Remembering Mount St. Helens, 40 years later

Ash covered Ritzville area

Katie Teachout, The Journ | Last updated May 18, 2020 10:52pm0

The Ritzville Adams County Journal count

The city of Ritzville brought out plows to clear the ashfall from the May 18, 1980, eruption of Mount St. Helens.

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RITZVILLE - For the 40th anniversary of the eruption of Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980, The Journal asked readers about their memories of the event.

Individual stories merged like so many streams into one river of memories.

Kirk Danekas was serving as the newly-elected mayor here when the mountain blew.

"It blew all over the world, basically, but it happened to settle in Ritzville. We got the brunt of it," Danekas said. "The hardest part of the ordeal was Ritzville went from a city of roughly 2,000 people to suddenly having another 2,000 people stranded in town.

"They were staying in the sch...