G E O S C I E N T I S T COOL STEM CAREERS CHAPTER ONE STUDYING THE EARTH 4 CHAPTER TWO WORKING AS A GEOSCIENTIST 10 CHAPTER THREE BECOMING A GEOSCIENTIST 18 CHAPTER FOUR GEOSCIENCE IN THE FUTURE 24 SOME WELL-KNOWN GEOSCIENTISTS 29 GLOSSARY 30 FOR MORE INFORMATION 31 INDEX 32 ABOUT THE AUTHOR 32 TABLE OF CONTENTS
The eruption of Mount St Helens covered parts of the surrounding area in a thick layer of ash 2 1 S T C E N T U R Y S K I L L S L I B R A R Y COOL STEM CAREERS GEOSCIENTIST CHAPTER ONE STUDYING THE EARTH Neil awoke one Sunday morning in his home in Washington State and looked out the window He couldn’t believe what he saw It looked like snow but the date was May 18 1980 and late spring was certainly not the season
for it to be snowing in the Northwest Yet everything outside Neil’s window was covered in several inches of white stuff Neil rubbed his eyes and took a closer look The stuff covering everything wasn’t pure white it was light gray Whatever it was kept dropping from the sky making the air look misty Then Neil saw his father outside walking through the falling stuff He was in short sleeves and wearing a surgical mask Neil’s father however was not a doctor Neil realized what was falling and covering the ground ash Everywhere he looked he saw volcanic ash He soon learned that less than 40 miles 64 kilometers away Mount St Helens had erupted The volcano had blasted off most of its north side The earth had quaked and a column of ash from the explosion rose 15 miles 24 km into the air in just 15 minutes Most of the heavy dark ash was blown north and east Luckily Neil’s house was south and west On the day of the earthquake winds carried away about 520 million tons 470 million metric tons of ash In Spokane Washington 250 miles 402 km away the air was so full of dark ash that it seemed like nighttime in the middle of the afternoon The next day people in Alberta Canada were scraping ash off their cars They lived more than 600 miles 966 km away from the volcano
