Canadians recall blast, fine ash from 1980 volcanic eruption at Mount St. Helens [Video]

Sandy Santori remembers the dark cloud that covered Trail, B.C., beginning May 18, 1980. It filled the sky with a colourless gloom, as fine ash fell to the ground.

“It was just no sunshine. It was just gloomy, grey, black. It was scary,” he said.

Santori was 26 years old, and first learned of the situation when his mother called him out of the house. There was a scene on the street. His neighbours, mostly Italian Canadians, were hurriedly covering their freshly planted gardens, unsure where the fine, dusty ash was coming from.

“Everybody at that time thought there was a malfunction at Teck Cominco and that they were emitting something out of the [smelter] stacks that we’d never seen before,” said Santori, who would later go on to be mayor of Trail, an MLA and B.C. cabinet minister.

Before long, word spread through the community that the ash was …