May 18, 2024 9:59 p.m. Updated: May 18, 2024 7 a.m.
Gerry Martin, a Navy veteran trained as a short-wave radio operator, drove his 1971 Dodge Superior Motor Coach on May 17, 1980, to Mount St. Helens to volunteer for an emergency services network known as Amateur Radio Emergency Services, or ARES. On a ridge looking at the mountain, he made his final broadcast on May 18.
