Earth ID: 10550

Forest Recovering From Mount St. Helens Eruption

Released on May 18, 2010

There is a newer version of this story located here: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12612

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.

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.

Newer Version

Credits

Jennifer A. Shoemaker (UMBC): Video Editor
Matthew R. Radcliff (USRA): Video Editor
Jennifer A. Shoemaker (UMBC): Producer
Ellen T. Gray (ADNET Systems, Inc.): Writer

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

Short URL to share this page:
https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10550

Mission:
Landsat

Data Used:

Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

This item is part of this series:
Narrated Movies

Keywords:
SVS >> Ecosystem
DLESE >> Geology
SVS >> HDTV
SVS >> Landsat
DLESE >> Natural hazards
DLESE >> Structural geology
SVS >> Volcano
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Solid Earth >> Volcanoes
NASA Science >> Earth

GCMD keywords can be found on the Internet with the following citation: Olsen, L.M., G. Major, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, S. Ritz, T. Stevens, M. Morahan, A. Aleman, R. Vogel, S. Leicester, H. Weir, M. Meaux, S. Grebas, C.Solomon, M. Holland, T. Northcutt, R. A. Restrepo, R. Bilodeau, 2013. NASA/Global Change Master Directory (GCMD) Earth Science Keywords. Version 8.0.0.0.0