Centralia mine fire
The 300-foot-wide, 75-foot-long (91 m × 23 m) pit was made up of a 50-foot-deep (15 m) strip mine that had been cleared by Edward Whitney[clarification needed] in 1935, and came very close to the northeast corner of Odd Fellows Cemetery.
Trustees at the cemetery were opposed to the landfill's proximity to it but recognized the illegal dumping elsewhere was a serious problem and envisioned that the new pit would resolve it.
Nonetheless, the Centralia council set a date and hired five members of the volunteer firefighter company to clean up the landfill.
On July 2, Monsignor William J. Burke complained about foul odors from the smoldering trash and coal reaching St. Ignatius Church.
[7] Clarence "Mooch" Kashner, the president of the Independent Miners, Breakermen, and Truckers union, came at the invitation of a council member to inspect the situation in Centralia.
Kashner evaluated the events and called Gordon Smith, an engineer of the Department of Mines and Mineral Industries (DMMI) office in Pottsville.
A call was placed to Art Joyce, a mine inspector from Mount Carmel, who brought gas detection equipment for use on the swirling wisps of steam now emanating from ground fissures in the north wall of the landfill pit.
[7] The Centralia Council sent a letter to the Lehigh Valley Coal Company (LVCC) as formal notice of the fire.
It is speculated that the town council had decided that hiding the true origin of the fire would serve better than alerting the LVCC of the truth, which would most likely end in receiving no help from them.
In the letter, the borough described the starting of a fire "of unknown origin during a period of unusually hot weather".
Therefore, Shober announced that he expected the state to finance the cost of digging out the fire, which was at that time around $30,000 (roughly equivalent to $302,000 in 2023).
Another offer was made at the meeting, proposed by Centralia strip mine operator Alonzo Sanchez, who told members of council that he would dig out the mine fire free of charge as long as he could claim any coal he recovered without paying royalties to the Lehigh Valley Coal Company.
[7] The Department of Mines and Mineral Industries (DMMI), who originally believed Bridy would need only to excavate 24,000 cu yd (18,000 m3) of earth,[1][page needed] informed them that they were forbidden from doing any exploratory drilling in order to find the perimeter of the fire or how deep it was, and that they were to strictly follow plans drawn up by the engineers[which?]
Intentional breaching of the subterranean mine chambers allowed large amounts of oxygen to rush in, greatly worsening the fire.
Crushed rock would be mixed with water and pumped into Centralia's mines ahead of the expected fire expansion.
On April 11, 1963, steam issuing from additional openings in the ground indicated that the fire had spread eastward as far as 700 ft (210 m),[7] and that the project had failed.
In 1979, locals became aware of the scale of the problem when a gas-station owner, then-mayor John Coddington, inserted a dipstick into one of his underground tanks to check the fuel level.
[5] Todd began suffering nightmares of the incident from Post-traumatic stress disorder later in life, for which he turned to prescribed medication.
In addition to the council minutes, Quigley cites "interviews with volunteer firemen, the former fire chief, borough officials, and several eyewitnesses" as her sources.
According to local legend, the Bast Colliery coal fire of 1932, set alight by an explosion, was never fully extinguished.
One man who disagrees is Frank Jurgill Sr., who claims he operated a bootleg mine with his brother in the vicinity of the landfill between 1960 and 1962.
[7] Another hypothesis arose from a letter sent to the Lehigh Valley Coal Company by the Centralia Council in the days after the mine fire was noticed.
The letter describes "a fire of unknown origin [starting] on or about June 25, 1962, during a period of unusually hot weather".
[21] In lawsuits, the remaining residents alleged that they were victims of "massive fraud", "motivated primarily by interests in what is conservatively estimated at hundreds of millions of dollars of some of the best anthracite coal in the world".
[22] In July 2012, the last handful of residents in Centralia lost their appeal of a court decision upholding eminent domain proceedings and were again ordered to leave.
[26] Visitors come to see the smoke and/or steam on Centralia's empty streets and the abandoned portion of PA Route 61, popularly referred to as the Graffiti Highway.
