On September 28, 2006 Heather St. Antoine and I hiked to the summit of Mt. St. Helens and witnessed geology in action on a large scale. Prior to our trip I had been pinning for the chance to see what is going on at the infamous St. Helens.
The mountain had been closed to climbers for at least a year if not two due to the small-scale eruptions and dome building which was occurring inside the 1980 crater. Finally this last May or June the rangers started allowing climbing again.
The last time I had been to the mountain was before the dome building began so I was excited to see the changes which had taken place and boy was I impressed. The dome within the crater is relatively large and growing everyday. The majority of the dome appears to be just a pile of rocks, but a portion of it consists of some very large rock monoliths which are standing at a near vertical angle. When we were there steam and gasses were released from different areas of the dome and crater area every once and awhile (15 or 20 minutes) while rockfall at the dome and the crater walls occurs at least once every 5 or 10 minutes. I could even pick-out some yellow staining on some of the dome rocks which I am guessing is due to release of gasses (possibly sulfur dioxide?). The whole scene really does impart the feeling of movement. It was way cool actually being able to see signs of volcanically induced change first-hand and in real-time! In addition, I couldn't help but notice that the view from the crater and across the 1980 blast zone resembled a fictional fire and brimstone place: Mordor (The Lord of the Rings).
On a sidenote and for future planning, the hike to the top took somewhere between 3 and 3.5 hours with a couple of breaks. This was not a hard hike and definately does not require an alpine start when done this late in the year. If it is windy a dust mask or bandana might be helpful. I can't wait to go back next year or this winter to see how the mountain has changed!
1 comment:
Very nice!
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