If you can't go to the mountain this week, here's the next best thing.
Courtesy National Weather Service
One of the best days of my life was my first visit to Mt. St. Helens.
This was in the early 1990s when the closest you could get to the crater was on the east side from the Windy Ridge viewpoint.
My future wife and mother-in-law were along for the ride. The narrow, winding road along steep slopes was just terrifying enough for them to constantly tell me to “slow down.” But thankfully not so scary that they made me turn around before we reached the ridge.
The scale of the disaster just blew me away. I was living in the Midwest at the time of the eruption and while I followed the news closely, I had no idea how big it was until this trip.
This morning I’ve spent some time looking at some of the recent news coverage ahead of Tuesday’s 30th Anniversary of the eruption. I’ve found some great stuff, starting with the best.
Longview Daily News: Mt. St. Helens Special
This is an amazing interactive collection of photos and stories about the eruption, and recent interviews with survivors. If you don’t do anything else today, be sure to check out the satellite animation.
Longview Daily News: News Coverage
The paper also has links to several recent news stories from its front page. The most interesting one I’ve seen so far is, What if it hadn’t happened? The story looks at the local, national and global changes that have taken place since the eruption.
My former colleagues at KGW have put up a great collection of historic video and recent stories about Mt. St. Helens. This includes the newscast from May 18, 1980. While the front page of this section isn’t as impressive as the Daily News, there’s a lot more content to be found here. This should be your first or second stop of the day.
And the rest…
None of the other sites I looked at had similar collections. For the Oregonian, go to the Environment section. The Mt. St. Helens coverage is mixed in with other stories.
The Columbian has links to a few stories from its front page. It started a three-part series yesterday.
OPB also has posted several good stories over the past few days. You’ll find a list of them under the Mount St. Helens tag.
