By Matthew Piepenburg – Von Greyerz
In May of 1980, David Alexander Johnston, a volcanologist for the United States Geological Survey, was manning an observation post 10 kilometers from the percolating volcano of Mount St. Helens in the state of Washington.
On May 18th, he would be the first to report the volcano’s sudden eruption.
Within in minutes, however, Johnston would be killed by the volcano’s “lateral blasts.” his body was never recovered, and 56 others would also perish—along with 7,000 big game animals, 12 million fish, 200 homes, 300 kilometers of highway and 15 kilometers of railway.
Although monitoring volcanos may seem entirely removed from monitoring economic shocks, there are volcanic rumblings beneath our global oil, credit, equity and currency markets which are about to erupt.