Yesterday we marked 43 years since the eruption of Mount St Helens on May 18th, 1980 at 8:32 AM. This is an important day in Washington State history, and for the ESS Community.
We remember ESS Graduate Dave Johnston, a USGS volcanologist stationed at Mount St Helens to monitor the unrest in 1980. He was one of 57 people who tragically lost their lives in the lateral blast.
Last Friday, many of you attended our Annual Awards Ceremony. ESS gives out two awards funded by the David A. Johnston Memorial Fellowship for Research Excellence. This award is presented to two Graduate Students considered to be the most outstanding young scientists in the fields of Geological Sciences and Geophysics. This year’s award recipients were PhD Candidates Annika Horlings and Nicholas Wogan. Every year in May, we are able to honor Dave’s legacy.
ESS and PNSN’s Steve Malone was the key seismologist who recognized the developing swarms of earthquakes and alerted the USGS and authorities of the potential for an eruption, setting in motion a huge effort from March to May, 1980. And now 43 years later, Steve continues to be a very active and invaluable member of PNSN’s team, even though he “retired” in 2007.
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- Steve Malone and colleague on Mount St Helens
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- Steve Malone working on Mount St Helens prior to the eruption
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- Image of Mount St Helens prior to the eruption
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- PNSN Researchers working on station ELK days after the eruption
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- Station ELK on May 23, days after the eruption
If you would like to learn more, please read this article by the College of the Environment from 2020, featuring George Bergantz, Steve Malone, and Harold Tobin. They detail the seismic events and observations leading up to the eruption, and discuss how research and technologies have evolved over the last four decades.
Today, PNSN in partnership with USGS and other institutions and universities work together to operate the national volcano early warning system that evaluates and monitors all the volcanoes in the US. This is a critical service that PNSN and ESS scientists perform for Washingtonians and everyone living in areas near volcanoes, and a responsibility they take very seriously.
Undergraduates, if you want to learn more about volcanology, sign up to take ESS 106 “Living With Volcanoes” with Professor Bergantz in the Autumn term!