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Trail to Mount St. Helens crater could reopen this year

Associated Press
March 16, 2006

VANCOUVER, Wash. (AP) — A trail to the south rim of the crater of Mount St. Helens, closed since the start of a dome-building eruption in late September 2004, may be reopened this year, officials say.

No decision has been made, but U.S. Forest Service officials began accepting conditional climbing reservations last month, Tom Mulder, manager of the Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument, told The Columbian of Vancouver.

“The public is interested,” Mulder said. “It’s a recreation niche, a learning opportunity, and we want to serve the public well.”

The climbing season traditionally begins May 15, and the number of permits historically has been limited to 100 a day, half by reservation and half by a daily lottery.

“Climbers will be taking on the responsibility for exposing themselves to any risk that they may encounter — temperature extremes to slippery slopes to things that may fall out of the sky,” Mulder said.

Tom Pierson, a local U.S. Geological Survey geologist, tentatively plans to lead a guided hike arranged through the Mount St. Helens Institute to the rim in August.

“It will be great to see the new view and to take pictures to compare,” Pierson said.

If the trail is reopened, climbers could get a close-up look at the relatively quiet oozing of molten rock into the gaping horseshoe-shaped crater from the volcano’s explosive eruption of May, 18, 1980.

That blast killed 57 people and removed the top 1,300 feet of the once-symmetrical peak. Most of what was blown away was a lava dome built in quieter eruptions like the current one over the previous 400 years.

The trail to the 8,300-foot south rim was closed Sept. 26, 2004, shortly after the most recent volcanic activity began. But based on the volcano’s recent behavior, the hazard appears to be low, Pierson said.

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