Mount St. Helens

Information

       There are many facinating facts about Mount St. Helens. It is famous for it's eruption in 1980 that caused death to many mammals and other creatures. Mount St. Helens is considered a stratovolcano located in Washington state, of the United States. It was a  major volcanic eruption. The eruption was a VEI=5 event, and it was the only significant one to occur in the contaigus 48 U.S. since the eruption in 1915 of California's Lassen Peak.
      The eruption was followed by a two-month series of earth quakes and steam-venting episodes, that was caused by an injection of magma at shallow depth under the volcano that made a huge bulge and a fracture system on Mount St. Helen's North slope. An earthquake that occured at 8:32 a.m. on May 18th, made the whole weekend. North face slide away, suddenly exposing the partly molten, gas, and steam-filled rock in the volcano to lower pressure. The rock responded by exploding a hot mixure of lava and pulverized older rock toward Spirit Lake so fast that it overtook the avalanching face.
       An eruption column rose 80,000 feet (24,400 m.) into the atomosphere and added ash to 11 U.S. states. At the same time, snow, ice, and several glaciers on the volcano melted, making a series of large lahars (volcanic mudslides)  that stretched as far as the Coloumbia River.