinkle in my dad's eye yet. ;) It happened before I was conceived.

[Natalieclare]

Honestly, I dont' remember where I was or what I was doing. I'm pretty sure I was in 3rd or 4th grade.

 

Me, too!

 

But a few days later I was traumatized by the eruption when I learned that my dear friend (and major crush) died on the mountainside. He was with his dad who wanted to photograph the eruption, in the blue pick-up that is in many of the photos.

[qfbrenda]

I was 7.5 yrs old. We were either at church or on the way home, I don't remember exactly. But I remember the sky getting very dark. We lived in Eastern WA at the time.

[Crissy]

Me, too!

 

But a few days later I was traumatized by the eruption when I learned that my dear friend (and major crush) died on the mountainside. He was with his dad who wanted to photograph the eruption, in the blue pick-up that is in many of the photos.

 

Oh!

I cried many times over THAT photo.

[myfunnybunch]

I remember hearing about it on the news and trying to figure out with my dad how we were supposed to get the ash off the cars. We live quite a way south, mid-Willamette Valley, and the skies were still quite dark with ash.

 

It's still such a vivid memory for me, learning that a real volcano had erupted relatively nearby. Up until then, I think part of me believed that erupting volcanoes were the stuff of storybooks and nature television shows.

 

Cat

[Crissy]

I learned that folks here count time in "before the eruption" and "after the eruption."

 

I was not quite ten so my memory could be cloudy, but I recall The Mountain being THE news story for a long period of time. More than a month, it seemed.

[DesertDweller]

Kansas. It was my senior year of high school.

 

They were planning on having the graduation ceremony outside on the football field. We had a fine layer of ash and everything was instead moved indoors.

[myfunnybunch]

Here's a link to an OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry) project on sound and Mt. St. Helens, "An interesting sound project by OMSI abouut people who saw and heard Mt. St. Helens when it exploded 30 years ago.":

http://www.oregongeology.com/pubs/og/OGv42n12.pdf

Scroll to page 8.

 

Cat

[linders]

standing on the roof of our college dorm watching same. A few years later I got to climb it the very first week it reopened to the public and a few times since. Amazing!

[Veritaserum]

I was a baby in my mother's arms. :tongue_smilie:

[coffeefreak]

Excited because I'd just turned 5 and would go to Kindergarten next year!!!:laugh:

[coffeefreak]

I just spent the last 1/2 hour reading about the eruption on Wikipedia. HOLY COW! I had no idea it was so destructive! I know that sounds incredibly naive, but, I was only 5 :) We also lived in North Carolina at the time, so it didn't directly affect us. It's so fascinating to read what they discovered as a result of that eruption. Why didn't I become a geologist?:lol:

[mommaduck]

We were in McChord housing, surrounded by boxes to move to Anderson. My mama was nursing my 5mo old brother, we were watching the news, it was beyond dirty gray outside, no sky to be seen, the highway behind us was packed, and my stepdad was working round the clock moving emergency supplies and equipment due to the eruption. I just turned 6yrs and just finishing Kindy.

Edited May 18, 2010 by mommaduck

[TravelingChris]

I was a junior in high school in VA. Saw and heard about it on the news. I loved earth science, still do, and was just really fascinated by it. NOVA had a show last week I think about Mt. St. Helen's 30 years later and how life has come back. I have it recorded and plan to watch it with my girls tomorrow since we are doing Earth Science now. It probably is available at the PBS website.

[Rosy]

I was meeting my baby cousin who was born that day. I was 4 and we lived far enough north that it didn't affect us, but I do remember news stories and my parents talking about it.

[TrixieB]

I was sitting in church. The organ was playing so we didn't hear the eruption.

[newlifemom]

My g-ma was watching me and we drove to Cornelius Pass Rd to watch. We watched all of the eruptions from the roof of my house. I also felt that first earthquake back I March. I was the only one from my family to feel it b/c I had just gone to bed. This reminds me that I need to call G-ma. I generally do on this day. Wow, 30 years. Ugh, I feel old. :P

 

And yes, it was a Sunday.

[Colleen]

In elementary school.

On Sunday?!;)

 

ETA: HA! I just realized Crissy posted the exact same thing. Great minds o' dry humor think alike. *grin*

Edited May 18, 2010 by Colleen

[Colleen]

Thirty years ago today, I was standing near my house, watching the mountain erupt.

 

I'm glad you posted this as I was just about to start a thread. I doubt people who didn't live here at the time can grasp how significant this event was and is to those of us who live in the shadows of the volcanoes. This anniversary is receiving a great deal of local attention, and justifiably so. What impresses me is how quickly a new ecosystem is emerging up there. Truly amazing.

[Colleen]

 

I was 8 years old and living in Freiburg, Germany. I don't remember hearing about the eruption (didn't learn about it until I moved to Portland, OR in 1989), so not sure if it made international news or not...

Yes, it made international news in a big way. My relatives in Germany were very aware of it. The ash circled the world and did affect air travel and weather elsewhere.

 

[elise1mds]

As my mom says ... I wasn't even a twinkle in my dad's eye yet. ;) It happened before I was conceived.

 

Glad I'm not the only 'baby' here... but my mom says she remembers the ash.

[Tap]

On a Sunday?

 

I must have been at church, in my classroom (private Christian school, that used the classrooms as Sunday school rooms on the weekends). I remember being in that classroom, so I assumed it was school. LOL

 

My teacher during the week was my Sunday school teacher, and the kids were grouped by grades, so many of us were together Sunday-Friday.

[KJsMom]

I was almost 2 and totally oblivious. I remember learning about it in school later and it seemed like 'history' and a minor event. As I got older and realized how recently it had truly happened and what a huge impact it had, it was kind of like awe i guess. Really? Here? I thought those things only happened in other countries, kwim?

[Guest Noodles]

I was 9 years old and watching it on the news thinking WOW, fascinating yet scary. Now living up by it (well 2+ hours away) it's even more fascinating to think that mountain I can see while driving up on top of the I-405 bridge was once that volcano blowing its top.

 

When we bought our first house in Hillsboro the lender said we had to get "volcano" insurance. We looked at each other puzzled?? He said it was because of the 1980 explosion that ruined vents and such in the houses that some lenders now require it. Crazy!

 

Today some of the news channels are doing an "all day" thing on Mt. St. Helens. It's interesting to go back to the 1980s and see how things were then...no cell phone, just good ol' cameras doing the work.

[milovany]

Me, too!

 

But a few days later I was traumatized by the eruption when I learned that my dear friend (and major crush) died on the mountainside. He was with his dad who wanted to photograph the eruption, in the blue pick-up that is in many of the photos.

 

Natalie, I never knew this! How incredibly sad! :grouphug:

[higginszoo]

I was across the country. I remember having ash on our car, etc. several days later. It was also big news in Weekly Reader for a while. I was not quite 8.

[Jen in PA]

I was 5, and remember my mother calling my uncle, a geologist, to comment that this was quite a thing to happen on his 30th birthday. He turns 60 today.

[iquilt]

As a six year old I was oblivious to the actual eruption, but living in MT meant the next morning we woke up to an inch of ash over everything! It was the only time they closed school....

[Ellie]

We were in San Diego, but I couldn't tell you exactly what I was doing. My mother was in Graham, Washington, just south of Tacoma; her yard was covered in ashes, and she put some in a bottle and sent them to me. I still have them.:)

[*********]

Well, I was two, so I have no idea. :)

[Kate in VA]

I wasn't even born yet... not even a thought in my parents mind for another year or so.... boy does that sound weird!:glare:

[simka2]

I was in the last open buisness, before they closed everything!!! Granted I was an infant being held by my mother, but I was right there ;)