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Any shortfall in Washington wheat production should be made up by bumper crops expected in Oklahoma, Texas and the Plains states. Though wheat prices rose a bit on the Chicago Board of Trade last week, at a time when they normally would be falling, traders were worried not about the St. Helens eruption but about drought in North Dakota.
Except in the immediate vicinity of the mountain, livestock escaped almost unscathed. State officials advised ranchers to put out fresh hay so that cattle would not eat the dusty forage in the fields. Ranchers were also told not to move their herds to avoid increasing the cattle's breathing rate and thus their intake of silica-laden dust. Breeders protected valuable race horses by keeping them inside barns with towels over their noses.
Probably the most lasting and pervasive effect of the eruption, outside the immediate area of Mount St. Helens, will be the monumental nuisance of the cleanup. Volcanic ash fell in amounts estimated at eight tons per acre in the Moscow-Pullman area of Idaho, 300 miles from Mount St. Helens, and 350 Ibs. per acre in southwestern Montana, roughly 400 miles away. The fine, gritty ash drifted into everything: aircraft engines, sewage and water treatment plants, tractor gears, washing machines. One official at Washington State University warned homemakers to use only detergents when washing clothes because soap might mix with ash in the water, forming a sludge that would hopelessly clog the outlet hoses of automatic washing machines.
Throughout Washington, Idaho and Montana, officials cautioned motorists to stay off the roads except for emergencies because the passage of an auto stirs up clouds of dust that blind other drivers. Motorists also were advised to clean air and oil filters every 20 or 25 miles. Some drivers tied pantyhose over their cars' air filters to help keep out the dust. Nonetheless, insurance companies will soon be deluged with claims from the owners of countless autos whose windshields and finishes were pitted by the ash.
On streets and in backyards, the ash is also a headache. At the airport in Spokane (pop. 250,000), which was covered by half an inch of dust, a neon sign said:
REJOICE, IT IS ASH WEDNESDAY. City officials requested citizens to hose down the streets in front of their houses, and the city council passed an ordinance requiring residents to get rid of the ash in ten days or face fines and short jail sentences. Said Evelyn Erdely, 20, a student at Spokane Falls Community College: "I have a cough, I'm sneezing a lot and I feel icky. My dad is out with the hose washing off the house all the time."
In Pullman (pop. 21,000), students from Washington State University jammed the Barley and Hops tavern for "eruption specials," $1 pitchers of beer. In Yakima, which was coated with half an inch of dust, the owner of an auto body shop jokingly put ash on sale for 500 per gal. but got no takers. Hosing or shoveling the ash was only a slightly more effective way of getting rid of it. Complained Yakima Mayor Betty Edmondson: "Wet ash turns into a slurry that is just about impossible to shovel."