View of Pumice Plain and Mount St. Helens, Washington, 2000
Photograph by Jim Richardson
Vegetation has returned to the scenery of Washington’s Pumice Plain, which was stripped of life after Mount St. Helens erupted in 1980. Despite the immense pyroclastic flow (a mix of hot gas and ash) that scoured these plains after the eruption, the purple flowers of prairie lupines appeared within a few years and accelerated the landscape’s recovery.
