The Missoulian from Missoula, Montana • 11

Missoulian, Monday, May 19, 1980-11 Mount St. Helens' eruption made 'midnight' descend during mid-afternoon in ,1 Associated Press Billowing clouds of gray ash from the violently erupting Mount St. Helens swept east across Washington state and into Idaho and Montana Sunday, creating near-zero visibility and closing highways and airports. Water supplies were polluted, car engines died, residents sought safety from the irritating ash and animals stood stunned as the coarse pumice coated their skins. Up to several inches of the fine gray ash were reported in cities 300 miles east of the mountain.

More than a foot of ash was measured at Camp Baker, 15 miles west of Spirit Lake. The volcano began erupting violently Sunday morning after almost two months of simmering volcanic acitivity. In Morton, about 10 miles to the north of the volcano, police vehicles sputtered to a stop when the cars' air filters became choked with the volcanic dust. A frantic call to auto-parts dealers to open their shops produced new filters, but the problem persisted. Police officers wore gauze masks over their faces to filter some of the lung-drying dust.

"If we had to evacuate this town, we couldn't," said Bart Dalfonso, a Morton resident. "We'd all die." Airports near the volcano and in eastern Washington were closed, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. All planes in the air were ordered to avoid the ash cloud, which stretched hundreds of miles, because the gritty material could destroy an airplane engine. The pilot of a crop-dusting plane crashed into a major Bonneville Power Administration line near Teanaway, possibly because of limited visibility from the ash cloud, said Kittitas County Sheriff Bob Barret: The pilot was killed and the line knocked to the ground. In Yakima, police and state patrol officers wore gas masks as they patrolled the area.

"You can't breathe without a mask at this time. It's overpowering," Sgt. Larry Gamache of the Yakima County Sheriff's office said Sunday afternoon. "It's just like midnight," Gamache said. "All the street lights and neon signs have turned on.

There is heavy smoke and ash up to four inches of the sand-like stuff in some places." The ash lay so thick on the power lines that electrical service was interrupted, Gamache said. "Apparently the stuff also is a good conoductor of electricity because we are having arcing problems on our lines and transformers," he said. Water was to be drawn from wells, not open, reservoirs, Yakima officials said. Washington Gov. Dixy Lee Ray ordered the National Guard to be prepared to truck in water supplies.

All roads in Grant County, in the central part of Washington, were closed because of the ash. "The whole county is shut down," a county radio officer said. The situation was the same in Adams County, Wash. "The warning to get them off the road can't be harsh enough," Adams County Sheriff Ron Snowden said. An air show scheduled at the Fair-child Air Force Base in Spokane was canceled as the ash cloud darkened the iky, said Neil Prindle, approach-control team supervisor.

The Spokane airport also was closed. When the cloud reached Idaho late Sunday afternoon, temperatures quickly dropped as the sun was obscured. Throughout Washington, people reported the ash looked like gray snow. "The ash is so light and fluffy, it looks newly fallen snow as it falls off the trees in small clumps," Dalfonso said. "The cars make tracks in it just like they do snow," he said.

Breathing the ash in Morton 3 like "sticking your head in the fir and st ting up the ashes," Dalfonso. It gives you a bad head: i. .1 can't escape it. Ash is iln under the door and through ci the windows. It's just horrible." AP photos The eruption of Mount St.

Helens Sunday sends a as high as 60,000 feet over Washington. Foof nvar WocJiinfitnn plume of smoke and ash billowing 7 ToMo Caill Rock MT MARGARET SPIRIT LK MT CT mil i HELENS ARIEL 0IM 0AmCR 1 Jiloo4n6 Trucks lie damaged after high water swept through a logging Toutle River, which flooded after the eruption of Mount St. operation on Washington's Helens. Mount St. Helens, in Washington, erupted Sunday, causing flash floods in area rivers.

fa k. Li I ILL 1 I I.