Centralia began burning in 1962 and is still burning today.
C
entralia began to burn on Sunday, May 27, 1962. At the time, the north-eastern Pennsylvania town, located 114 miles northwest of Philadelphia, was home to around 1,400 people. As authorities battled for decades to put the coal mine fire underneath Centralia out, inhabitants ultimately had to be paid to relocate because it was so dangerous. As of 2023, the town’s population is down to just five residents.
There are various rumors about how the fire started. One is that a trash truck errantly dumped ash or coal into a landfill on the city’s edge. Another is that a previous colliery fire from 1932 was never actually extinguished. The most believed theory is that the town’s landfill was intentionally set ablaze. This used to occur annually to clean it out before that year’s Memorial Day celebrations. In 1962, though, it never went out.
Whatever the reason, the fire ultimately entered the maze of coal mines underneath Centralia. Cracks and sinkholes soon started to appear in backyards and on public streets, while the toxic fumes full of carbon monoxide made the air increasingly dangerous. For the last 61 years, the fire has continued to rage at depths of around 300 feet, while there is so much coal in the eight-mile stretch of 3,700 acres that experts believe it could remain on fire for another 250 years.
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The once quiet town has now been mostly bulldozed. The trees and plant life that used to line its streets and fill its parks have all wilted and died. Over recent years, though, Centralia has remained a tourist destination for the curious.
“The town was evacuated. Everything had mostly been knocked over; there’s not even buildings or anything. A lot of nature has reclaimed it,” says Johny Xmas, who in 2021 decided to pay the abandoned burning Pennsylvania ghost town a visit after he’d ventured to Allentown, around 65 miles to the east of Centralia, for work.
“Centralia has an urban legend status,” explains Xmas. “They’re very interested in making sure people don’t come to see it. It’s not like there’s a sign that says, ‘Hey, turn this way for some fire.’ But we were looking for day trips. I can remember hearing that Centralia was the inspiration for the general vibe of Silent Hill.”
The 2006 supernatural horror film was initially based on the hugely popular Silent Hill video game series. But its the film’s writer, Roger Avary, admitted in interviews to using Centralia as his inspiration for the fictional titular town that has long been abandoned for the same reason.
“Avary knew about Centralia because his father was a mining engineer,” explains David DeKok, a journalist and writer, who in 2009 released the book Fire Underground: The Ongoing Tragedy Of The Centralia Mine Fire. “He adapted the mine fire story to his story about a town occupied by underground demons.” When Silent Hill grossed over $100 million at the box office, coupled with the initial success of the video game, a whole new generation of people were introduced to the story of Centralia.
But the local authorities have done everything they can to stop Centralia from looking like Silent Hill. “You can go up and down every street. That is mostly what we did. As far as the underground fire that’s still burning, they are very quick to get anywhere where there’s smoke coming up out of the ground. They’ll pile huge amounts of dirt on top of it to try and smolder it out,” says Xmas.
That wasn’t always the case. Documentarian Joe Sapienza, who in 2017 released his documentary Centralia: Pennsylvania’s Lost Town, insists that “back in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, the smoke was really bad.”
“A lot of people told us that when they visited, they thought there would be abandoned buildings and fire and smoke everywhere. But it wasn’t like that for us,” admits Sapienza. “If you go on the other side of the cemetery, there’s a little valley with a huge boulder where a lot of steam comes out. But that’s it.”
That doesn’t stop people from still trekking across America to see Centralia. “The tourism didn’t really start until the late 2010s,” says DeKok.
“Every time we went up there to film, there were always people there,” adds Sapienza. “I’d say maybe a good 20 people spread around town. A lot of that had to do with Graffiti Highway.”
The 0.73-mile-long part of Pennsylvania Route 61 that previously brought visitors to the town was closed in 1993 due to the wreckage caused by the underground fire. At the start of the 2000s, graffiti artists started to spray paint the road. They were joined by skateboarders, mountain bikers, other daredevils, ghost hunters, photographers, and people who wanted to check out such a unique and desolate location. Social media and Silent Hill only increased the popularity of Graffiti Highway.
But while it initially looked like not even COVID-19 could stop people from descending on Graffiti Highway, that ultimately proved to be its downfall. “People just kept on coming. There were a couple of minor accidents. Nothing really serious,” says DeKok. Pagnotti, a mining company that bought the land in 2018, soon decided they didn’t want to be liable for any potential lawsuits.
“They covered the entire highway with piles of dirt,” says DeKok. This hasn’t completely stopped people from coming to the area, though. “These piles of dirt were supposed to deter the dirt bike and ATV riders. In fact, they just created an exciting new challenge. You’ll see these dirt piles with motorcycle tracks,” says DeKok, who also still takes visitors on tours of Centralia.
“My tour lasts about two hours. I show them photos of what the town used to look like. I’ll have them standing in front of the municipal building, one of the few buildings still standing. I’ll unscrew one of the holes and show them the steam coming out. It’s all done very safely.”
Xmas believes that Centralia can do more to attract visitors. In fact, he thinks the town should take inspiration from Roswell, New Mexico, as tourists still flock there even though there’s no history to appreciate or anything worth seeing.
“If there was a UFO crash there, it was gone within half a day. But people still go there. Even though there’s nothing really there to see. They buy a keychain and a hat. With Centralia, at least they can make it interesting and say this used to be a town. But they don’t even want to do that.”
For Sapienza, ultimately, there’s no doubt about Centralia’s future: “I see it as still being a tourist attraction. There’s always going to be people that are curious and want to go out there. They want to see what’s left and imagine what happened. Even if the town doesn’t want them to.”
I remember driving that road while smoke was coming up by the side of the road during the early 1990's. I was scared but my husband just said it was okay. I was worried the tires would melt or that all of a sudden there would be an explosion. A few miles from Centralia we stopped at a small local eatery and there were people there who had lived in the town. Their whole lives were turned upsaide down by the fire that just couldn't be put out.