As the thunderous black ooze rolled into the valley, the once bright and sunny day became the blackest of nights…

Sounds like cheesy sci-fi right? Well I actually lived thru this particular event and I think the story can help you!

I am talking about living thru the volcanic eruption of mount saint Helens in May of 1980.

I had turned 8 just a few weeks before and that very morning we were set to celebrate the second wedding of my grandmother. It was a beautiful morning and I was outside playing while I waited for my family to pull themselves together. My oldest sister had made the wedding cake and it was gorgeous!

It was then that we first heard the sound of the explosive eruption, and it was shockingly loud for being 80 miles away!

The radios immediately began the emergency broadcast and within five minutes the ash cloud appeared on the horizon, no it wasn’t the tall pillar of smoke that you see on TV it was a low rolling and boiling black mass.

The town I lived in is named Ellensburg WA. And it is literally surrounded by mountains in a 360 degree circle. With the mountains to the south west (closest to the volcano) being tall rolling hills.

So when the inky black clouds of ash came in it was like a scene from “The blob” (an old black and white sci-fi movie) it was rolling and oozing like some thick burnt motor oil.

As we watched it literally pour into town you could see Pink and Blue inter-cloud lightning in the front of the black cloud.

Then during had been a bright morning the street lights came on and as things grew darker the sun was blacked out entirely!

As the ash began falling like dark gray snow my parents panicked and threw us four kids in the car, with a wash tub of water and clean cloth diapers to use as masks (my littlest sister being 1 year at the time).

They also brought the cake to my grandmother and my the time we got it in her house the cake had turned battleship gray from all the ash.

As we drove out of town the street lights began disappearing as we drove towards them… then we entered the Cascade mountain range on our way to Seattle. Our headlights barely piercing 40 feet in front of them as we drive through the mountain passes.

Once we started descending into Seattle the skies cleared up and we began realizing what we survived and how exhausted we were.

We went to my uncle’s Yacht that was moored near by. He had just returned from a sailing trip to Hawaii and back with his wife and two sons.

On this boat you have to enter/exit the cabin thru a hatch via a small ladder on the inside, as we knocked you could hear him stepping on the ladder and unlock the hatch.

When he opened it and saw the gray mass of humanity that stood on his deck his jaw fell open and he slid down the ladder, (thud, thud, thud) then he points to the harbor masters building and says go use the showers in there and we will bring you soap, towels and clothes!

When we get to the showers we realize that we were literally caked with ash as if we had rolled the mud!

The economy of Ellensburg collapsed for the next two years, it crashed so badly that the local food banks ran out of food and had to close!

Naturally this meant that my father’s business went bankrupt… meaning that I saw two worlds end. :/

So what did this teach me?

• Shit happens, but you can survive
• Major events have lasting impacts emotionally and economic
• When shit does happen, the natural response is to shutdown. Don’t shutdown, launch into action (thoughtful action is best)
• All of the businesses that shut off their marketing, wound up going out of business… however, those that leaned into their marketing and showed up as helping the community grew massively!