Engineer helped design Spirit Lake highway after 1980 eruption. Now a landslide has brought him back

Less than a decade after the catastrophic May 18, 1980, eruption, construction of a new highway began; this time with more bridges and at a higher elevation. The terrain was still devastated.

“Going up there in 1990 … nothing had started growing back,” Harrison said. “You could really see the devastation. It was like a moonscape.”

As a designer, Harrison spent most of his time in the Vancouver office, only traveling the mountain once a week. When he did go, conditions on the mountain were sometimes sketchy. He often took old logging roads — sometimes dirt, sometimes gravel, and filled with potholes and mud puddles. Some abruptly turned into dead ends when bridges he planned to cross were washed out.

The experience was a crash course in working in remote locations, adverse weather conditions and with different government organizations.

“I didn’t know if it was overwhelming or not because it was my first project,” he said with a chuckle.

Harrison said the project provided him with an uncommon opportunity. Typically, he said, modern engineers work with existing structures — altering an exchange on an established freeway, moving a road a few feet one way or another or adding a turn lane.

“We don’t really get a chance to build brand new highways through nowhere land,” Harrison said.

First drive

Harrison waited over a decade to drive the highway after it opened in the mid-1990s. He navigated the winding road between the rust-colored guard rails to the Johnston Ridge Observatory.

“I guess I took it for granted,” he said. “Once it was done, I was on to the next project and left that one behind.”

Harrison wasn’t surprised when he learned of the slide. They’re not uncommon, he said.

The highway after Milepost 43 near the Science and Learning Center and areas like Coldwater Lake, the Hummocks Trail and Johnston Ridge Observatory remain closed. There is no expected time for its reopening.