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Where is it?Spirit Lake , Washington [ 46.2658524 , -122.1512829 ]
What ’s in the photo?A heart - shaped lake next to Mount St. Helens .
Spirit Lake is situated around 3 miles (5 kilometers) north of Mount St. Helens' summit and was transformed by the record-breaking landslide during the volcano’s 1980 eruption.
Which satellite took the photo?Landsat 8
When was it taken?April 26 , 2023
This striking satellite photo shows the strange shape of Spirit Lake , which was transubstantiate into a jumbo anatomically inaccurate heart by the explosiveeruption of Mount St. Helensin 1980 . Today , the resilient body of water is closely monitored by scientists who are studying how ecosystem can rally after major lifelike disasters .
Trees uprooted during the eruption have formed a permanent log raft on the surface of Spirit Lake. (The mountain in the background of this 2005 photograph is Mount Rainer, not Mount St. Helens.)
At approximately 8:32 a.m. PDT ( 11:32 a.m. EDT ) on May 18 , 1980 , a 5.1 magnitude earthquake triggered a " cataclysmal eruption " at Mount St. Helens — an active stratovolcano around 90 miles ( 150 kilometers ) to the south of Seattle in Washington state , according to theU.S. Geological Survey . At first , the summit and northern incline of the mint settle , creating the gravid subaerial ( on land ) landslip in recorded chronicle . Then , an enormous explosion released a giant pyroclastic feather into the sky and rained rocks , lava and ash tree across the surround area .
Fifty - seven the great unwashed were kill by the initial landslide and fallout , constitute it the deadliest volcanic outbreak in U.S. account . It also caused around $ 1 billion in damages ( tantamount to around $ 3.8 billion today ) .
Prior to the eruption , Spirit Lake " had a smaller footprint that consisted of west and east arm link up by a minute span of water — similar in shape to the top one-half of a heart , " according toNASA ’s Earth Observatory .
However , the landslide and resulting blast reshaped the lake , constitute it broad and shallower — and completing the heart shape . The lake ’s surface , which now underwrite around 4.5 square miles ( 11.5 hearty km ) , is also around 200 invertebrate foot ( 60 meters ) higher than it used to be .
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Spirit Lake was once a pop tourist terminus with six unlike summer camp and many logarithm cabins scattered along its edge ( the corpse of which are now in all probability bury beneath the lake ) .
However , despite recuperate from the eruption , the lake remain for the most part off - limits to people and there are now bans on fishing and swimming in its waters . This is because scientists want to canvas exactly how the lake ’s ecosystem has recoil from the disaster , according to Earth Observatory .
investigator are particularly concerned in a muckle of trees on the lake ’s surface ( visible as a brown streak in the satellite image ) , which were extirpate during the eruption and have now likely " become an of import part of the lake ’s ecosystem . "
An explosive rebirth
During the eruption , the landslip displaced most of the pee in Spirit Lake , creating a wave up to 800 feet ( 250 m ) tall that wash out over the lake ’s shoreline , according toAmerican Scientist . The water eventually run back into the basin and settled on top of the volcanic detritus .
However , lava from the eruption had blocked the lake ’s instinctive outflow , which previously course into the North Fork Toutle River . As a event , the lake ’s surface proceed to uprise until 1985 , when engineer constructed a Modern 8,500 - infantry - long ( 2,500 m ) drain tunnel to stop it overfill . Without this tunnel , the volcanic dam may have finally burst and spark devastating flood tide in the river ’s valley .
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In the early months after the eruption , up to 40 % of the lake ’s surface was cover by uprooted Tree . This , along with volcanic petrol seeping up from the lakebed , had made the water anoxic , or innocent of oxygen , make it inhospitable to life .
Scientists initially predicted it could take decades before life revert to the lake . But in 1983 , scientists detected phytoplankton grow on the lake ’s control surface , which lento returned oxygen to the water and kickstarted the recovery mental process , which is now in full swing .
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