Forest Recovering From Mount St. Helens Eruption

  • Released Tuesday, May 18, 2010
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The 1980 Mount Saint Helens eruption was one of the most significant natural disasters in the US in the past half-century. The eruption laid waste to 230 square miles. Landsat captured the extent of the destruction, with grey tones revealing widespread lava flows and ash deposits. Subsequent Landsat images over the years show the spread of vegetation recovery across the site.

The 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens leveled surrounding forest, blasted away over a thousand feet of the mountain's summit, and claimed 57 human lives.

Landsat satellites have tracked the recovery of the surrounding forest. This video shows that recovery, in a timelapse of annual images from 1979-2011.

Thirty years ago, Mount St. Helens roared back into major activity with a massive eruption that leveled surrounding forest, blasted away over a thousand feet of the mountain's summit, and claimed 57 human lives.

This short video shows the catastrophic eruption - and the amazing recovery of the surrounding ecosystem - through the eyes of the Landsat satellites, which have been imaging our planet for almost forty years.

For complete transcript, click here.

Timelapse of Mt. St. Helens and surrounding area from 1979 to 2010, as imaged by Landsat satellites.

From 1979-1983 the images are shown in false-color, where red indicates healthy vegetation. From 1984-2010, the images are shown in natural-color.

Credits

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

Images used from NASA's Earth Observatory:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/WorldOfChange/sthelens.php

Landsat is a joint program of NASA and USGS:
http://landsat.usgs.gov
http://www.nasa.gov/landsat

This page was originally published on Tuesday, May 18, 2010.
This page was last updated on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 at 1:54 PM EDT.

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