Mount St. Helens: America’s Deadliest Eruption 

Simon can we get a Geographics on Western Sahara?

The only thing that keeps me from skipping the ad reads is knowing that Simon actually uses anything he endorses. Well, that, and Simon's seamless transitions and segues.

This took me back to geography class back in the late 80s where this eruption was discussed and almost after was about an English village again the 80s that disappeared into the sea and another UK village that got swept away by landslide if I recall correctly...

@@worri3db3ar nothing good came out of the 1980's. I'm proof!🤣

@@SkunkApe407 lol well at least we got to witness the fall of the Berlin Wall and an end to the cold War with the former ussr.

Didn't they purposely go there knowing they would die? I thought they did it specifically to get footage and data that wouldn't be collected normally.

@@NotWorthTheAirIBreathe they did not know they were going to die. They knew it was a possibility, like storm chasers following tornados, but I dont think the USGS or US government would have been okay with letting them be there if everyone knew the men would die. To them, it was small odds because they assumed the blast would go upwards and had no idea how violent the eruption would be

That`s a badass move..

There's a small monument to where they found his body out there, I think. Very subdued thing but sobering.

That man deserves a medal for his dedication to science. Well, they all do.

I agree with this comment but “A few years back”?? It was 2004, the Boxing Day Earthquake and Tsunami, so that was now 16 years ago. A bit longer than “a few years back”

@@dancingcarapace Please show me the standard definition for a few years back.

@@TheGryfonclaw usually when someone says “a few years back” they mean 3-7 years ago. Not friggin 16

@@dancingcarapace Usually? Okay, great, that's a good working definition. For you.

@@TheGryfonclaw usally when I have a pissing match it's over something better. See what happens when we don't just look at data... u ovb knew what he ment an you sir a ovb a tatch on the older side if 16 years is a few years back. Your both right move along now work together an get me

some dude in Pompeii: "hey should we move? these earthquakes are getting ridiculous that volcano is is ready to pop!" some other dude: "nah its just a volcano"

legit

depends. Lots of volcanoes out there are dead, never going to erupt again because the lava plumes are no longer there. Think the Eiffel mountains in Germany. Beautiful, fertile, area but no risk of erupting.

its just an ACTIVE volcano might bring a lil more soothing ..TERROR

Not only that, but it is a small volcano too. With said eruption being in the mid VEI range.

That's how we here in Western Oregon feel about it as well. We haven't had a major eruption in the near past. But there's always Crater lake to remind us of the other sleeping giant that blew it's top off. So between the crater lake, any number of only napping volcanoes and the cascadia subduction fault line, any of them could wake up at any time.

@@redchic I've heard that a variety of Native American folktales from different tribes in our area all basically tell that all the volcanoes AND the subduction zone erupted simultaneously. Cheery.

@@ProffesionalZombie12 .. .. dang! the natives history is usually pretty accurate. I can't even imagine how apocalyptic that must have seemed. And strangely enough, it would make sense given that the all sit on the same fault line and all connected by shared lava tubes. All I can say is....i love the PNW and don't ever intend to move, so I hope I'm dead before it happens again!

@@ProffesionalZombie12 .... Thanks for the history. As scary as it must have been, history is a good tool to learn from.

@@redchic No problem! And I'm planning on being in the SAFEST PLACE possible!

Truth.

Exactly!!! People who don't take personal responsibility because "the government/media/etc said it will be okay" FFS. The kid was smarter than their parents. It's sad that they died because of their parent's stupidity.

If you have to ask , “is it safe”- that’s a clue to get out of there .

There wasn't lava. It was pyroclastic mud flow that killed many people. Some people were forth or fifty miles away down river and we're still killed due to mud flow.

@@morticiaheisenberg9679 Take personal responsibility? They were killed by a vulcano. The only reason you know it wasn't safe is because you know how the story ends. How were they supposed to know? How were they supposed to know that the goverrnor was lying, and not listening to the eperts? You're blaming them for this, rather than the governor whose lies got them killed, because they didn't automatically assume the government was lying? What a callous load of crap. Have some respect.

Interesting that the west part of the state didn't get much ash but the eastern part did, when it was the west side of the mountain that blew. But I suppose it was the prevailing winds at the time, from west to east, which determined where the ash went. I was 9 at the time, but I still remember seeing a graphic in the newspaper about the ash and where it would fall, and we down in Kansas were on the edge of the fallout zone. The talk of volcanic ash was in all the news for weeks. Of course, as Simon said the ash eventually flew all around the world, as volcanic ash usually does.

You shut your damned mouth draco. I read your story.

The ash cloud covering the easy isn't weird...that's just normal weather patterns. It would have been odd if it was the opposite.

My mom was a teenager living in Tacoma at the time. The blast was loud enough to wake her up. Meanwhile, my dad and his family, living in Federal Way (only a few miles north of Tacoma), didn't hear a thing, even though it was heard even further north in British Columbia.

I’m from Eastern Washington, my mom had only been in the country for less than a year, and said it was like watching a dark ass cloud coming over the area, and that it was as dark as midnight for the next three days, and took a long time to clean up all the ash and damage

The media didn't lie about it, on the contrary they were the ones encouraging people to ignore the warnings and come look. Media greed and political incompetence is more appropriate. (Also as simon said, the geologists only suggested an extension to the red zone practically before the eruption and the suggestion didn't reach the governor in time as she was away from office at the time, although this doesn't excuse her for originally setting the zone to small in the first place)

Well. Regardless of semantics, mountain go boom, people died, dang, if you don't like it, ask Elon musk for a one way ticket off. Donate it to science

Yeah, sounds like a movie plot. That would never happen in real life...

Yes, a Democrat politician. I think they got what they deserved that day putting a Democrat like Lee Ray in power. Remember, elections have consequences.

@@LordVulcan93 True that.

Me too.... Been telling my boyfriend this for years😂

I don't think he's ever seen Jaws... there is a lot of movies he's never seen

My parents were in Washington state during the eruption mum was pregnant with my sister

@@ianashby6294 ok Ashby

we do, and thats something americans have forgotten recently

The camping owner and his cats got me too, very sad end

Yes.People dying is sad.Thanks for weighing in!

I was chocked when i heard that. Damn it!

@@ink3539 isn't the guy who refused to leave?

@@darthvenator2487 yeah, I thought how scared he was, and his poor cats too !

Question: Could Oregon refer to yourselves as organic?

That I can completely understand. I used to visit Oregon, California and the Cascadia Range a lot when I was younger. It can be deceptively eerie to know how a place that can be so beautiful and peaceful one moment, can become so destructive with little warning. Then again there many area's surrounding St. Helens that do serve as a reminder of what happened, the ruined Caldera, the remains of spirit lake, the petrified forest... one can only hope you stay safe.

As a fellow oregonian I understand completley

Names don't mean shit to me. Just letters on a screen.

@@ember-evergarden that’s fantastic, you are cool.

@@ember-evergardenthese are peoples lives. they aren’t just letters.

It sounds so classy when an Englishman says it

I loved the animation.

Every time I look out my window It will be all I can think of. Forever.

@@purplemoonshoes me too. a moment of levity in an otherwise very sad story.

That's a scientific term, if I recall.

Well that's comforting

For further information on how devastating a lahar can be, please see documentaries and articles concerning the Nevado del Ruiz eruption and Amero Tragedy, or the accounts of the lahars following the eruption of Mount Pinatubo.

I remember the log story. Her arm was badly damaged being pinched between basically two tree-trunks but it also held her face just ever so slightly above the water some of the time so she could breathe. I didn't know the husband survived too. That's good to know.

My family still has all the ash collected from all of the different eruptions from Mt. St. Helens.

I was only three and don’t remember it, but my brother was 5 as well. We were visiting family in Portland and my brother says sneaking out to play in the snow and the horrible shock of putting volcanic ash in his mouth is one of his earliest memories.

Me too! Except I was 6 and lived in Portland. We still have a big jar full of MSH ash.

My Auntie and Uncle live near Portland and Vancouver. The first time I went to visit them, my uncle took me to the bottom of their garden to show me a huge chunk of ash that's permanently embedded in the floor.

@@BIGSHANE456 I remember driving through Yakima right afterwards wishing our ashfall was like theirs. Yakima had less and it was heavier so not as dusty. The Columbia Basin around Moses Lake had it the worst of all.

How about: The world learned a lot from the blast

I was born only a few months before this eruption. I never truly realized the effect that this eruption had on the world and the people around it until watching this video. Thanks Simon for a good video that also tells the story of a few that were lost in the devastation that ensued. These stories deserve to be told.

is like my belly after eating a quarter pounder burger in macdonalds

She has blown up more than Rainier or the other mountains that are caused by the Cascadia Subduction Zone that is just 62 (apx) miles off our coast from Vancouver Island to Cape Mendocino, CA. You can check this out by contacting the U.S. Geological Survey in Vancouver, WA.

"the world"

That is beautiful! 😢

please don't just go around telling your age online, especially if youre that young, lots of dangerous creepy people on the internet

@@fairykeibani9155 You’re blasting your own childhood on the internet by posting gacha videos for “daddy”, which is equally if not more unsafe. Public videos like yours are essentially a breeding ground for the creeps you’re talking about

you got an ology, your a scientist! Might have to be 30+ and from the UK for that one

“Big ass eruption” lol

Video of it dident happen.

Did he say whether they were aware that it was bulging? You'd think that in itself would be a huge warning especially if you lived there and knew it wasn't normal.

@@JaneAxon123 they were monitoring it, did expected an eruption, but not what came

I visited a couple of years ago. Can see where run off has carved new gullies through the ash, but it's still quite other worldly to look at. Trees that have literally been blown off near the ground level. When you look at the mountain today standing at the Johnston Observatory, you realise how big a mistake being there was. It's maybe four to five miles from the mountain and it almost couldn't be more in the path of the eruption.

That was brutal in every sense.

yep, great movie.....we are lomg over due for a badass st helens film with truman and the rest of em

It's accurate but has one failing. A stratovolcano does not produce the red lava and the explosive pyroclastic flows and Ash. They wouldn't have had to deal with the lava driving back down the mountain.

@@timothybogle1461 I mean they overdid it in the movie, sure, but... While they do not reach as far as those from shield volcanoes because they have a higher viscosity, stratovolcanoes can produce lava flows. Mt. Etna is a stratovolcano and does produce lava flows. So does Stromboli.

Í was seven when it came out and I watched it and Volcano at the same time. I still get the two movies confused but my advice. Neither is for 7 year olds. Neither is Tornado! or The Jackal. A lot of weird shit came out around the same time and I watched all of them

The same with Mt. Hood and Portland.

Yellowstone been kinda quiet since this dropped 😳

Edwin Lindley imagine if they both popped at the same time

As worrying as those looming disasters are (Rainer in particular since it seems one of its flanks is failing and thus likely to go whenever the volcano next erupts making it a scaled up analog of Mt. Saint Helens). I also fear there is an even deadlier situation brewing beneath Naples Italy. The city of Naples Campei Flegrei has all of those beat largely because they built an entire major city (Naples) inside its caldera. The ground has been continuously swelling for more than with scientists very worried as they think the cap of the caldera is nearing its breaking point. Earlier this year earthquake swarms have gotten much more frequent and intense as the ground continues to swell as it has since the 1950's currently it is rising at around 0.7 cm /month. It is an alarming situation the Earthquake swarms appear to be due to rising magma the hydrothermal systems have already over the last decade rapidly peaked and stayed at high levels of activity. It is an alarming trend of activity as while scientists think it will blow "soon" the timescale of soon isn't quantifiable making evacuation very difficult. I expect one day we or our near descendants will wave up to Naples having been blown off the map from below probably with untold casualties from the political tensions and interests

Yep, Seattle in its eyes.

Agree. They did suspect.

Everything's gonna fall down to the ground and turn gray

All of my friends family and animals probably going to run away But me I'm feeling curious so I think I just might stay

The Dow Jones just fell down to 0 it's going to be a fine swell day

And I wonder if its gonna be as good a day as yesterday~

All of these business suits that I’ve just purchased, gonna have to throw em all away

What could go worse with his lungs, eh? :)

I noticed that too....gotta love 1980!

Was he smoking a cigarette or was he just trying to tell us how big of a cunnilingus fan he is?

@@Mbbrog analingus is the ultimate example of recycling lost calories

You know you really could of went the extra mile here and made your profile photo Nissan instead of Ford. However its very understandable. I owned a 05 Nissan and the damn thing had a cassette player and no power windows. I had to save money to put a cd player in because Nissan didn't get the memo that they no longer produced cassette tapes at that time. I suppose it was a step up from 8 track tapes

Ohhhh that’s so beautiful story about your grandparents!

No kidding it's like having a nuke in the back yard and saying "it's just a bomb".

@@wesrrowlands8309 it’s 50 kiltons of tnt, whats the issue?

I take it you've never been to the Hawaiian Islands then? Those volcanoes are constantly active, and pose very little threat to life. The composition of the magma is what makes the difference. The magma in Hawaii is thin, and almost watery, meaning that the eruptions are constant, but not that explosive. The magma in Mt. St. Helen's is thick and goopy, which traps gasses, and leads to cataclysmic eruptions.

You're missing the key word. DORMANT

@@mandipowell7797 Mt. St. Helen's isn't dormant though...

Dang, didnt know that. Thought it’d be relatively the same age as the rest of the chain. Speaking of old mountains though, the Appalachian Mountains are really old as well, which makes me wonder if they had active volcanos in the past.

@@YOOT_JJ The Appalachians formed as a result of an ancient collision between Africa, America, and Eurasia. The 3 continents collided about 200 million years ago during the days of Pangaea and actually created mountains on all 3 continents (Appalachians, Scottish Highlands, and Little Atlas Mountains). These mountains were collectively called the "Central Pangaean Mountain Range", and at the time, would've rivaled the modern day Himalayas. Of course, the type of mountain building involved is unlikely to produce volcanoes. After all, you've never heard of a Himalayan volcano, right? The area that is now Appalachia has likely not seen volcanic activity for the past 400-500 million years. Of course I'm not a geologist so I wouldn't know that for sure.

@@TheCoLDKanadian That’s actually pretty sick, thanks for the info. I live near the end of the chain, so i was naturally kinda curious about that. Crazy to think about how ancient this land we live on really is.

@@YOOT_JJ No problem! I find it interesting just how old North America actually is. I mean, the Canadian Shield has some of the oldest known rocks in the world at over *3.8 billion years old.* That's about as old as the continents themselves. Suffice it to say, North America is old. Probably was one of the first continents to emerge from the sea. Hard to think it's survived this long relatively intact.

@@TheCoLDKanadian All of this really just makes me appreciate that we, humans, are even here. On a continent so ancient it has existed since just after this planet formed, on a planet so beautiful that it shines like a blue marble from afar, and in a universe we may be able to see and explore for ourselves one day. Sorry to get so existential, but damn does that simple notion give me hope for us. Hope it does for you too, man.

I don’t think that was Johnston, I think that was a photographer named Robert Landsburg, who also died in the explosion

Johnston and anything close to him was vaporized in seconds, definitely thinking of the other photographer who was mych further away that they actually found

No rush -- take your time.

Please, not until we invent force fields

it's already done that at least three times - and before that it was called the something else supervolcano and proved it several more times. PS have you seen the "dramatised documentary" Supervolcano? The bonus material is fascinating - The Truth About Yellowstone. The two parts may be on YT.

You don't have to go that big for a deadlier eruption. If Mount Rainier goes lahars will flow directly into Seattle suburbs. 80,000 people live in the danger zone.

When Yellowstone "goes up" that's pretty much an eraser for most of the west coast and America. Sleep tight kiddies. Ain't science fun? ;p

Maybe Danny put it in the script?

Definitely see the blazing personality creeping into the other channels. Even the memes lol

That whole jaws bit screamed of Danny

@@TunaFreeDolphinMeat Dermatologist

Who vacations in Spokane?! That’s like vacationing in Barstow

@@caseycasey621 I laughed my ass off at this. I believe we were there for a parade and festival that only happens on that long weekend? Anyway, you'll have to forgive us, as we are Canadians and clearly didn't know any better. I will say, however, that we really enjoyed the mountainous regions outside the City, and everyone treated us extremely well under very unusual circumstances.

Indeed. I don't know who to be most angry at for going there and thinking it safe. Those poor kids.

@@lisakaz35 to the parents knowledge, it was safe, according to state maps.

@@lisakaz35 yeah, I mean, I get wanting to see a volcano, but that’s what film is for!

@@whalesauce3647 Common sense tells me it's not a good idea, but I get that you wanna blame the State. I wonder how Simon knew the parents laughed and called it safe. History tells different stories. I suggest checking out how Pliny the Elder died trying to save people fleeing Pompeii. I don't think he was terribly close when it happened.

@@lisakaz35 The parents did something stupid out of ignorance that got them all killed, but the key is “out of ignorance”. They didn’t realise that the location they were driving in was unsafe because it was not declared such. Not everyone is familiar with how volcanoes work. (Maybe they had recently moved to the area from a place that doesn’t have volcanoes.) Even the scientists were caught off-guard. If no one tells you something is dangerous, it is hardly only your fault if you do it with disastrous consequences. The Governor should not have tried to cover up their mistake by blaming the victims. They blamed scientists for doing their jobs! They blamed people for not being out of an area that they had not evacuated. That is far worse than taking your kids on a dangerous joyride.

It is now! 🥴

Hi Daddy

Hey is Dennis Rodman a nice guy in person?

In a Kazakhstan, we say to let a womans drive a car is like letting an apple into volcano, Great Success!

*applicable to nearly every disaster everywhere.* did you know there was an outbreak of the bubonic plague in San Francisco in 1900? Not that the politicians would have you know that. It's unfortunate how many people are constantly put at risk for a few people to "save face."

I was in Vancouver, B.C.

Yeah, there's something unnerving about watching ash rain down. I haven't seen a volcano erupt, but in San Diego and we had the Cedar Fire in 2003 and the Witch Fire in 2007 and they both led to a smoky red orange sun and raining ash. It really does look like a "not-quite-right" snow. The very first time they showed the ending premonition for game of thrones (spoilers) I was like, "omg, it's ash. They want us to believe it's winter and snowing, but watch, it's raining ash and shit's on fire!" My husband didn't believe me.

i live in the lahar zone of Mt Rainer we dont really do that lol, we barely get any training on what to do the only thing they tell us is where the lahar evacuation routes are and expect us to get out of the valley in time.

@@tristanr7799 remember to time earthquake gaps and if they become any more bigger than the average magnitude, then bolt it immediately

@@tripwire3992 Yeah better to have a false positive than to risk a false negative volcanos like Rainer where a flank failure eruption is geologically imminent aren't really risks that one can walk away from if you are wrong and you stay only for it to erupt....

The problem with that is that you would constantly be on the run. The smallest warnings around faults and subduction zones are constantly and consistently happening. However, I would be on alert for concentrated clusters of earthquakes and be monitoring data from the USGS (it's public domain).

@@Dragrath1 yes but flank failures aren't as deadly as you think when it comes to Rainer, its the lahar that everyone is worried about it can travel miles and can reach the Puget sound, which has over 10 different cities in its path with around 200k people, the good thing is the lahar takes around 25-40 minutes to get to you depending on where you are.

I live in Tacoma but work in Fife, also worked in Sumner good old Lahar sirens. Always thought Mt. Tahoma is the prettiest mountain ever.

Oh good! Now you can add a fear of Rainier's lahar to your list! I've heard that if Rainier blows, the resulting lahar will be catastrophic.

@@ryanholloway9645 I always thought so, too. It's breathtakingly beautiful up here. Peaceful. Mostly. LoL😊

@@MegaKat Lahars scare the crap outta me. I just hope there's enough warning if anything should happen. But, in the meantime, I love it up here.😊

@@aliciapittenger515 haha I'm sorry you're so scared of them! I've read and heard mixed things about yall's warning system, but I hope it's enough to get all yall out in time!

That's almost exactly as my aunt described it. She lived in Uniontown.

I like to think of Jul 4th as a slightly delayed birthday celebration... As my birthday is the 1st

How many times have you used that line?

Stop being old

@@Grantperkins1 lol never before now

@@t.c.thompson2359 the only alternative I have to being old not that 52 is horribly old, is to die. I've lived with a cyst on my brain in the multitude of doctors telling me I'm going to die any day now since I was 26 so I think I'll just keep doing what I'm doing

Oh yeah. I watch all 10