May 18, 1980

[Jerry Lozier]

Quite an event, we lived just 30 crow miles from St Helens at the time!

[Jerry Lozier]

Economic boost for roofers the next few years. Replaced my 1800' cedar shingle roof with another cedar shingle roof, knew I wasn't cut out to be a roofer.

[Robert Jones]

I was on Ft. Lewis at the time as a kid. Remember seeing the plume and my dad was stranded in Moses Lake for quite a few days. It was incredible.

[kurt]

I'd just gone through the tornado that devastated Kalamazoo on the 17th, my house was blown apart, it was just starting to make the newlines, and Mt. St. Helens went the next day. The tornado faded into obscurity.

My brother, otoh, was in Yakima, some few miles downwind of the blast. He had 4' of ash in his front yard. He's got pics showing black sky, full of volcanic ash.

It's why the Yakima valley has such good fruit growing conditions; millennia of volcanic ash deposition for a base.