Mt. St. Helen by Erika Sanchez (Event)

In the 1980's there were many scientific discoveries but one of the main ones was defitenetly the eruption of Mt. St. Helens. This eruption was the worse volcanic disaster in the United Sates history. The date it eripted was May 18, 1980 at 8:32 AM. Mt. St. Helens is approximately 40,000 years old, a very active volcano. This volcano was fisr discovered by Eroupean when British commander George Vancouver spotted Mt. St. Helen from the mountain after his fellow contry man, Alleyne Fitzherbert, the Baron St. Helen.

Mt. St. Helen has had many eruptions geologic evidence say that Mt. St. Helens erupted around 1,600 and 1,700. 1,800 and during the 26-year span of 1931 to 1957 after 1857 the volcano grew quiet. On March 20, 1980 a 4.1 magnitude earthquake struck underneath Mt. St. Helens. This was an alert to scientist that the volcano had reawakened and was active. In March 27 small explosions occur clowing a 250-foot hole in the mountain and released a plume of ash. These kind of explosions continued to happen for the next month. In April a large bulge started to grow quickly pushing five feet a day. The buldge reached a mile in length by the end of April. The day had came and on May 18, 1980, a 5.1 magnitude earthquake struck under Mt. St. Helens. In less than 10 seconds the bulge and a surroundings are fell away in a gigantic rock avalanche. This creeated a gap in the mountain. This gap allowed was very bag that the noise was even heard in Montana and California. But those who were close to Mt. St. Helens didnt hear anything. This avalanche grew quickly in sizwe as it went down the mountain doing 70 to 150 miles per hour. This big blast killed everything in a 100 square mile area. In less than 10 minutes the plume of ash had reached 10 miles high. This eruption was nine hours long. Scientists and other who were caught in the area had no way out. 57 people were killed. They think about 7,000 large animals. This eruption felled entire forests. Mt. St. Helens is now only 8,363 feet tall and 1,314 feet shorter than it was before the explosion. This will not be last sruption from this very volcano.