I don’t recall any of this hysteria after Mt. St. Helens. We know there was an ash cloud because people all along the jet stream were getting ash falling on them. But I recalled no stoppage of flights in and out of Seattle or Portland during that time. If ash was so bad for jet engines (and it’s easy to believe why), how come we had no plane crashes or emergencies when Mt. St. Helens erupted?
- St. Helens erruption plume contained larger particles. The stuff exhausted from iceland is much finer and remains longer in the air.
- Air traffic in 1980 was nothing compared to airtraffic today.
Pilot recounts day of heroism on Mount St. Helens
"Commercial air traffic throughout the area ground to a halt because of the reduced visibility and potential hazard of flying through ash clouds rising 80,000 feet into the sky."