On the morning of 18 May, 1980, I was camping with my Boy Scout troop in Ft. Stevens State Park. We were just finishing up breakfast when the news reached us from one of the rangers that Mt. St. Helens had erupted. None of us would learn the full extent of the damage – including the destruction of Spirit Lake, a heartbreakingly beautiful location at which we had camped the year before – wrought by explosion until days later. Fifty-seven people died from the blast, as well as countless animals and plants. So much of the surrounding landscape was either incinerated or buried by ash that it resembled the surface of the Moon more than any Earthly environment. Like so many of my Pacific Northwest neighbors, I remember wondering if I would live to see the area even begin to return to its former lush, green state.
