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Short Stuff: Centralia Coal Fire · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, you welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh. There's Chuck.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: We're Josh where Juck doesn't matter. And this is stuff
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: you should know? Is it short stuff? Yeah? Short stuff
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: you should know. Man, my mind, Chuck, You're right. No, Okay,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: let's continue. Okay, we're talking about Centralia. Yeah, which we've
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: talked about before. I don't know if it was in
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: an Abandoned Places episode or I think that I don't
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: remember what else we would have talked about it in.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: But we have definitely talked about it. Yeah, unless we
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: talked about Cole maybe, but um that that's the then
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: diagram of abandoned places and coal uh Sits Centralia, Pennsylvania,
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: the very smallest municipality in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: it is a former mining community a couple of hours
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: northwest of phil Lee. That there was always a small town,
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: a small mining town it. I think it only had
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: about four hundred people there in the early nineteen sixties,
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: but now there are less than ten people for one
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: very scary reason. And what is that. Well, the scary
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: reason is that when you're walking around Centralia, the earth
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: may open up and swallow you into a fiery pit
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: at any given moment without anyone. Yeah, how's that good
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: way to say it? Thank you? Uh yeah, So what's
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: what happened, Well, we don't know exactly what happened. There's
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: a few different versions of this story that will go
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: over in a second, but the end result of each
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: of these stories is that in nineteen sixty two, there
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: is uh still burning from that year a coal seam
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: fire literally coal on fire underground under Centralia in the
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: surrounding area of Centralia, Pennsylvania, right, which is I mean,
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: that's a very alarming thing because I think any person
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: who hears that says, well, how would you put one
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: of those out? And the answer to that is, by
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: the time it's been burning for seventy years, you don't
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: burns itself out. And then an average reasonable person would
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: be like, wait, wait, well there's a lot of coal underground.
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: Can it just keep burning like indefinitely? And the answer
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: to that reasonable person is absolutely so. Uh. These seams
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  Speaker 1: um are naturally occurring coal deposits. They're called seams in
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: the industry. Uh. They're sort of like veins that run
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: through the earth that are made of coal, and they
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: can It's it's not like this is a rare thing.
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: Coal seam fires happen a lot, and can happen all
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: over and do happen all over the world. I had
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: no idea. I mean, I've known about centrally as fire
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: for many, many years, but I had no idea that
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: this is a very common thing. It's very alarming. Really, Centralia,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: what did I say? You said to Centralia? And you
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: don't want to anger those ten people. Uh, it's like
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: saying Nevada. Which way? Do they not like it? They say,
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: only people in Nevada call it Nevada? Okay, Yeah, everybody
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: else calls it Nevada. Really makes them mad. I don't
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: want to do that to the people of good people
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: of Centralia, altend of them. So I'm just gonna call
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: it c Town then to cover my basis. Yeah, okay,
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: because now if I if I just spend time thinking
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: about it, it'll just totally derail this whole episode. Let's
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: go back to coal seam fire. So they're very common,
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: Like you said, apparently in China, um something like, well,
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: there's a three thousand miles stretch of a coal mining
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: belt around China, and I guess at any given time,
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: a pretty decent proportion of it is on fire with
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: these coal seam fires, which is problematic. There's a town
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: in India called jahari H and it has had a
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: coal seam fire going on since nineteen eighteen and has
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: lost something like forty one million tons of coal to
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: this fire just up and smoke quite literally. Yeah. Uh,
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: obviously this happens more often if the miners didn't do
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: the right thing when they left. So like they're down
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: there mining and they've got these tunnels and you've got
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: to take care of that stuff when you leave. You
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: can't just say all right, we're out of here and
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: put the confishient sign out front. Well, unfortunately a lot
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: of mine owners have done that for a very long time. Yeah,
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: absolutely so. Um, if you don't have like the right supports,
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: uh to keep the ground from collapsing, that can be
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: a fire risk as well. Get a film in I
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: saw also chuck that. Um. There's this company that developed
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: what they call a cellular foam. It's actually a mixture
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: of Portland's cement and fly ash, which is a very
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: difficult ways to get rid of and so my their
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: stuff and it's a foam you can spray on whatever
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: coals left over um and it will prevent this fire
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  Speaker 1: from these fires from catching, which is a really great thing.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: And also it gets rid of like I said, that
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  Speaker 1: fly waste or fly ash waste, that's that's tough to
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: um remediate on its own. So you're killing two birds
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  Speaker 1: with one stone. But one of the reasons that you
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: would want to seal off whatever coal seam is left
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: after you abandon the mind is because it's not just
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: dipstick humans who set coal seam fires like they can
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: happen quite naturally too. And then because that's a very
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: tantalizing thing to say, I suggest, Chuck that we take
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: an am break right now. All right, let's do it
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: all right now? Is the payoff everybody. Coal seam fires
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: can start under natural circumstances, go, Chuck, Yeah, they are.
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  Speaker 1: They can even spontaneously combust. Uh. And once they get going,
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  Speaker 1: especially this anthracite coal, it is very very hard to
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: put out. Um produces a lot of heat, and that
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: that's self heat. It it just sort of is a
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: cyclical thing. It just sort of stays on fire. And
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: that's why when you're shipping coal, uh, it's you know,
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: it's dangerous to ship coal when they get all those
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: big steamerships. It's dangerous, yeah, because the the as the
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: coal oxidizes, I think Piet Pie write um inside the
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: coal as it oxidizes, it starts to heat up. So
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: the coal can heat up from inside out, and it
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: can get hot enough that it can actually self ignite
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: spontaneously combust like you were saying, So, imagine having like
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: a tanker ship full of coal and your sailor on
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: that ship, and you are fully aware that coal can
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: spontaneously ignite. Wouldn't you be nervous? That'd be a little
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: nerve breaking, especially because so you know that that ship
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: is on fire in San Diego, the Navy ship right now, right,
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: and they were saying that it's reaching temperatures of about
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: a thousand degrees fahrenheit and it was melting steel. It
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: was that hot. Well, friend, that coal seam fire in Centralia,
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: Did I say it right? Centralia? Man Um. It has
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: been shown to reach at least temperatures of fifty degrees
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: which is something like seven two degrees celsius. So if
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: that happened on your ship, it would definitely burn a
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: hole right through your ship and you would be sunk
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: down to Davy Jones locker. Yeah, so how this thing starts? Did?
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: There are a few different versions. Um, my money is
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: on probably the most popular version, which was on sixty
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: two they burned a landfill on purpose. This was something
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: that that you know, would happen regularly as you would
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: burn the trash literally and that this trash burn kind
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: of got into that coal seam and boom, there you
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: have it, and it started a fire that has never
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: been put out to this day. Um. Other versions of
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: the story was that it was another garbage fire and
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: not that one on let by a truck driver. Uh.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: And then another one is that it started in the
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: nineteen thirties I think and has just been around, and
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: then in the nineteen sixties it was kind of noticed
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: for the first time. I like that one myself. Oh yeah, yeah.
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: The idea that it was kind of smoldering and then
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden, you know, maybe a flapper through
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: there cigarette I could totally see that. Sure, that might
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: be sexist though, so let's just say it could have
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: been a flapper or a boy toy. Okay. Either way, though,
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: that thing caught on fire started sweeping through those tunnels. Um,
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: we're talking a hundred to three hundred feet down below.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: The earth is still on fire. You can still see
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: it today. There's some cool little short version YouTube documentaries
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: where news crews have gone out and stuff about Centralia,
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  Speaker 1: and on rainy days, you just you stand there, especially
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: on rainy days, and you just see that steam and
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: smoke coming out from the earth itself. Um, which is
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: why one reason why it gave rise to the video
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  Speaker 1: game and then later on the movie Silent Hill. It's
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: just this creepy abandoned town. Although the astounding thing is
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: that it's not fully abandoned, like you said, there are
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: some people. They're still. I think there's ten people that
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: live there still, and they live there because they basically
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: said I'm not moving. And so the government of Pennsylvania
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: finally said, fine, you you guys, you lifelong residents of
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: original residents of Centralia, you can stay here until you
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: and what you say in chill, I said, Centralia, Centralia again.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: I don't care. I don't care anymore. I'm sorry, I'm
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: sorry people of c Town. I'm mispronouncing your name. I'm
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: offending ten people right now. Well, the government tried to
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: get them out of there. Um, they took away their
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: zip code in two thousand two. They were like, sorry,
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: no zip code. Uh. I don't know if they were
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: like we need that for somewhere else or we're just
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: retiring it. It's a big burn, no pun intended. They
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: took away Route sixty one or part of it. At
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: least it ran through there, and some people say it's
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: closed for other other people say like it could reopen
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: again one day. I don't think it will. Know who
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: says it could reopen one day, that's ridiculous. And one
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: of those documentaries and like, you know, the idea was
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: if this and gets under control, they could rebuild the
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: road and no Centralie one reason why they decided to
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: move everybody out of there, and it was done with
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: taxpayer funded basically like moving fund everyone has given a pope. Well,
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: the reason why they started moving everybody think in the
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: early eighties some kid was playing in one of the
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: streets and the street just collapsed under him and he
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: was hanging by his fingers above this like burning pit
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: that he was about to drop into, and they're like, okay,
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: I don't think Centralie is safe to live in. That
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: was forty years ago, so the town has done nothing
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: but get more unstable since then, so that at the
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: very least that highway is not opening back up. They've
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: also demolished buildings there too. You know what actually happened
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: to that kid? What is he went to investigate some smoke, uh,
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: and the thing exploded and shot him fifty ft up
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: into the air. I think it was a different kid,
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: was it? I don't know? And like the idea that
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: I got something wrong, man, And it just so happened
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: to be on the same day that a bunch of
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: news crews and local politicians were there, and that was
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: not a good look at all. The kid lived by
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: the way, Well, the kid lived in my version too. Yeah,
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: that's good. They've tried a bunch of things over the
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: years to extinguish it. They put vent pipes in in
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: the eighties, and the idea there was not to put
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: out the fire, but to direct these noxious gases because
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: you know, there's all kinds of nasty stuff being put
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: into the air, to vent those at least away from
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: the town. And some people said that's not working, and
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: in fact it's feeding the fire with oxygen. So they
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: sealed them up a right, So where does that leave us? Chuck. Well,
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: they've also tried to put it out altogether. They dug
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: it's sort of like a firebreak. They dug a trent
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: down to try and reach that seam in front of
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: the fire, but the fire went so fast they didn't
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: go far enough ahead. It beat them to where they
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: were digging down and they just went nuts. Right, But
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: apparently that's like, um, that's kind of par for the course.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: Like that. You they're just really tough to put out.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: You can kind of understand how that would be the
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: case from from what I've read. You have to stay
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: on top of it immediately after you noticed this and
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: then continue monitoring it basically indefinitely, because it can just
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: keep flaring up. And in fact, there's a there's something
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: called burning mountain Mount Wingin or Winging in New South Wales,
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: Australia that they think has been burning for six thousand
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: years now. Really yeah, really, man, Well that's scary stuff.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: I think so too. But that was a good one,
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: don't you think I think it was great? Great? Well,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: we hope that you think the same thing too. And
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: since we've run out of stuff to talk about about Centralia,
• 14:03
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