The Town That's Been on Fire for 62 Years | Centralia, Pennsylvania
In 1962, a fire started in a coal mine beneath the small town of Centralia, Pennsylvania. That fire is still burning today.
For more than six decades, the underground blaze has consumed coal seams, buckled highways, opened sinkholes, and filled basements with carbon monoxide. The town that once held over 1,000 residents now has fewer than five.
How It Started
The exact cause is still debated. The most widely accepted explanation is that in May 1962, the town council hired firefighters to clean up a landfill in an abandoned strip mine pit at the edge of town. The fire spread through an unsealed opening into the vast network of coal mines running beneath Centralia.
Attempts to extinguish the fire began almost immediately. Workers dug trenches, flushed the mines with water, and tried to excavate the burning material. Every effort failed. The fire was too deep, too spread out, and the mine network too complex. By the mid-1960s, the state had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars with nothing to show for it.
A Town Slowly Consumed
For years, residents lived with the fire. Smoke drifted from cracks in the ground. Gardens grew unseasonably warm. The smell of sulfur hung in the air. Some dismissed the danger. Others couldn’t afford to leave.
In 1981, a 12-year-old boy named Todd Domboski fell into a sinkhole that suddenly opened in his grandmother’s backyard. The hole was four feet wide and 150 feet deep, filled with hot steam and lethal levels of carbon monoxide. His cousin pulled him out. He survived, but the incident made national news and forced the government to act.
The Evacuation
In 1984, Congress allocated $42 million to relocate Centralia’s residents. Most accepted buyout offers and left. A handful refused. They argued the fire wasn’t as dangerous as officials claimed, or they simply didn’t want to leave the only home they’d ever known.
By the early 1990s, Centralia was a ghost town. The state condemned all remaining buildings. The zip code was revoked in 2002. Pennsylvania claimed eminent domain over the holdout properties in 2009, though a few residents were allowed to stay until their deaths through a legal agreement.
Still Burning
Experts estimate the fire could continue burning for 250 years or more. There are enough coal reserves beneath the region to fuel it for centuries. The affected area has grown to roughly 400 acres.
Centralia’s streets are still there, cracked and buckled, with steam rising through the pavement. Graffiti Highway, a section of the abandoned Route 61, became a tourist attraction before the state buried it under dirt in 2020 to discourage visitors.
The town is a reminder that some disasters don’t arrive with a bang. Some arrive quietly, burn slowly underground, and never stop.