Fifty-nine people dead, 200 homes destroyed or damaged. What could cause so much damage? Many things but in this case Mt St Helens, a volcano that erupted and caused the death of innocent humans and the damage of their homes. It wasn’t like a normal volcano that flowed lava, the whole top flew off. Hundreds of square feet were completely ruined, huge plots of land with nothing but garbage. It was May 18, 1980 a Sunday morning. It was a beautiful spring day and the sun was finally out. It had been a depressing winter; my grandma had two kids and a newborn baby. After the hard winter all she wanted was just some sun to brighten her day. She was in the car driving home with her husband and kids. All of a sudden she saw a huge cloud, …show more content…
Like usual she turned on the radio while making lunch, and heard the depressing news that Mt St Helens had erupted. The black cloud was ash that was rapidly moving toward them. Her beautiful spring day was officially ruined. In fact it would be ruined for about the next two weeks. As she looked out the window she saw that the ash had started to fall. Eventually, the ash reached about one and a half feet. When she went outside she had to wear a mask because the air was toxic. It didn’t even look like earth. She felt like she was walking on the moon. Nothing looked familiar with the black ash covering everything. Home no longer looked like home. She felt lost in her own yard, the mountains behind her were covered in ash. Everything she knew was different. Finally after three or four days the sky cleared up and she could see the beautiful blue sky with the sun. She so badly wanted to go outside, and the kids were going crazy being cooped up in the house for that long. Even when the sky cleared she still couldn’t take the kids out because of all the ash. Thankfully her whole spring wasn’t ruined; even though they had a little set back with all the
There seemed to be nothing to see, no fences, no creek or trees, no hills or fields. I had the feeling that the world was left behind, that we had gone over the edge of it.... If we never arrived anywhere, it did not matter. Between that earth, and that sky, I felt erased, blotted out. (3 - 4)
When she think of the home town of her youth all that she remember is the brown crumbly dust. Of the late summer arid, sterile
covers the area, causing people, animals, and structures to practically disintegrate. Even years afterwards people were still dying and having
...815 eruption of Mount Tambora. With over 70,000 deaths and a rating of 7 on the volcanic exclusivity index, this eruption is one of the largest in recorded history. Not only did this volcano cause destruction in Indonesia but the consequences were further felt around the world, as volcanic ash and sulphuric gases were dumped into the stratosphere causing a global climate shift. Dark clouds covered the sun, and dramatic weather changes ensued. Flash floods frequently occurred wiping out a great deal of crop eventually causing prices to skyrocket. Disease began to spread due to malnourishment and unsanitary living conditions. Eventually these consequences subsided and citizens began to migrate towards Mount Tambora once again. Today the government has placed seismic sensors are set up in the most volatile areas to ensure preparedness in the event of another volcano.
The physical damage done to San Francisco due to the earthquake was extensive. The earthquake caused gas lines to rupture and chimneys to collapse which resulted in perhaps the greatest devastation from the earthquake, the fires. About fifty fires broke out around the city that in combination with the earthquake caused the destruction of about 28,000 buildings (The Great San Francisco Earthquake: One of America's Worst Urban Disasters. 2005). The fires continued to burn for four days because the water mains had burst; therefore, the hydrants had no water. Desperation sunk in and the fire department and military, having no water to stop the fires, used dynamite to create firebreaks. This ultimately backfired and led to the fires expanding. When the fires stopped, the city was left in ruins with 80% of it being destroyed (Dean. Pg 506).
Ten million California residents who lived closely from the major fault lines could have been endangered in many extreme ways. (House, 56). A tragic thing was that after the earthquake a multitudes of fire followed right after. The situation led to the water mains being destroyed and the firefighter being left with no water to settle the growing fire which continued blazing. The bay water was planned on putting all of the dure out but it was to far in distance to be able to transport it (Earthquake of 1906, 2). The firefighters who were putting out the fire were either surrounded or being burned by the fire that was blazing in all directions (San Francisco Earthquake, 2). A resident who was present during the event mention that he/she saw men and women standing in a corner of a building praying, one person who became delirious by the horrific ways that were surrounding him while crying and screaming at the top of his lungs “the Lord sent it, the Lord”. Someone also mentioned that they experience themselves seeing Stones fall from the sky and crushing people to death. Reporters say there were 100 cannons going off (San Francisco Earthquake, 3). People who lived fifty miles away from the fire was able to “read the newspaper at
An atmosphere of fear and anxiety is created in order to highlight the eventual theme of the story. It was a normal say on Maple Street. Kids were playing and adults were listening to the radio and working outside. That is when what is to believed to be a meteor went overhead and disrupted the calmness. Steve Brand and his neighbor, Don Martin, were both working outside at the time. “Looked like a meteor didn’t it? I didn’t hear any crash though.” Steve tells Don, which leads the reader to believe it was not a normal meteor. After the “meteor” passes over Maple Street, there was a power outage that also affected cars, radio, and water. The inhabitants of Maple Street began speculating why the power outage had also affected their cars, radios,
The harm that came from the earthquake was harsh and most everything was destroyed. Buildings collapse, people died, and landslides occurred, trapping everyone hopelessly in the zone where the
The arrival of winter was well on its way. Colorful leaves had turned to brown and fallen from the branches of the trees. The sky opened to a new brightness with the disappearance of the leaves. As John drove down the country road he was much more aware of all his surroundings. He grew up in this small town and knew he would live there forever. He knew every landmark in this area. This place is where he grew up and experienced many adventures. The new journey of his life was exciting, but then he also had a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach of something not right.
It was the deadliest and costliest natural disaster of all time in US history. What I
The eruption on Mount Saint Helens has a specific cause and comes with many effects. A multifold of people would say that the “mountain looked like the site of an atomic blast” (Bredeson 30). That is a very accurate depiction as it took great power to inflict as much damage as it did. The reason for this impressive amount of force is that when magma is built up with pressure and an earthquake hits, the pressure gets magnified and the volcano explodes (Lewis). This is exactly what happened inside Mount Saint Helens. Furthermore, it has been revealed that “The earthquake that triggered the explosion was a 5.2 on the Richter scale” (Gunn 559). The earthquake to the magma can be compared as a match to gasoline. Even though the earthquake was not huge, the scale of the eruption was much greater than that of the earthquake (Gunn 560). The earthquake was only the trigger that allowed for more devastating things to occur. Thirteen hundred feet of the volcano were lost in the explosion followed by landslides, mudslides, and lava flows...
Deep within the Washington wilderness in the shadows of Mount St. Helen lies the infamous Ape Canyon. Upon these steep shallow cliffs, strange encounters have emerged over the past century. In 1924 a group of seasoned miners set out on a routine expedition searching for gold. However, what they encountered changed their lives forever. It was here that allegedly famous attack by a group of sasquatches occurred. In the short autobiography, I Fought the Apemen of Mt. St. Helens by Fred Beck, one of the miners, recollects his parties encounter with the beast.
I noticed this really dark cloud cloud coming in from the North East. When i told my Ma and Pa about it they told us to go get some wet towels. After that my brothers and i were confused we didn't understand why Ma was putting wet towels in the cracks of the doors and windows or even why she made us wear wet towels over our mouths and nose. Everything was crazy, my dog, Skippers freaked out.
It was a dark, cold, cloudy day. The clouds covered the sky like a big black sheet, nothing to be seen except darkness that seemed to go on forever. This was the third day in a row that there had been complete darkness, there was no getting rid of it. This was because of ‘the meteorite.’
The ruckus from the bottom of the truck is unbearable, because of the noise and excessive shaking. As we slowly climbed the mountain road to reach our lovely cabin, it seemed almost impossible to reach the top, but every time we reached it safely. The rocks and deep potholes shook the truck and the people in it, like a paint mixer. Every window in the truck was rolled down so we could have some leverage to hold on and not loose our grip we needed so greatly. The fresh clean mountain air entered the truck; it smelt as if we were lost: nowhere close to home. It was a feeling of relief to get away from all the problems at home. The road was deeply covered with huge pines and baby aspen trees. Closely examining the surrounding, it looks as if it did the last time we were up here.