Looking east, standing above the town dump where the fire began.
This is east of the Oddfellows Cemetery. The dump has been covered over since then.

A fire in the dump in 1962 (reportedly on May 27) started the coal seam on fire.
The fire spread through mine tunnels, which ran under the town.

What's amazing is how close the dump was to the town of Centralia. Just a 5 minute walk.
And nobody was able to marshall any serious efforts to stop it.