Volcanoes
This feature accompanied the Science Museum's exhibition of A Day in Pompeii during 2007.
Is Mount St. Helens OUR Vesuvius?
Photo by Austin Post, USGS, on May 18, 1980
The eruption was the worst volcanic disaster in US history.
On May 18, 1980, Mount St. Helens erupted. Shaken by an earthquake (5.1 on the Richter scale), the north face of the mountain collapsed in a massive avalanche. Nearly 230 square miles of forest were blown down or buried beneath volcanic deposits. A mushroom-shaped column of ash rose sixteen miles into the sky and drifted downwind, darkening the sky as it fell over eastern Washington and beyond. The eruption lasted 9 hours, but Mount St. Helens and the surrounding landscape were dramatically changed within moments.
The processes, effects, and products were the most intensively studied and photographically documented of any explosive volcanic eruption in the world to date—even shedding light on the eruption of Vesuvius that buried Pompeii.
Matt Panciera studies Pompeii's ancient graffiti
Volcano Stories
from the Buzz Blog
- Pompeii threatened
- Waking up: Chilean volcano thought to be dormant erupts for the first time in 9,000 years
- Nevado del Huila erupts
- Mud Volcano displacing thousands in Indonesia
- More volcanic activity in South Pacific
- Lecture tonight: (Pompeii) The Final Hours
- Once dormant Red Sea volcano, Jabal at-Tair, explodes
- The earth bursts forth at Mount Saint Helens
- Volcano evacuation underway
- Indonesian earthquake
Have you ever experienced a natural disaster? How did it make you feel?
We want to hear what you're thinking and feeling.
Science Buzz and all related activities