Hike Mt. Shasta

Storm clouds break up over Mount Shasta as the sun sets.

It certainly was an interesting weather day here in Mount Shasta. It began as a beautiful sunny morning but by mid-morning the sky was filled with a spectacular array of wavy clouds above the Trinity Divide. It was a really remarkable display, enough that it caused me to stop and capture a couple of images. Later in the day, the clouds closed in and a big thunder storm rolled through. The afternoon was filled the the boom of the thunder and a little bit of rain. Most of the clouds eventually cleared, but Mount Shasta’s summit remained shrouded by a large plume that seemed intent on covering the mountain for the rest of the evening.

The sound of thunder was replaced by the hum of a helicopter. When I finally took notice of its repeated flights over my house, I observed it was carrying a bucket for putting fires. With all the lightning that had come down, this was not a surprise. It kept flying to the northwest but I could see no plumes of smoke in that area. It turns out that the fire was actually on Black Butte and the helicopter was presumably refilling its bucket at the pond over at Hammond Ranch. I was able to pop over near the south face of Black Butte and catch a few images of the fire. It was small, but seemed to be expanding. The helicopter seemed to be done at that time, so we will see if the fire has grown when morning comes. It’s not a big fire, but seeing things burning that high on the peak was certainly noteworthy. While capturing images of the small fire, the breaking storm clouds to the south and north presented beautiful scenes, making the entire evening quite memorable.

Click to enlarge (especially for the fire images!):