Photos taken 33 years ago by a photographer who died in the Mt. St. Helens eruption have been discovered and developed.
Photos taken 33 years ago by a photographer who died in the Mt. St. Helens eruption have been discovered and developed.
Reid Blackburn took the photographs in April 1980 during a flight over the simmering volcano. When he got back to The Columbian studio, Blackburn set that roll of film aside. It was never developed. On May 18, 1980 — about five weeks later — Blackburn died in the volcanic blast that obliterated the mountain peak.
Those unprocessed black-and-white images spent the next three decades coiled inside that film canister. The Columbian’s photo assistant Linda Lutes recently discovered the roll in a studio storage box, and it was finally developed.
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Photos taken 33 years ago by a photographer who died in the Mt. St. Helens eruption have been discovered and developed.
Reid Blackburn took the photographs in April 1980 during a flight over the simmering volcano. When he got back to The Columbian studio, Blackburn set that roll of film aside. It was never developed. On May 18, 1980 — about five weeks later — Blackburn died in the volcanic blast that obliterated the mountain peak.
Those unprocessed black-and-white images spent the next three decades coiled inside that film canister. The Columbian’s photo assistant Linda Lutes recently discovered the roll in a studio storage box, and it was finally developed.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
Interesting, a story about recently discovered photos. Attached is an image of the photographer, but not a single one of the long lost images…unless I’m just too technologically challenged to trace down the link?
My brother was at work that day in Seattle. He said he heard it and the building shook a little.
i have seen some of these photo publishing from David Kern before. perhaps 10 years ago. And the story of Blackburn’s car.
The photos are at the link. There are “previous” and “next” buttons to the left and right of the photo of the photographer at the top of the story. Click on those and you can see them.
When St. Helens starts to smoke a little, as it did a few years ago, people in Portland get nervous. When I lived in Seattle, people had one eye on Rainier. Folks in the Northwest take their volcanoes seriously.
Its so sad that they waited so long to develop that film for whatever reason.
The pictures have lost so much detail and definition.
apparently my firewall doesn’t like the link