USGS/Cascades Volcano Observatory, Vancouver, Washington

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Mount St. Helens, Washington
Eruption Highlights
2004 to Current

Current Eruption HomePage CVO HomePage Mount St. Helens HomePage Current Update University of Washington Webicorders Eruption Highlights Eruption Chronology Photo Gallery USFS VolcanoCam	MOUNT ST. HELENS returns to SLUMBER !!! [More] CVO Lowers Mount St. Helens Alert Level and Aviation Color Code [More] Mount St. Helens' Current Eruption THREE YEARS !!!!! Mount St. Helens' Current Eruption is now THREE YEARS OLD !!! READ more about it !!! Mount St. Helens in STEREO !!!!! MSH07_STEREOVIEW_st_helens_crater_from_NW_06-26-07.jpg "Stereoview Card". Mount St. Helens crater and dome, in stereo, as seen from the northwest. USGS Photograph taken on June 26, 2007, by Jim Vallance. [medium size, 7 inches wide, 96 dpi] ... [large size, 7 inches wide, 300 dpi] Hint --- if printing from your browser doesn't work well try downloading the "large size" onto your computer, bring it up in any graphics program, print (you will want image to be 7 inches wide), cut image out, mount on cardboard, and use an old stereographic viewer to view !!!! ... Stereographic views were popular in the early 1900s. Mount St. Helens View from Harrys Ridge 25 Years Apart 1982 and 2007 [Click to enlarge] MSH07_st_helens_from_harrys_ridge_05-19-82_and_04-20-07.jpg Comparison, Mount St. Helens as seen from Harrys Ridge (5 miles to the north) 25-years apart, in May 1982 and April 2007. USGS Photographs taken on May 19, 1982 by Lyn Topinka, and April 20, 2007, by Gene Iwatsubo. "USGS Alert Notification System for Volcanic Activity" New four-page FACT SHEET online by Cynthia Gardner and Marianne Guffanti, explaining the USGS's new Volcano Alert Notification System for volcano activity. [Report] "View from the Crater Rim" A pan from Mount St. Helens' crater rim looking north, made from 12 images "stitched" together, with accompanying annotation. USGS Photograph taken on July 27, 2006, by Willie Scott. [image, medium size] ... [image, large size] ... [graphic, medium size] ... [graphic, large size] ... [graphic, PDF] ... [image and graphic, medium size] ... [image and graphic, large size, 300dpi, good for printing] ... NEW ONLINE: "Rebuilding Mount St. Helens" New Scientific Investigations Map by Steve Schilling, Dave Ramsey, James Messerich, and Ren Thompson, showing vertical Digital Elevation Model (DEM) views of Mount St. Helens new dome between October 2004 and February 2006. [More] Mount St. Helens latest dome growth as seen from the Brutus remote camera for July and August 2006: MSH06_MOVIE_spine_from_brutus_08-02_to_08-10-06.avi "Movie" made from pictures taken from the Brutus camera (located on the east rim of the 1980 Mount St. Helens crater) on August 2-10, 2006. The sequence shows the continued extrusion of spine 7 of the growing lava dome. However, between August 4-5 and August 7-8 a segment of the middle part of spine 7 (located inside the yellow circle in the .avi movie) temporarily stopped moving. After the August 5 picture was taken (at 13:10 PDT) a magnitude 3.6 earthquake occurred (at 13:15 PDT). The next photo (taken on August 6 at 13:10 PDT) shows that the “stuck” segment became unstuck at some time after the magnitude 3.6 earthquake. Motion again stopped in the circled area between photos taken at 13:10 PDT on August 7 and August 8, and subsequently a magnitude 3.3 earthquake occurred at 8:01pm on August 8. Clouds obscured the volcano from view on August 9, however clouds parted enough on August 10 to show that once again the segment became unstuck. One explanation for these observations is that the large earthquakes were caused by parts of the spine sticking and then slipping. Scientists use observations such as these to develop and test ideas about what is driving the eruption and to anticipate changes in the volcano’s behavior. [AVI Format, 15 M] ... [AVI Format, Compressed, 1.3 M] MSH06_MOVIE_spine_from_brutus_07-01_to_07-28-06.avi "Movie" -- Mount St. Helens new slab/spine, as seen from the remote camera on "Brutus", with frames put together, covering dates from July 1 through July 28, 2006. [AVI Format, 21 M] ... [AVI Format, Compressed, 1.9 M] [Click for more of CVO's "Movies and Animations"] Nearly Vertical View, with Locations MSH06_aerial_crater_nearly_vertical_07-27-06.jpg Nearly vertical aerial view, Mount St. Helens' crater. View is from the southwest. USGS Photograph taken on July 27, 2006, by Matt Logan and Julie Griswold. [medium size] ... [large size] ... [Annotated, medium size] ... "Whalebacks" MSH05_crater_from_north_with_whaleback_views_annotated.jpg Image/Graphic showing aerial view, high angle, Mount St. Helens crater and dome, from the north, with inset images of what the "whalebacks" use to look like. Base image is from October 30, 2005, by John Pallister. Inset images are from November 29, 2004, February 22, 2005, June 21, 2005, and August 31, 2005. [monitor size, 72 dpi, 800 pixels wide] ... [print size, 300 dpi, 8x8 inches] "The First Year" MSH05_dome_from_sugarbowl_camera_10-04_to_09-05.jpg This graphic of the growing lava dome at Mount St. Helens is based on daily photographs taken by an automated digital camera system on Sugar Bowl Dome, located at the crater mouth about 2.3 km (1.4 miles) north-northeast of the vent, from between October 10, 2004, and September 18, 2005. The Sugar Bowl "DomeCam", designed by the Hawaiian Volcano Observatory and loaned to us for our eruption, was installed on October 10, 2004. It takes one image every 3 minutes and relays one image back to the Cascades Volcano Observatory (CVO) every hour. [More] More Memorable Images from "The First Year" Nearly 350 "memorable" images selected from over the thousands taken this past year, which tell the story of "The First Year". Monitoring Stations as of May 18, 2005 Map -- Monitoring stations as of May 18, 2005 [PDF Format, 500K] Photo Archives - Field Crews and Field Work MSH05_photographing_dome_from_crater_rim_02-22-05.jpg Hundreds of images have been taken of USGS Scientists and the monitoring techniques used at Mount St. Helens since the beginning of this 2004 Eruption. [More] The above image shows a U.S. Geological Survey scientist photographing the dome from the "Brutus", a crater rim camera station. USGS Photograph taken on February 22, 2005, by Steve Schilling and Dan Dzurisin. [above image, medium size] ... [above image, large size] View from Sugar Bowl Camera, June 16 to August 16, 2006 MSH05_MOVIE_dome_from_sugarbowl_06-16_to_08-16-05.avi This time-lapse movie of the growing lava dome at Mount St. Helens is based on 45 daily photographs taken by an automated digital camera system on Sugar Bowl Dome, located at the crater mouth about 2.3 km (1.4 miles) north-northeast of the vent. The movie covers the time period from June 16 to August 16, 2005, and shows dramatic changes in the new dome during that two-month interval. A smooth-sided, light gray whaleback feature grew upward and southward in June and early July, then largely collapsed in a series of rockfalls in mid-July. A new, nearly vertical lava spine emerged to the west (to the right in this view) of the older whaleback in early August, allowing the remnants of the older whaleback to sag and slide down slope, back toward the vent. The volume of the new dome that has grown since October 2004 was about 54 million cubic meters (71 million cubic yards) in mid-June, and about 57 million cubic meters (75 million cubic yards) in mid-July. The lava dome that grew in the crater from 1980 to 1986 is visible in the lower right portion of the frame. [More] [.AVI Format, Compressed, 2.8 M] ... [.AVI Format, Reduced in window size and Compressed, 1 M] [.AVI Format, Reduced even more in window size and Compressed, 500 K] NEW ONLINE: "Mount St. Helens Erupts Again" Activity from September 2004 through March 2005" New four-page Fact Sheet release, by Jon Major, Willie Scott, Carolyn Driedger, and Dan Dzurisin, covering the 2004-2005 eruption of Mount St. Helens from September 2004 through March 2005. [More] "Plume in the Evening" - March 8, 2005 MSH05_plume_from_CVO_office_03-08-05.jpg A small, short-lived explosive event at Mount St. Helens volcano began at approximately 5:25 p.m. PST, March 8, 2005. Airplane pilot reports indicate that the resulting steam-and-ash plume reached an altitude of about 36,000 feet above sea level within a few minutes and drifted downwind to the northeast. The volcano's rim stands at 8,325 feet. [More] The above image shows the plume as seen from the Cascade Volcano Observatory Office roof, taken approximately at 5:30 PM, PST. Plume is drifting east-northeast after reaching approximately 36,000 feet above sea level. USGS Photograph taken at approximately 5:30 PM PST on March 8, 2005, by Matt Logan. [above image, medium size] ... [above image, large size] "Things That Go Bump" - January 2005 MSH05_remains_opus_dome_cam_gas_sampling_station_01-19-05.jpg January nightttime rockfalls and explosions have damaged three of the monitoring instruments in the Mount St. Helens crater. Those rockfalls from the new dome uncover momentary brilliance as the newly exposed hot rock glows incandescently. Come aboard and learn how the failure of some instruments provides a study of its own -- if we can decipher the sequence of events. [More] The above image shows the remains of the dome camera/gas sampling station on Opus, after the event of January 16, 2005. The camera is missing, wooden base and fiberglass housing are broken, gas intake tube is disconnected, and there are three holes in the roof, and, although not obvious here, the station is tilted eastward 10-20 degrees (i.e., away from the likely source of the explosion). USGS Photograph taken on January 19, 2005, by Dan Dzurisin. [above image, medium size] ... [above image, large size] Comparing Dome Rocks, 1986 to 2004 Comparing Dome Rocks Eruption Monitoring: October and November 2004 On September 23, 2004, Mount St. Helens grumbled into restlessness. With a premonitory seismic swarm, magma began rising to the surface. It was a race worthy of a tortoise, however. The volcano's first proud proof of hard work was only an uplifted crater floor. After nine days a steam-and-ash eruption ensued. Deformation of the crater floor continued and gas emissions slowly increased. Finally, 14 days after the awakening seismic swarm, new lava was visible where it had pushed through the crater floor and begun building a volcanic dome. [More]

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URL for CVO HomePage is: <http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/home.html>
URL for this page is: <http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/MSH/Eruption04/Monitoring/framework.html>
If you have questions or comments please contact: <GS-CVO-WEB@usgs.gov>
09/19/07, Lyn Topinka