In seconds, a mountain and many lives were lost
May 18, 1980: Jimmy Carter was still in the White House, pesrsonal computers were in their infancy. And Mount St. Helens had been quietly smoldering for months. Then, without warning on a clear, blue Sunday morning, the volcano exploded, devastating the surroundings and ejecting a plume of ash that spread around the world.

>> Illustrated timeline: The first moments of the eruption
>> Eruption summary: An overview of the devastation
>> An overview of the eruption's effects on wildlife
>> Path of destruction: The lateral blast
>> Lessons learned from the eruption

A witness to the eruption, journalist's life was changed forever
Among the heroes to emerge from the ashes of Mount St. Helens were local journalists who often risked their own lives in debris fields and mudflows to describe the utter devastation and its effect on the people of Southwest Washington. Twenty years later, former reporter Bud May is still telling the story of St. Helens.

Crotchety Harry Truman remains an icon of the eruption
All he did to become a legend was stay on Mount St. Helens and die. But there was more to crotchety old Harry Truman than his last stand -- which he really did not want to make, according to family and friends of Truman, who refused to leave his home below the volcano.