Word: volcanoed
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...winds carried the eruption's debris northeast from the shattered mountain, thick layers of ash, looking like dirty snow, fell on eastern Washington. Yakima, a town of 50,000 located 85 miles east of the volcano, experienced midnight at noon. The mining and ranching communities of the Idaho panhandle and western Montana turned into ghostly towns in which nobody could move about the dust-choked streets without surgical masks or some substitute: handkerchiefs, bandanas, even coffee filters strapped over nose and mouth with rubber bands. Schools, factories and most stores and offices closed. Highways were closed and airports were...
...there was a possibility of another natural disaster. A 200-ft. wall of mud and ash from the volcano prevented the waters of Spirit Lake from flowing into the Toutle River. Local officials feared at first that the dam might suddenly give way, sending backed-up water and mud flooding through the riverbank towns of Longview, Kelso and Castle Rock, menacing the lives of 50,000 people. By the weekend, however, water was slowly seeping through the mud-and-ash plug, and pressure on the dam had eased...
Mike Moore of Castle Rock, Wash., his wife Lu and their two daughters, four-year-old Bonnielu and three-month-old Terra Dawn, were on a hike along the Green River trail, about 13 miles north of Mount St. Helens, when the volcano erupted. "The sky turned as black as I've ever seen, and ash and pumice fell on us like black rain," said Lu Moore. "Then the air pressure changed, and our ears went...
...volcano is also producing fallout, literally. Geologists noted that Mount St. Helens is venting radioactive radon gas in greater quantities than any "hot" discharge from Pennsylvania's crippled Three Mile Island nuclear plant. Fortunately the gas has a short half-life (3.8 days) and quickly climbs high into the sky before it can affect people...
...hardest-hit towns outside the immediate vicinity of the volcano was Ritzville, Wash, (pop. 2,000). A current of warm, dust-laden air from the west collided with cold air from the east and dumped 5 in. of ash on the town. Reported TIME Correspondent James Willwerth: "If Spokane looked like an ashtray, Ritzville looked as though it had been hit by an avalanche. The town was caked in dust and mud. Streets had 2-ft. drifts. On South Adams Street, Mrs. Erma Miller's once meticulously landscaped ranch-style house looked as if it were in a desert...