Vulcan : Romania

Vulcan (Hungarian: Vulkán, German: Wulkan, Wolkendorf) is a city in Hunedoara county, Romania with a population of 33,186, being the second city as size of the Jiu Valley.
The city is named after the Vulcan Pass that connects the Jiu Valley to Oltenia.
The coal resources of ther region were discovered in 1788 when Austrian General Landau defended Vulcan from the Turkish invaders, when one night the soldiers could not put out the camp fire they made, as the underneath piles of coal caught fire. General Landau thought that he could stop the Turks without fight by setting piles of coal on fire. The Turks noted the large numbers of fires on the heights and thought that the Austrian army was much larger than theirs and retreated.
In 1850, the first mine was set up by the Hoffman brothers of BraÅŸov.