CENTRALIA, Pa.—Where cars and trucks once rolled by, graffiti now sprawls across desolate, cracked pavement, and weeds push through the abandoned sidewalks leading nowhere.
Centralia Borough, Pennsylvania, endures as a modern ghost town, its empty streets and old foundations stubbornly resisting the slow advance of nature.
Only four known residents and a church still call this place home.
The rest, once a thriving community of 1,200, vanished years ago, driven away by relentless coal mine fires that still burn and deadly carbon monoxide.
Since 1962, these secret infernos have crept beneath Centralia, threading through coal seams and winding their way through the tangled labyrinth of collapsed tunnels below….