60th anniversary of the infamous centralia coal mine fire upon us now
it is an excellent time to talk about the darkest side of pennsylvania's most prominent industry
the fires deep below ground this state is the location of a third of all the
united states's mining disasters and up to 45 confirmed fire zones burning for decades or
even centuries to come but how did this happen and why in the keystone state well today we will have
a look into the history of pennsylvania's coal mine disasters and fires which have resulted in
countless ghost towns i'm your host ryan socash and you're watching it's history
before the war of 1812 against great britain anthracite or rock coal found
infrequent use as people had a tendency to stick with wood and charcoal anthracite was
challenging to collect as its source was deep in the ground and it was equally challenging
to transport however as the 1800s progressed transportation became increasingly more feasible
as technologies such as railroads and canals develop in the 1860s pennsylvania's coal was
one of the driving forces behind the industrial revolution of america it regularly and almost
single-handedly supplied metropolitan areas like new york city and philadelphia with all the energy
they needed but when it came to iron and steel production anthracite coal had no equal its fires
produced much higher quality iron and yielded up to 25 percent more than its competitors this
efficiency quickly became highly sought after and by the 1850s hard coal produced more than
half of all crude iron in the united states this increased efficiency was instrumental in making
the machinery needed to create structures such as steam engines forming the backbone of the new
industrial society railroad companies capitalized on the importance of pennsylvania's coal being
chiefly responsible for its transportation from the mines and these railroad companies became
empires within the industrial revolution this enormous concentration fueled the mining boom
as the demand made it much easier to build deeper shafts and find more coal in the 1850s
miners went as deep as 1 500 feet working in small tunnels supported only by timber bars
mines needed drainage systems to pump out water found deep underground
which was a frequent discovery mines also needed reliable ventilation systems to pump out used air
and then pump back in fresh air without these air pumps miners would suffocate on the very
air that they breathed one such incident was the avondale mine disaster on september the 6th 1869
the wooden lining of the shaft caught fire and ignited the coal breaker built directly overhead
the fire trapped and suffocated 108 workers as well as two rescuers trying to help them it was
the most significant mine disaster in american history at the time though accidents were common
parents all across the state delved into the depths never to see the light of day again many
felt they had no other choice in order to provide for their families in 1917 production reached
an astonishing 100 million tons but nothing was ever enough for the ever hungry furnaces of the
industrial revolution at least not until the great depression during the great depression industries
switched to cheaper fuel alternatives like electricity oil and natural gas which were more
affordable leading to existing mines being poorly maintained which is bad news for many reasons
but fire would come to damage this state the most you see after the 1950s coal mining became nearly
irrelevant and the number of abandoned mines was a major fire hazard but before we examine their
stories let's have a quick overview on how coal mine fires start a coal seam fire is when a coal
source underground catches fire an event like that might occur naturally and they might have
naturally occurred for millions of years even without human intervention but importantly they
were previously primarily on the surface where coal could easily reach oxygen in the atmosphere
even a wildfire might ignite coal near the surface and start the fire which is likely the case with
the oldest known coal seam fire that fire is a burning mountain in australia whose flames
have already raged for 6 000 years but that being said the fires we're discussing today are totally
different these fires happened deep underground where natural circumstances don't allow for fire
you might wonder why well fire needs three things to ignite heat oxygen and fuel surface level coal
seam fires have everything figured out the coal is the fuel the oxygen is the air and the heat enters
from the wilderness or other circumstances so how does it happen underground well cold deposits are
often near pockets of highly flammable methane gas and as you might imagine if even the smallest
spark occurs the gas pocket can burst into flames if oxygen is present and although you might not
realize it sparks actually happen all the time for example one could come from let's say a miner's
pickaxe striking a stone that spark causing miner also needs his oxygen to breathe so if the mine
is pumped full of fresh oxygen then the methane gas has all the tools needed to
explode into flames and depending on the size of the gas pocket the resulting explosion could
be insignificantly small or so massive that it might be mistaken as an earthquake so it's
no wonder that methane blasts were often the most common cause of death within mines and as if that
wasn't enough should the explosion be large coal may reach its combustion temperature in this case
the methane explosion provides the heat the oxygen is already present and the coal becomes the fuel
and if you ever used coal for a grill you'll know how long it can burn and just how hot it can get
even after the fire seems to have run out so in the context of a massive coal mine imagine the
same thing with literal tons of coal supported by industrial air pumps fire like that is nearly
impossible to extinguish in smaller mines one can stop the growth by demolishing mine shafts but
given the coal-rich mines of pennsylvania where one can find plenty of coal when a fire starts
it does not stop it might burn for decades or even centuries and although many precautions are taken
sometimes a mine fire is just as simple as the wrong place at the wrong time as was the
case with pennsylvania's most famous coal mine fire resulting in a massive ghost town centralia
let's head back to 1962 centralia and the story starts in an attempt to dispose of trash local
authorities set fire to a landfill but with the dump something else began to burn a nearby mine
which sat abandoned let's run down that list again oxygen it had ventilation from when it was in use
so check heat the landfill is burning fire is enough heat to ignite the coal so check and fuel
an entire mine full of coal so also check all the pieces were together leading to a fire consuming
the town over the years residents fled sinkholes emerged and the fire has burned for 60 years and
counting but it's not only centralia that burns to this day in december of 1915 a miner accidentally
left his lamp lit on a timber support eventually catching fire due to the company laying off their
night watchmen this fire went unnoticed for an entire weekend upon returning on monday december
the 6th the fire had grown beyond manageable levels the miners attempted to block off the
air supply by blocking vents with sand and filling the entrance with concrete after which they stated
everything was under control however by 1921 it had become apparent that the fire had only grown
the company began building temporary seals to contain the fire so that the area could remain
workable which is a rather frightening thought this situation persisted until kaliri ceased
active mining in 1957 at which point they also stopped trying to control the fire
as a result by 1962 residents in the nearby town of laurel run had to abandon their homes
due to the gases that were seeping out of the mine and by 1971 when more blockage actions began
850 residents had to relocate elsewhere in pennsylvania these types of stories are not unique
in the mid-1940s a fire in carbondale-pennsylvania city dump the source of which is unknown spread
to a nearby mine attempts to flood the mine failed throughout the late 40s and early 50s
at which point the town dug boreholes around the perimeter to choke it out with sand
they then attempted to dig out the fire but significant property damage and fire spread forced
this process to stop 1952 saw the first fatalities as a couple suffocated to death on carbon monoxide
in their own home dozens later suffered poisoning but no deaths before anyone else could die
evacuation began in 1960 as the fire spread throughout the decades by 1974 however the
city had successfully extinguished it after a thousand residents had already evacuated
and it caused millions of dollars of damage pennsylvania has over a quarter million acres of
abandoned post minefire lands estimates claim that 1.3 thousand acres of underground mines still burn
to this day and that the remaining abandoned mine shafts in the state do not bode well either all
it takes is one erratic spark and the state may suffer yet another fire and end up with another
ghost town one more disturbing thought is that some estimations suggest that these types of mine
fires contribute more to global warming than cars these fires are extremely difficult to put down
and in some cases extinguishment is simply impossible one can only hope that in another
60 years these fires will have gone the way of their industry but that might very well
be wishful thinking in places such as centralia they're expected to burn for a thousand years