Mountain of Fire: Chapters 15–27

The crater had grown to 1,300 feet in diameter. Two giant arrays of cracks spread across the entire summit area.

The bulge on the north side of the mountain was—and had been for over a month—expanding at six and a half feet every day. By May 18, the top reached 140 meters (almost 450 feet) above the ground. The surface of the bulge continued to crack and break, distorting from pressure underneath.

More than 10,000 earthquakes had shaken the mountain since mid-March. Though harmonic tremors had ceased again after May 8, twenty to forty earthquakes still shook the ground every day. Two large earthquakes were recorded on May 8 and 12.

They drew closer. Dorothy clicked away, capturing images of the stalwart Shoestring Glacier sitting astride the mountain’s rocky top.
Then the ice of the glacier fell into the crater.

“Huge east-west waves undulated like agitated jello,” said Keith. It was “eerie…The entire mass began to ripple and churn up, without moving laterally.”

The bulge was gone, hurtling down the mountainside, gathering speed and power and debris as it went.

“A thousand feet below the airplane the mile-wide face of the mountain was flowing, picking up speed. Below us, a huge explosion, but I felt and heard nothing. Its gray and frothy cloud billowed beneath us and plunged north [down the mountain]. Within seconds it blocked my view of Spirit Lake.”

The landslide had come crashing away from the mountain, the lateral blast had exploded out the side, and a dark column was spewing tens of thousands of feet into the air.

“We got to the terminal, and then we realized we’d left my purse and our cameras on the plane. We looked out on the tarmac, and there was our little plane with the doors wide open,” said Dorothy.

He watched as the frothing cloud engulfed Coldwater II.

From the road, all they could see were tall fir trees; the forest blocked Mount St. Helens from view.
Then they came around a bend. They should’ve had a clear view. The mountain should have been looming above.
It wasn’t there.

But just like the Stoffels had noticed from the air, Bea was amazed that “the show was silent. No noise with something so big; the brain can’t comprehend what’s happening.”

Under the combined sleeping bags, there was a space for the three of them to huddle, crouched together beneath their makeshift roof.

“Arms of [the cloud] spurted out in front a hundred to a few hundred feet, boiling and branching, the black wall quickly caught up, then other arms shot out…the roar of the wind horrendous. With my back to the wind, my hair braids blew straight out in front. I glanced back. The cloud had grown big so fast and was racing straight toward us.”

Though the heat had been intense and the ash was still painfully warm to the touch, Sue began to feel cold and nauseous.