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Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeart

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Radio, Hey

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brain Stuff Lauren Vogel bam here. The

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smallest municipality in Pennsylvania is

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Centralia, a former mining

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community located about two hours northwest

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of Philadelphia. Records tell

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us it had one thousand, four hundred and thirty

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five residents in the year nineteen sixty.

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Today, fewer than ten people still

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live there. The US Postal

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Service revoked Centralia's zip code

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in two thousand two, and the local

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portion of State Route sixty one was permanently

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closed off nine years before that. We

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can't blame the area's decline on the usual

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socioeconomics suspects. Its

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problems run deeper, literally,

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since at least nineteen sixty two,

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a coal seam fire has been smoldering

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right below the town. Yes,

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in Centralia, the earth has been

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smoking and ash has been raining

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down for over fifty years. No

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one knows exactly how the coal fire got

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started, but whatever set the thing off,

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this long lived blaze isn't some kind

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of one off fluke. Naturally

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occurring coal deposits are called seams

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in the mining industry, and wherever such

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veins occur, whole seam fires

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like the one under Centralia may break out

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and commonly do. China's

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three thousand mile or five thousand kilometer

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coal mining belt is notorious for its

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seam fires. So is a town in

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India where fires have claimed about

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forty one million tons of coal since

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nineteen eighteen. We

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spoke via email with a Newtma Prakash,

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a geologist at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks.

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She said the issue is more prevalent

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in areas where coal was extracted in the past

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with limited efforts to ensure that the whole

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left from the extraction was filled up. She

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explained that minds that don't provide

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structural support to keep ground from collapsing

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likewise risk seam fire outbreaks.

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Granted, humans aren't always responsible

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though. Down in New South Wales,

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Australia, there's a famous coal seam

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that's been burning for six thousand years

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straight. Scientists think it was

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first ignited by an ancient brush fire or

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lightning strike. The coal

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doesn't need much encouragement to catch fire.

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Under the right circumstances, the material can

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actually light itself ablaze through spontaneous

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combustion. We

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also spoke via email with research geologist

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Alan Colker He explained

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the decomposition of pyrite present in

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coal produces heat, and in

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some cases this self heating can

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start the coal on fire. This is a problem

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even where coal is transported long distances

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and ships. By

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most accounts, Centralia's Great Fire

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began at a dump near the local Odd Fellows

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Cemetery on nineteen

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sixty two. This landfill was intentionally

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set ablaze with six volunteer firefighters

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standing by. It was all part

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of a yearly clean up effort by the local

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government. Controlled ns

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were popular garbage disposal technique

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back then, but things didn't always

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go according to plan. Perhaps

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this fire ran deeper into the trash than

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anybody realized. If so, it

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could have spread through the refuse and entered

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the nearest coal mine pit with no one

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being the wiser. Then

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again, maybe the town government

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had nothing to do with it. Some have

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argued that a different garbage fire at the same

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site, a lit by an unidentified

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truck driver, is what really sealed

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Centralia's fate. Another

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less popular theory claims that the coal

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seam fire started all the way back in the Great

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Depression and went unextinguished for

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decades before the nineteen sixties gave it

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a new lease on life. Regardless,

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the inferno made itself right at home,

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sweeping through mine tunnels and coal seams.

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Flames descended as far as three hundred

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feet that's ninety below the ground,

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sometimes nearing temperatures of one thousand,

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three hundred and fifty degrees fahrenheit or

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seven thirty celsius. According

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to an investigation, in passageways

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underlying some four hundred acres or

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a hundred and sixty hectares of land had

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been touched by the blaze at some time or other.

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Kolker said uncontrolled coal

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fires have all the potential environmental impacts

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of burning coal for power generation, with

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none of the benefits. In addition to

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emitting carbon dioxide, trace metals

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such as mercury and harmful fine

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particles are omitted. Per

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Cash noted that methane and sulfur dioxide

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are also common and so distinctive

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that just talking about these fires virtually

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floods her with memories of the scent. To

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this day, smoke rises from the earth

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through fissures around Centralia.

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Meanwhile, the terrain has become perilously

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unstable over time. Percash

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said these fires are dangerous

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as land can suddenly collapse or sink

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as the fire just eats up the ground

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underneath. Such collapses can damage

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houses, roads, train tracks, et cetera. That's

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why Pennsylvania closed off four thousand feet

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or about one thousand, two hundred meters of root

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sixty one back in. Subterranean

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pillars that held up the pavement were destroyed

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or weakened by the flames, making the roadway

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totally unsuitable for motorists. So

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will Centralia's fire ever burn

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out. Extinguishing efforts

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so far haven't paid off. Between

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nineteen sixty two and nineteen eighty two,

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assorted government agencies spent seven

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million dollars fighting the Centralia coal

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fire. Openings were sealed, trenches

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were dug, and the mines were stuffed with non

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combustible ashes, sands and crushed

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rocks, but nothing worked. Nearly

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all of Centralia's former residents are long

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gone. Many took advantage of a forty

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two million dollar taxpayer funded relocation

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initiative, which saw five hundred buildings

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destroyed. The final holdouts

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have been granted permission to spend the rest of

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their lives in the town, as per settlement

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with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

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According to the state's Department of Environmental Protection,

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the fire might keep on raging for over a hundred

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years yet to come. But

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as bad as they can get, coal seam

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fires aren't invincible, Prakash

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said. Good policies on mining safety

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and reclamation go a long way as

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preventative measure. If a fire does

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start, taking quick action to contain

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it by isolating the fire, dousing

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the fire, cooling the area, and

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continued monitoring to ensure that the fire

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does not start again are important measures.

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Centralia's hellish effect made it part

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of the inspiration for the two thousand six horror

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film Silent Hill, the departure from

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the video game series that it was adapted from,

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and over the past thirty odd years, the

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town Centralia, not Silent

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Hill, has become an unlikely tourist

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destination. One former attraction

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was the abandoned stretch of Root sixty

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one. Dubbed the Graffiti Highway.

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It attracted masses of street artists who

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added a rainbow of cartoons and signatures

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to the pavement. However, in

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twenty twenty, the corporation that the

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undrivable road had it covered up with piles

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of dirt, to dissuade visitors from swinging

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by during the COVID nineteen pandemic.

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Today's episode was written by Mark Mancini and

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produced by Tyler Clay. For more on this

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and lots of other burning topics, visit how stuff works

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dot com. Brain Stuff is production of

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