Mountain of Fire

The Eruption and Survivors of Mount St. Helens

Mountain of Fire is the narrative nonfiction story of the violent volcanic eruption of Mount St. Helens on May 18, 1980, the story of the people who died, those who survived, and the heroes who fought to raise an alarm.

For weeks, the ground around Mount St. Helens shuddered like a dynamite keg ready to explode. There were legends of previous eruptions: violent fire, treacherous floods, and heat that had scoured the area. But the shaking and swelling was unlike any volcano ever seen before. Day and night, scientists tried to piece together the mountain’s clues—yet nothing could prepare them for the destruction to come.

The long-dormant volcano seethed away, boiling rock far below the surface. Washington’s governor, Dixie Lee Ray, understood the despair that would follow from people being forced from their homes. How and when should she give orders to evacuate the area? And would that be enough to save the people from the eruption of Mount St. Helens?

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Praise

“Barone mixes science and survival in this white-knuckled account of the most deadly and destructive volcanic eruptions in the history of the United States.” —John Rocco, author of the National Book Award nominee, How We Got To The Moon

“The pages of this book absolutely crackle with ash and mud. . . A taut, white-knuckle true tale that will keep readers turning the pages from beginning to end.” —Candace Fleming, YALSA Nonfiction Award winning-author of The Rise & Fall of Charles Lindbergh

“A heart-stopping account of how everyone sprang into gear—or didn’t—when the ground shook, and Mount St Helens rumbled and bulged and finally, spectacularly, erupted.” –Elizabeth Partridge, Sibert Medal Winning author of Seen and Unseen: What Dorothea Lange, Toyo Miyatake, and Ansel Adams’s Photographs Reveal About the Japanese American Incarceration.