Emergency Crime Scene and Biohazard Cleanup in Laurel Run, PA

Laurel Run is a borough in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, tucked between Wilkes-Barre Township and the steep ridge known as Giant's Despair.

Laurel Run was incorporated as a borough in 1881.

The Laurel Run mine fire began on December 6, 1915, when a miner's carbide lamp left hanging in the Red Ash Coal Mine ignited the timber supports and then the coal itself.

In the 1960s the federal and state governments relocated about 850 residents living over the fire, and roughly 166 homes, two grocery stores, a church, a school, and a lumberyard were razed; the fire was declared contained in 1973 but is still burning underground.

Laurel Run's population fell from 723 people in 277 households at the 2000 census to just 500 people at the 2010 census.

Despite its tiny population, Laurel Run covers about 5.2 square miles, most of it steep, wooded mountainside above the Wyoming Valley.

Laurel Run hosts the Giants Despair Hillclimb, an automobile race up East Northampton Street held since 1906 and one of the oldest continuing motorsport events in Pennsylvania.

The borough also includes the village of Georgetown, where the ground over the mine fire stayed stable enough that homes there were spared the demolition that erased old Laurel Run.