Not much has been said recently in the news about Mt. St. Helens and the fact that it's still active and spewing some steam and ash. The alert level for volcanic unrest, as they call it, remains at Orange. Earlier today USGS photographers took some pictures from the air of a steam and ash eruption (it's actually been ongoing for almost a month now). A new lava dome has formed, and continues to be active and grow.

From the USGS: “Seismicity remains at a low level compared to that observed early in this unrest. The current seismicity is consistent with a continuing, slow rise of magma driving uplift of the crater floor and feeding a surface extrusion of lava. The overall low rates of seismicity and gas emission suggest that the lava reaching the surface is gas poor, thereby reducing the probability of highly explosive eruptions in the near term.”

These images are from November 4th. Click the images to go to the official web site, where more pictures and info can be found. Note the ash stains on the snow in both images. You might also be interested in the "repeat views" image gallery, which contains same-angle images over time, so you can see the progression of change.