There's so much to address in this film, and once we realized the scope we also realized it needs to be a longer and more in-depth piece or reporting...working on it!
My family is from Scranton and my grandfather and his brother worked the mines in Carbondale. My uncle still lives near there. Thank you for bringing this problem to a larger audience. We have known about this for years.
Hi Sara - You almost have to be from there to know anything about this stuff. Carbondale and the surrounding country is amazing. Thank the filmmaker John Welsh. He saw the story.
As someone that lives in PA, this was very interesting and I would love to know more. I’ve always heard about the mine fires that burn for decades but not much more information than that.
This is very informative and not something I would have known had Mike Rowe not posted about it. Thankful that you did this content. Background sound could use less volume very good music choice nonetheless.
The video presents a problem in very dramatic terms. But it left me frustrated because it did not answer obvious questions that I would think at least some viewers would predictably have and that should have been addressed. How did so many fires start? How are they getting oxygen to burn and why can't the oxygen supply be smothered? Are all the fires the result of mining or are any "natural" - like lightning-caused forest fires are natural? Have any fires been "put out" and if so, how and why can't the same method be used on other fires? What agencies are responsible for putting these out? Is this a U.S. problem only or are other countries dealing with the same problems, and if so, what are they doing that we might learn from?
I was born and raised in Mt. Carmel (about 2 miles from the centralia mine fire). Over the decades from the time the fire was first discovered, they have tried to put it out, they have shoveled millions and millions of dollars trying to extinguish it. They have tried digging it out, filling the mines with sand, etc. The fire is deep underground, and it spans square miles of area, oxygen is getting down to it through cracks in the ground, old mine tunnels, etc. It would be nearly impossible to smother its oxygen supply. There are new areas of ground that subside every day that gives oxygen a new path to the fire.There have been other mine fires that were extinguished, including one right outside of Mt. Carmel, but they were much smaller scale operations.
Hey Bob - We got as much in here as we could. The story is enormous and it is a global catastrophe as I understand it. We'd love to be able to unpack this story even more.
I grew up in Laurel Run and have been to Centralia. No words other than bittersweet is how I see these disasters. It's sad that it came down to negligence that interrupted so many lives, cost so much money and damaged countless acres of Earth. Here's to learning from our mistakes and hopefully making a better place for our future.
Well done. Made me actually wish for something longer, seems like a subject you could really sink your teeth into. I knew about Centralia, had no clue about the other places and the extent of the problem. Do other coal mining states have similar issues? If not, how come? If so, how are they handling it? Are other mines being remediated before they catch fire? Many questions....
Guns - Thank you. We wanted to do something longer and there is a sister film to this that takes a deeper dive and I'll post it when I can. I'm, sadly, just the host of this. However, my understanding is that the only continent on Earth that doesn't have mine fires is the only continent without mines: Antarctica. The fires shown in the film are all within a 30-minute drive of each other, give or take. The problem is global. There is an inferno of energy just burning away underground. And don't even get me started on the flooding and hydro catastrophe going on.
Thanks...and it was an eye opening experience creating this short with Mark as the host. The more we uncovered, the more we realized that this is not just a Pennsylvania problem, but a global one too...there are mine fires on 6 continents.
Thank you. Thank you. You can copy this link. Then paste it wherever you want to share and it should populate with a thumbnail - ua-cam.com/video/BeynZtqsqtQ/v-deo.html - There is also a share button next to the thumbs up/down. Bottom right.
Thank you. I really don't like to take much credit if I can avoid it (plenty of self-loathing in here) but I wrote that one and am proud of it. Thank you.
I grew up in Shamokin and am proud of my roots. The coal region has seen some incredibly tough times. Things started to take a turn for the worse when the silk industry failed in the 1930s. It's been a slow and steady decline since then. Very very sad situation for the proud people of that area.
It really is, the irony is that when we started creating this film, I was revisiting where my grandfather and mother grew up (he worked in a bootleg before moving to Philly) so I have heard lots of stories throughout the years from a generation of aunts and uncles about Shamokin.
@@myfixituplife My grandfather came from the Ukraine, and when looking for work at the Glen Burn Colliery, was turned away - LITERALLY - with the statement, "No one died today, come back tomorrow and maybe there will be an opening." So he took to the hills and worked for an illegal mine, a bootleg, meaning it was a bunch of guys who dug into the mountain (not really worrying about whose coal they were taking) and had a rogue mining operation where they extracted their own coal. And according to wiki here ya go: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootleg_mining
Also came via Mike Rowe. I had no idea. Thank you for the interesting video. A suggestion if you ever decide to tweak the editing -- turn the music down just a bit. The first two minutes especially have a lot of bass in them that maybe doesn't come through laptop/phone speakers, but is quite loud on larger speakers.
I'll jump in ahead of Mark and say yes, there are many other angles of attack regarding this story...and we didn't even get into the water issues leftover from mining in PA. Lots to do and plan for!
Yup. Mike Rowe sent me here too. I knew about the mine fires, but I didn't care. But now that I think that the energy has a possibility of being harnessed?!? Now I care!
Hi Body - It's easy to not care. The fires are far away in places people don't really go much. -- You don't want to even know about the Olympic-sized swimming pools of polluted water draining through the "bore-holes". One per minute. All polluted. All run into natural water ways. No turbines in sight.
This appears well done and is interesting. It could be very compelling, but it left me with mostly questions- not questions I will go seek the answers to, just a feeling of being baffled. For beginners, it isn't obvious to me- why are underground fires bad? Do they cause cave-ins? Smoke problems? Is the ground too hot to walk on? I have no idea. Fire needs oxygen. How can it burn underground? Also, is there anything that can be done about it? After watching this, I have no clue. Can the mines be filled with CO2 or water? You want to harness the energy? Like, generate energy from coal without even having to dig it up? That sounds brilliant. Why don't we always do that? (back to my first questions) What is this video really about and what is the call to action?
All great points and when we started creating this short, the goal was to explore the idea that 80 fires burning is actually a "thing" in PA but that opened doors onto the many other effects on society and what IS the call to action...we have more work to do!
Lots in here to unpack Chris and unfortunately, I'm just the host so my knowledge is cursory at best. To say these mines are deep and immensely complicated is an understatement to beat all understatements. As for flooding, many (not on fire) are already flooded and the problem with that is that they leak. Like an Olympic-sized swimming pool every minute. And the water is jammed with heavy metals. Lots of it is iron oxide so the stream beds they gush into are rust colored. The sulphur makes it smell like rotten eggs. The fires have caused cave-ins. Centralia had to be evacuated because the ground was collapsing. Then there are the products of combustion (smoke) that's a consideration. Follow EPCAMR on Facebook. Bobby is the real expert. He's the action.
Hi Chris. I grew up in this area and mine fires are just normal to us. We used to play in the abandoned mines as kids (in the 80s) I live in the same town as the Dolph Colliery fire in Olyphant PA. Which has been burning since 2003. I haven't been to the site recently but local news has said the fire is finally going to be extinguished. I'll believe it when I see it. They already tried that. So yes the fires cause cave-ins that are called subsidences. As the coal seams burn they turn to ash which no longer hold up the mine ceilings. This anthracite area which is many miles, all the towns are built over these mines. They're very deep down. But still we like to call it living on toothpicks. The burning smoke is toxic. The air in mines is also toxic. The miners had to have big industrial fans for ventilation and there were also ventilation shafts. The burning smells like rotten eggs mixed with like terrible smelling landfill gases. That is what the burning releases. Carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide. The coal and culm also kill wildlife by turning the water orange, which is iron oxide. Google "Old Forge Bore Hole" photos and you'll get a look at what it does to the local river. It has choked off all life downstream. It's awful. But the bore hole is a necessary evil. It drains all the mines otherwise they would completely fill with water which would end up rising and being in people's basements along with mass subsidences. Basically the towns would fall into the mines. The fires get oxygen from all of the mines being interconnected. There are still ventilation shafts and mine openings. Many have been gated off but there is no way to close up every single opening. Animals also make some of the drift mines their homes. Hope that answers some of your questions. This has now reminded me to renew my mine subsidence insurance policy!
Centralia is the fire that is the most interesting. The fire is pretty much out underneath the main part of Centralia but fire continues just off of Big Mine Run Road about a mile as the crow flies from the town center. I visit there about twice a year. This year I looked for thermal hot spots using infrared and a temperature reader. I did find one thermal anomaly in the main part of the town but it is just be residual heat. I remember steam being prevalent in 2002 all over town.
I see your comment is a year old so just giving this a shot. When was the last time you visited Centralia? I heard they removed or blocked off that main road. I guess the one that's all cracked open. But recently. Could just be a rumor. I'd hate to see you go there and not be able to really visit. I haven't been there in a very long time I actually live in the same town as the Dolph Colliery fire in Olyphant PA
@@tiffanyshanley1419 I was there on the 26th of Dec 2023. The road you may be referring to is Graffiti Hwy (old 61) is off limits and covered with dirt. Cops will fine you if they catch you there. Although you can still visit the town. There is a new steam vent near the St Ignatius Cemetery but it may be a collapsed area and the ground is still hot underneath. Carbon monoxide readings indicate the fire is not under Centralia but may be far away and the heat is travelling a distance underground. Steam can also be seen off of Big Mine Run Road (although it's intensity is getting less as time goes on)
We went through Nanticoke while we were shooting this. An amazing part of the world. If it were happening under Manhattan, you can be sure the results would be different. Thank you for commenting.
I am surprised they can't bore down to the hot zones and use molten salt heat exchanger to make super heated steam for turbines. Water is pushed down center line, hits heat exchangers and returns in the outer casing. Like geothermal setups. The molten salt helps to throttle the heat with a melting point of about 500 degrees F.
Us too. Apparently the engineering is profoundly complicated and the decision has been made (by whom, I don't know) it's more expensive than the energy is worth to go after it. I find this impossible to believe, but there you have it.
Is this a series? viewed because of the Mike Rowe tie-in, this barely scratches the surface of the issues in rural PA and doesn't being to address if this can be harnessed as an energy source.
It’s been 3 years since this was put on here. So what has been done about the fires? A.) Absolutely nothing! B.) Fires are out! C.) Still working on the issue!
I think there is one resident left in Centralia, but there is no Centralia, so...what are they really a resident of? It's a blend of all of the above. Centralia will burn out several lifetimes from now, as will many of the others. It has also inspired up to produce another video. Coming soo, as they say.
What we're told is that the costs for getting the energy are more expensive than the energy that could be retrieved. For the Centralia fire, with a projected 250-year burn, I find that hard to believe. It stinks of a lack of willpower to me. If this was burning under Manhattan, they'd find a way. But it isn't. It's the other side of nowhere.
I'm a big fan of Mike Rowe, whose link sent me here. I was also born and raised in Pennsylvania (Venango County) I knew of the fire in Centralia, but not any of the others. Obviously, it's a lot worse than I ever could have dreamed it to be. I never thought of harnessing the energy from them though. Sure, it comes at a cost, but then, so does building a dam, or a nuclear power plant. Somebody somewhere is just making excuses. I also hope you get millions of views. This story definitely deserves to go "viral" as they say. I'm assuming your name is Mark Clement. I hope that a solution and way to harness all that wasted energy can be found, and soon. Whatever your name is, I wish you well. God bless you, hunny.
Wow. Thank you. Yes, this is the same Mark Clement that is in the video typing this response. - The mountain they're cutting the top off of in Centralia comes at a cost too. I just don't know--and wish I did--the engineering required to get at that heat. If you have to drill well to literally vent the earth, there must be a way to get at a fire that's predicted to burn for 25-decades. Thank you and thank you! Please share if you can.
The mines are deep and complicated and it is dangerous work. Digging into a geologically-sized inferno isn't easy. But it's my primary question. There should be a way.
@@myfixituplife not all geo thermal is thst deep. It would just need to go far enough to get heated like into the layer of bedrock just above the fire. If we can do it with hot springs why not this?
@@melanieseekins1243 You've got me. I don't know the engineering of it. The filmmaker John Welsh was just telling me today that an area college's architecture school has harnessed the mine shafts over which it is built for geo-thermal heat exchange (there's nothing magic about geo-thermal; it just uses the ground's constant temp to moderate air temperature so it takes less fossil fuel to condition it) so all ground can be used for that. It's getting to the inferno to boil water and turn turbines that's the golden goose here. I think.
@@myfixituplife I don't disagree, I'm merely stating that geothermal doesn't get all the way to a magma source to heat water. If the heat can be felt a couple of feet below the ground why not run water lines that far down. No where near as deep as the fire itself.
@@melanieseekins1243 ah. I see your point and it is a good one. My guess (and this is home improvement me, not TV host me) is that geo-thermal is expensive up front. And these are places that dense with homes that haven't seen a new roof or siding in 40-years. And, each fire is different. Centralia is an underground holocaust. Shamokin is burning, but not hot enough to melt my shoes.
Having been raised in the western US I'm ignorant when it comes to coal fires. Can someone kindly explain to me how coal burns with no oxygen to fuel the fire? Seems to me that if you eliminate the source of oxygen the fire will go out.
I have wondered this too. Here's this: www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2014/02/14/3944897.htm#:~:text=%22Unlike%20timber%2C%20coal%20when%20it,is%20very%20hard%20to%20extinguish.&text=Coal%2C%20and%20particularly%20brown%20coal,and%20that%20coal%20will%20burn.%22
Some of the veins run up to the surface. Once the coal burns, it turns to ash and collapses, leaving cracks that lead to the surface allowing oxygen in. The mine systems are massive enough as is to track and seal up. Add the natural coal veins burning and creating their own "micro mines" via crack formation, and it's just impossible to stop.
I wish everyone drove cars that run on coal. I still heat my home with coal and I love it! Coal is beautiful, so beautiful that I traded in my solar panels for 2600 pounds of coal.
Eventually you're going to get too old for the physicality of burning coal. I used to burn it in my garage. I would cook hams, turkeys, chickens on top the stove. Came out great
100%. Steel needs coke and civilization needs steel. Period. However, it is way more complex than that. There are other sources. There are nuances that matter.
I hate to comment on such a petty point, but the music is way too dismal - too much effort pit into that. When I think of modern "kids" I think of way too much effort on emotion rather than something productive.
@@myfixituplife I loved the music. Tried looking for the artist on Spotify but couldn't find this particular track. Was it created for this documentary?
I too am here because of Mike Rowe. I've known about Centralia, I'm sure lots of people do, but even I didn't know the full scope of the problem or the devastation it caused until I found a documentary on it here on UA-cam. And it's saddening, and maddening at the same time. Sad to see such decay and loss, sad to know how carelessness started it. But also maddening. And the question I keep coming back to is why? And how? It seems impossible that fires so deep underground could continue burning for decades and even centuries. And yet, they do. And like any fire, they consume and they produce. They consume the enormous amounts of coal still buried, and they give off some and fumes and goodness knows what else. The land above the coal the fires consume gradually becomes uninhabitable. And then to see the economic loss and hardship that comes with it. My heart breaks for the thousands of people around the world affected by these fires.
Came here from the post on Mike Rowe's Facebook page. Good video and interesting. I hope that this will help push this up the urgency scale.
Me too. Mike Rowe said he thinks this video deserves millions of views, and I agree. Hopefully it will go viral.
Rory Brown ...I to came from Mike Rowe’s post. Very interesting, hope someone will come up with a solution.
Thank you Rory. It seems impossible to me that the energy isn't being harnessed but it isn't. The problem is a catastrophe.
@@LetUsTryThat wow. Just wow. Tip of the hat, as it were, to the filmmaker. It's his creation. Thank you.
There's so much to address in this film, and once we realized the scope we also realized it needs to be a longer and more in-depth piece or reporting...working on it!
Mike Rowe sent me here. Great video but the background music is much too loud and I wish it was longer with more information.
Thank you. We wish it could be a feature length unpacking of this topic too.
I hate "liking" something like this. Excellent work and I hope to see more videos.
Wow! Thank you. We'll try and stay on top of this.
Excellent intro to a most urgent topic. Very well done and looking forward to more!
Thank you. We'll do our best to fond a way to keep telling this story.
Wow. I had no idea. Very well done video. The narrative is to the point and great video shots. Thanks for posting.
Hi there. Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks :)
My family is from Scranton and my grandfather and his brother worked the mines in Carbondale. My uncle still lives near there. Thank you for bringing this problem to a larger audience. We have known about this for years.
Hi Sara - You almost have to be from there to know anything about this stuff. Carbondale and the surrounding country is amazing. Thank the filmmaker John Welsh. He saw the story.
Very well done. I hope that we can do something about either using the energy or better yet putting out the fires.
Us too. I think that's the core of this problem and what makes it so compelling. I mean, the energy is. right. there.
As someone that lives in PA, this was very interesting and I would love to know more. I’ve always heard about the mine fires that burn for decades but not much more information than that.
We'll do our best to stay on top of it. Follow EPCAMR on Facebook. That's Bobby in the film and he's an actual real life hero.
This is very informative and not something I would have known had Mike Rowe not posted about it. Thankful that you did this content.
Background sound could use less volume very good music choice nonetheless.
Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for watching.
Mike Rowe brought me here. We need to know more. Great production!
Love to answer any lingering questions. And thanks for watching!
That was really good! I'd truly like to see more.
I came here to see the video because of the post on Mike Rowe's Facebook page.
Floored. Thank you.
@@KawasakiChi22 golly. thank you so very much.
The video presents a problem in very dramatic terms. But it left me frustrated because it did not answer obvious questions that I would think at least some viewers would predictably have and that should have been addressed. How did so many fires start? How are they getting oxygen to burn and why can't the oxygen supply be smothered? Are all the fires the result of mining or are any "natural" - like lightning-caused forest fires are natural? Have any fires been "put out" and if so, how and why can't the same method be used on other fires? What agencies are responsible for putting these out? Is this a U.S. problem only or are other countries dealing with the same problems, and if so, what are they doing that we might learn from?
I was born and raised in Mt. Carmel (about 2 miles from the centralia mine fire). Over the decades from the time the fire was first discovered, they have tried to put it out, they have shoveled millions and millions of dollars trying to extinguish it. They have tried digging it out, filling the mines with sand, etc. The fire is deep underground, and it spans square miles of area, oxygen is getting down to it through cracks in the ground, old mine tunnels, etc. It would be nearly impossible to smother its oxygen supply. There are new areas of ground that subside every day that gives oxygen a new path to the fire.There have been other mine fires that were extinguished, including one right outside of Mt. Carmel, but they were much smaller scale operations.
@@Biaxident0 THANK YOU. Awesome response.
Hey Bob - We got as much in here as we could. The story is enormous and it is a global catastrophe as I understand it. We'd love to be able to unpack this story even more.
I grew up in Laurel Run and have been to Centralia. No words other than bittersweet is how I see these disasters. It's sad that it came down to negligence that interrupted so many lives, cost so much money and damaged countless acres of Earth. Here's to learning from our mistakes and hopefully making a better place for our future.
Great sentiment, Mike. Yes, it's troubling to be sure. And it gets worse. After the fires, there's water, as I'm sure you know.
Well done. Made me actually wish for something longer, seems like a subject you could really sink your teeth into. I knew about Centralia, had no clue about the other places and the extent of the problem. Do other coal mining states have similar issues? If not, how come? If so, how are they handling it? Are other mines being remediated before they catch fire? Many questions....
Guns - Thank you. We wanted to do something longer and there is a sister film to this that takes a deeper dive and I'll post it when I can. I'm, sadly, just the host of this. However, my understanding is that the only continent on Earth that doesn't have mine fires is the only continent without mines: Antarctica. The fires shown in the film are all within a 30-minute drive of each other, give or take. The problem is global. There is an inferno of energy just burning away underground. And don't even get me started on the flooding and hydro catastrophe going on.
Thanks...and it was an eye opening experience creating this short with Mark as the host. The more we uncovered, the more we realized that this is not just a Pennsylvania problem, but a global one too...there are mine fires on 6 continents.
Came here from Mike Rowe's Facebook page. I'd like to share, but I'm not certain I can. Good Luck!! Great Idea!!
Thank you. Thank you. You can copy this link. Then paste it wherever you want to share and it should populate with a thumbnail - ua-cam.com/video/BeynZtqsqtQ/v-deo.html - There is also a share button next to the thumbs up/down. Bottom right.
Love your last line.
Thank you. I really don't like to take much credit if I can avoid it (plenty of self-loathing in here) but I wrote that one and am proud of it. Thank you.
Wow, that's pretty scary. Good info, but a little hard to hear with the music so loud.
If it's too loud, you're too old. ROCK IS LIFE!!!!
@@jasonsmith3454 Your compassion towards people with disabilities is overwhelming.
@@joyfulnoise2477 it's not my fault your hair cut does such a good job hiding your lobotomy scars.
Thank you Joyful. We did our best.
@@myfixituplife It was a really good production! And very informative! Thank you for doing it and keep up the good work.
I grew up in Shamokin and am proud of my roots. The coal region has seen some incredibly tough times. Things started to take a turn for the worse when the silk industry failed in the 1930s. It's been a slow and steady decline since then. Very very sad situation for the proud people of that area.
It really is, the irony is that when we started creating this film, I was revisiting where my grandfather and mother grew up (he worked in a bootleg before moving to Philly) so I have heard lots of stories throughout the years from a generation of aunts and uncles about Shamokin.
Well said Will. It's a hardscrabble place. I grew up in a similar town in MA and was there after the textile industry moved out.
@@JohnWelshPhotographer Explain "bootleg" when you get a chance.
@@myfixituplife My grandfather came from the Ukraine, and when looking for work at the Glen Burn Colliery, was turned away - LITERALLY - with the statement, "No one died today, come back tomorrow and maybe there will be an opening." So he took to the hills and worked for an illegal mine, a bootleg, meaning it was a bunch of guys who dug into the mountain (not really worrying about whose coal they were taking) and had a rogue mining operation where they extracted their own coal. And according to wiki here ya go: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootleg_mining
Also came via Mike Rowe. I had no idea. Thank you for the interesting video. A suggestion if you ever decide to tweak the editing -- turn the music down just a bit. The first two minutes especially have a lot of bass in them that maybe doesn't come through laptop/phone speakers, but is quite loud on larger speakers.
Mike - Glad you're here and thank you both for the kind words and the constructive criticism. Appreciated to be sure.
Thanks to Mike Rowe’s FB post I’m over here watching this in complete shock. Do you plan to explore this further and possibly in other “coal states”?
We. Would. LOVE. To. The topic is as compelling as it is tragic. Alas, the wheels of business must turn.
I'll jump in ahead of Mark and say yes, there are many other angles of attack regarding this story...and we didn't even get into the water issues leftover from mining in PA. Lots to do and plan for!
Yup. Mike Rowe sent me here too. I knew about the mine fires, but I didn't care. But now that I think that the energy has a possibility of being harnessed?!? Now I care!
Hi Body - It's easy to not care. The fires are far away in places people don't really go much. -- You don't want to even know about the Olympic-sized swimming pools of polluted water draining through the "bore-holes". One per minute. All polluted. All run into natural water ways. No turbines in sight.
The wasted heat as I lower my thermostat 😰. It seems use should be made of it of it can't be stopped.
You don't even want to know about the wasted water and kinetic energy from the mines that aren't on fire.
This appears well done and is interesting. It could be very compelling, but it left me with mostly questions- not questions I will go seek the answers to, just a feeling of being baffled.
For beginners, it isn't obvious to me- why are underground fires bad? Do they cause cave-ins? Smoke problems? Is the ground too hot to walk on? I have no idea.
Fire needs oxygen. How can it burn underground? Also, is there anything that can be done about it? After watching this, I have no clue. Can the mines be filled with CO2 or water?
You want to harness the energy? Like, generate energy from coal without even having to dig it up? That sounds brilliant. Why don't we always do that? (back to my first questions)
What is this video really about and what is the call to action?
All great points and when we started creating this short, the goal was to explore the idea that 80 fires burning is actually a "thing" in PA but that opened doors onto the many other effects on society and what IS the call to action...we have more work to do!
Lots in here to unpack Chris and unfortunately, I'm just the host so my knowledge is cursory at best. To say these mines are deep and immensely complicated is an understatement to beat all understatements. As for flooding, many (not on fire) are already flooded and the problem with that is that they leak. Like an Olympic-sized swimming pool every minute. And the water is jammed with heavy metals. Lots of it is iron oxide so the stream beds they gush into are rust colored. The sulphur makes it smell like rotten eggs. The fires have caused cave-ins. Centralia had to be evacuated because the ground was collapsing. Then there are the products of combustion (smoke) that's a consideration. Follow EPCAMR on Facebook. Bobby is the real expert. He's the action.
@@JohnWelshPhotographer I like where you're coming from. More work to do for sure.
Hi Chris. I grew up in this area and mine fires are just normal to us. We used to play in the abandoned mines as kids (in the 80s) I live in the same town as the Dolph Colliery fire in Olyphant PA. Which has been burning since 2003. I haven't been to the site recently but local news has said the fire is finally going to be extinguished. I'll believe it when I see it. They already tried that.
So yes the fires cause cave-ins that are called subsidences. As the coal seams burn they turn to ash which no longer hold up the mine ceilings. This anthracite area which is many miles, all the towns are built over these mines. They're very deep down. But still we like to call it living on toothpicks.
The burning smoke is toxic. The air in mines is also toxic. The miners had to have big industrial fans for ventilation and there were also ventilation shafts. The burning smells like rotten eggs mixed with like terrible smelling landfill gases. That is what the burning releases. Carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide. The coal and culm also kill wildlife by turning the water orange, which is iron oxide. Google "Old Forge Bore Hole" photos and you'll get a look at what it does to the local river. It has choked off all life downstream. It's awful. But the bore hole is a necessary evil. It drains all the mines otherwise they would completely fill with water which would end up rising and being in people's basements along with mass subsidences. Basically the towns would fall into the mines.
The fires get oxygen from all of the mines being interconnected. There are still ventilation shafts and mine openings. Many have been gated off but there is no way to close up every single opening. Animals also make some of the drift mines their homes.
Hope that answers some of your questions. This has now reminded me to renew my mine subsidence insurance policy!
Interesting documentary
Thank you. Much appreciated.
wow, just learned something....thank you for the interesting but scary reality...
Right! Compelling as all get out and equally as tragic. Thank you.
Centralia is the fire that is the most interesting. The fire is pretty much out underneath the main part of Centralia but fire continues just off of Big Mine Run Road about a mile as the crow flies from the town center. I visit there about twice a year. This year I looked for thermal hot spots using infrared and a temperature reader. I did find one thermal anomaly in the main part of the town but it is just be residual heat. I remember steam being prevalent in 2002 all over town.
Hey - Do you know Bobby Hughes and his EPCMR organization?
@@myfixituplife I don't know Mr Hughes. I pass through Centralia once or twice a year as I like to explore the place and it is fascinating :)
@@volcanoimage Please find him. Facebook EpCMR
I see your comment is a year old so just giving this a shot. When was the last time you visited Centralia? I heard they removed or blocked off that main road. I guess the one that's all cracked open. But recently. Could just be a rumor. I'd hate to see you go there and not be able to really visit. I haven't been there in a very long time I actually live in the same town as the Dolph Colliery fire in Olyphant PA
@@tiffanyshanley1419 I was there on the 26th of Dec 2023. The road you may be referring to is Graffiti Hwy (old 61) is off limits and covered with dirt. Cops will fine you if they catch you there. Although you can still visit the town. There is a new steam vent near the St Ignatius Cemetery but it may be a collapsed area and the ground is still hot underneath.
Carbon monoxide readings indicate the fire is not under Centralia but may be far away and the heat is travelling a distance underground. Steam can also be seen off of Big Mine Run Road (although it's intensity is getting less as time goes on)
Im from Nanticoke PA .All you have to do is drive down Middle Raod to see the impact .
We went through Nanticoke while we were shooting this. An amazing part of the world. If it were happening under Manhattan, you can be sure the results would be different. Thank you for commenting.
Whoah... sharing
THANK YOU!
I am surprised they can't bore down to the hot zones and use molten salt heat exchanger to make super heated steam for turbines. Water is pushed down center line, hits heat exchangers and returns in the outer casing. Like geothermal setups. The molten salt helps to throttle the heat with a melting point of about 500 degrees F.
Us too. Apparently the engineering is profoundly complicated and the decision has been made (by whom, I don't know) it's more expensive than the energy is worth to go after it. I find this impossible to believe, but there you have it.
Interesting..What can be done?
Follow EPCAMR on Facebook. It is a problem of global significance.
Is this a series? viewed because of the Mike Rowe tie-in, this barely scratches the surface of the issues in rural PA and doesn't being to address if this can be harnessed as an energy source.
This was a one off for film festivals at first, but as we went deeper, and like you mentioned, there's SO much more to explore. To be continued...
We got as much in as we could. We'd love to find the resources to unpack all this on a global scale.
It’s been 3 years since this was put on here. So what has been done about the fires?
A.) Absolutely nothing!
B.) Fires are out!
C.) Still working on the issue!
I think there is one resident left in Centralia, but there is no Centralia, so...what are they really a resident of? It's a blend of all of the above. Centralia will burn out several lifetimes from now, as will many of the others. It has also inspired up to produce another video. Coming soo, as they say.
Do you have ideas about how we could harness this energy and help the communities affected?
What we're told is that the costs for getting the energy are more expensive than the energy that could be retrieved. For the Centralia fire, with a projected 250-year burn, I find that hard to believe. It stinks of a lack of willpower to me. If this was burning under Manhattan, they'd find a way. But it isn't. It's the other side of nowhere.
Is there a mine fire in Shamokin pa???
I think that one is called a "bank fire". It's on top of the ground and is just smoldering. That's the big hill we slide down.
I'm a big fan of Mike Rowe, whose link sent me here. I was also born and raised in Pennsylvania (Venango County) I knew of the fire in Centralia, but not any of the others. Obviously, it's a lot worse than I ever could have dreamed it to be. I never thought of harnessing the energy from them though. Sure, it comes at a cost, but then, so does building a dam, or a nuclear power plant. Somebody somewhere is just making excuses. I also hope you get millions of views. This story definitely deserves to go "viral" as they say. I'm assuming your name is Mark Clement. I hope that a solution and way to harness all that wasted energy can be found, and soon. Whatever your name is, I wish you well. God bless you, hunny.
Wow. Thank you. Yes, this is the same Mark Clement that is in the video typing this response. - The mountain they're cutting the top off of in Centralia comes at a cost too. I just don't know--and wish I did--the engineering required to get at that heat. If you have to drill well to literally vent the earth, there must be a way to get at a fire that's predicted to burn for 25-decades. Thank you and thank you! Please share if you can.
How sad!
Yes, it really is. Thanks for watching.
So question why not use the fire to generate steam for power? I mean..
The mines are deep and complicated and it is dangerous work. Digging into a geologically-sized inferno isn't easy. But it's my primary question. There should be a way.
@@myfixituplife not all geo thermal is thst deep. It would just need to go far enough to get heated like into the layer of bedrock just above the fire. If we can do it with hot springs why not this?
@@melanieseekins1243 You've got me. I don't know the engineering of it. The filmmaker John Welsh was just telling me today that an area college's architecture school has harnessed the mine shafts over which it is built for geo-thermal heat exchange (there's nothing magic about geo-thermal; it just uses the ground's constant temp to moderate air temperature so it takes less fossil fuel to condition it) so all ground can be used for that. It's getting to the inferno to boil water and turn turbines that's the golden goose here. I think.
@@myfixituplife I don't disagree, I'm merely stating that geothermal doesn't get all the way to a magma source to heat water. If the heat can be felt a couple of feet below the ground why not run water lines that far down. No where near as deep as the fire itself.
@@melanieseekins1243 ah. I see your point and it is a good one. My guess (and this is home improvement me, not TV host me) is that geo-thermal is expensive up front. And these are places that dense with homes that haven't seen a new roof or siding in 40-years. And, each fire is different. Centralia is an underground holocaust. Shamokin is burning, but not hot enough to melt my shoes.
Having been raised in the western US I'm ignorant when it comes to coal fires. Can someone kindly explain to me how coal burns with no oxygen to fuel the fire? Seems to me that if you eliminate the source of oxygen the fire will go out.
I have wondered this too. Here's this: www.abc.net.au/science/articles/2014/02/14/3944897.htm#:~:text=%22Unlike%20timber%2C%20coal%20when%20it,is%20very%20hard%20to%20extinguish.&text=Coal%2C%20and%20particularly%20brown%20coal,and%20that%20coal%20will%20burn.%22
Some of the veins run up to the surface. Once the coal burns, it turns to ash and collapses, leaving cracks that lead to the surface allowing oxygen in. The mine systems are massive enough as is to track and seal up. Add the natural coal veins burning and creating their own "micro mines" via crack formation, and it's just impossible to stop.
Impossible to stop. Exactly. If this were burning under Manhattan or LA, well, I bet the outcomes would be different.
Just like Hawaii's volcano 🌋
Permanently on fire. Sounds about right.
Music on this thing sucks. Hard to hear what the guy is saying.
We do our best. It's a complicated topic. I t was 10-degrees. And the music...seriously...
@@myfixituplife Like I said, hard to hear what is being said.
I wish everyone drove cars that run on coal. I still heat my home with coal and I love it! Coal is beautiful, so beautiful that I traded in my solar panels for 2600 pounds of coal.
Good for you. However, you're using greeting card adjectives to describe technical matters. Gotta pick one bro. It's either a love affair or not.
Eventually you're going to get too old for the physicality of burning coal. I used to burn it in my garage. I would cook hams, turkeys, chickens on top the stove. Came out great
The annoying loud music or should I say lack thereof turned me off immediately
The annoying nitpicking turned me off immediately.
All these EVs need coal to charge their batteries
100%. Steel needs coke and civilization needs steel. Period. However, it is way more complex than that. There are other sources. There are nuances that matter.
I hate to comment on such a petty point, but the music is way too dismal - too much effort pit into that. When I think of modern "kids" I think of way too much effort on emotion rather than something productive.
Noted. The music is heavy, no doubt.
@@myfixituplife I loved the music. Tried looking for the artist on Spotify but couldn't find this particular track. Was it created for this documentary?
@@bikutageto8369 I'll check with the filmmaker. This is an original score, I believe.
Water. the end. you're welcome.
What?
Good thing you told us that 🙄
I too am here because of Mike Rowe. I've known about Centralia, I'm sure lots of people do, but even I didn't know the full scope of the problem or the devastation it caused until I found a documentary on it here on UA-cam. And it's saddening, and maddening at the same time. Sad to see such decay and loss, sad to know how carelessness started it. But also maddening. And the question I keep coming back to is why? And how? It seems impossible that fires so deep underground could continue burning for decades and even centuries. And yet, they do. And like any fire, they consume and they produce. They consume the enormous amounts of coal still buried, and they give off some and fumes and goodness knows what else. The land above the coal the fires consume gradually becomes uninhabitable. And then to see the economic loss and hardship that comes with it. My heart breaks for the thousands of people around the world affected by these fires.
Same question I keep coming back to. And what's worse, there's more.