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Swallowed Up By The Ground: Sinkholes!

A sinkhole started by a subterranean collapse and enlarged by heavy rains is threatening a small West Virginia town's police headquarters.

WVa-Sinkhole-PoliceDept-221120.jpg
Growing West Virginia sinkhole threatens local police department

A large sinkhole that opened in the West Virginia town of Hinton in June has grown after recent rain and is now threatening to swallow the local police department.

The sinkhole, located on West Virginia Route 20 next to the police department, was about 6 feet wide and about 30 feet deep when it first opened and has since grown due to rain ...
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FULL STORY: https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/202...eatens-local-police-department/2881668906309/
 
Sharon Hill said:
Sinkholes appear in Southern Cal in response to heavy rains.
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Rats! Not available in my country or region :( And I like to scare myself by looking at sinkholes. And whirlpools, river bores and fast moving lava.
 

Sinkhole swallows mother, daughter and two others driving in California storm​

Two vehicles plunged into the 15-foot-deep sinkhole that opened around 7.20pm on Monday in Chatsworth, a suburban neighborhood in Los Angeles, California.

The mother reportedly did not see the sinkhole while driving home with her daughter on the 11000 block of Iverson Road, and their vehicle fell in.

Shortly after, a pickup truck with two occupants fell in on top of them. The two people in the truck were able to climb out before firefighters arrived and were not hurt.

But the mother and teenage daughter were trapped under the truck and unable to escape by themselves.
About 50 firefighters engaged in the rescue operation. It ‘involved bringing ground ladders and laying them down to span the hole so crews could try to reach the victims but this was not successful,’ stated the Los Angeles Fire Department.

The road continued to slough and firefighters tried to stabilize the vehicle but it kept shifting and rolling in the sinkhole.

‘With the entire road compromised, firefighters had to make an immediate rescue to save the lives of the two people trapped,’ the fire department stated.

Rescue crews positioned an aerial ladder and lowered a firefighter down into the opening to secure and hoist out the daughter and the mother, separately.

They both suffered minor injuries and were taken to a hospital to be evaluated.
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hunck said:

Sinkhole swallows mother, daughter and two others driving in California storm​

Two vehicles plunged into the 15-foot-deep sinkhole that opened around 7.20pm on Monday in Chatsworth, a suburban neighborhood in Los Angeles, California.

The mother reportedly did not see the sinkhole while driving home with her daughter on the 11000 block of Iverson Road, and their vehicle fell in.

Shortly after, a pickup truck with two occupants fell in on top of them. The two people in the truck were able to climb out before firefighters arrived and were not hurt.

But the mother and teenage daughter were trapped under the truck and unable to escape by themselves.

View attachment 62356
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Nice to have a happy ending.
 

London-Basingstoke rail passengers face major disruption​

The 144ft-long (44m) landslip, which happened near Hook, in Hampshire, has damaged the main line from London Waterloo to Basingstoke.
Network Rail has asked passengers not to travel between London and south or west of Basingstoke on Monday.
It also said there would be "major changes to train services for some time" while repairs take place.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-64283381

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Imagine my surprise when I saw this Breaking News on the Jerusalem Posts website.
A sentient sinkhole!

sink1.jpg



I clicked on the story, only to be disappointed.
It was a translation error, and in actual fact the highways authority had dug it for maintenance reasons.

sink 2.jpg
 
Victory said:
Imagine my surprise when I saw this Breaking News on the Jerusalem Posts website.
A sentient sinkhole!

View attachment 64488


I clicked on the story, only to be disappointed.
It was a translation error, and in actual fact the highways authority had dug it for maintenance reasons.

View attachment 64489
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Intentionally? Not just sentient, but evil.
 
Sinkhole above HS2 tunnel

The hole, which is about 20 ft wide & 16ft deep, appeared over part of the Chiltern tunnel in Little Missenden, Buckinghamshire, on Saturday.

A HS2 spokesperson said 'Investigations are ongoing, but this is likely to be linked to pre-existing ground conditions above the tunnels.

Catherine Bunting, a parish councillor for Great Missenden and Prestwood, said: 'Residents want drilling to stop whilst the safety of the aquifer is independently assessed.

'They have expressed concern for the fragile aquifer for years now and HS2 don’t appear to address any of our concerns.

'The aquifer feeds drinking water to millions of people in the south east and feeds our chalk streams and rivers.'
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Not sure this is technically a sink hole - according to the report it’s the result of snow melt from mountains causing rivers to run high. Whatever, it results in something of a raging torrent in the hole. The man doesn’t sit there for long as the sides wash away.

The sinkhole formed in a golf course in American Fork, Utah, over the weekend. A tree became lodged in a pipe that brings water from the American River, according to officials at the golf club.
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Maybe the blockage was removed resulting in the torrent.

Video at link.

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hunck said:
Not sure this is technically a sink hole - according to the report it’s the result of snow melt from mountains causing rivers to run high. Whatever, it results in something of a raging torrent in the hole. The man doesn’t sit there for long as the sides wash away.



Maybe the blockage was removed resulting in the torrent.

Video at link.

View attachment 66436
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That's just plain old erosion.
 
Vid at link.

A man has been rescued after falling into a well that suddenly opened up in a back garden.

Emergency services were called to Forge Road, in Bordon, Hampshire, at about 18:00 BST on Tuesday after reports of a man trapped in a hole. A 76-year-old man fell 2m (6.5ft) and suffered minor cuts and bruises, according to Hampshire's fire service. It said water had caused part of the well to erode, creating a void underneath a garden patio.

"He was fortunate not to slide down the slope where he could have dropped approximately 12 metres further into the well," the service said in a statement.

Firefighters worked along with paramedics to save the man and set up a rope system that lifted him from the well.

He was treated at the scene by paramedics and a cordon was put in place around the hole.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-oxfordshire-65970662
 
Could have been a lot worse.


Car with wheel in sinkhole in Witham
IMAGE SOURCE, TINA TOWNSEND Image caption, The hole gave way beneath an unfortunate driver on Saturday

A driver got more than they bargained for when a sinkhole opened up beneath their car, swallowing up the front wheel.

The surface on Newland Road in Witham, in Essex, began to give way late on Saturday afternoon. The resulting hole eventually measured about one metre wide (3ft), and a similar depth. The car was towed out of the hole and barriers placed around it

The barriers remain around the hole to allow for repairs to take place. A road closure is in place in the town between Maldon Road and Collingwood Road.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-essex-66012456
 

Sinkhole that swallowed Seffner (Florida) man while he slept has reopened​

https://www.fox13news.com/news/sink...man-while-he-slept-has-reopened-officials-say

This is not unusual. It's extremely common for sinkholes to reopen because it's very hard to seal them up. Water finds a way through the open and connected voids in the rock and takes the fill, eventually manifesting as a hole that pops at the surface.

It's the 3rd time in 10 years. So this is not really news. That's how sinkholes roll.

https://www.baynews9.com/fl/tampa/news/2023/07/11/seffner-sinkhole-reopens-for-3rd-time-in-10-years

See also https://spookygeology.com/sinkholes/ for a previous picture of it.
 
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Sinkholes in Pennsylvania

5 inches of rain fell in one day at this location. It's no wonder more sinkholes didn't pop.
https://www.mcall.com/2023/07/11/sinkhole-opens-up-behind-homes-in-macungie/
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Similarly, a major route outside Philadelphia is closed because of a sinkhole related to a water line break. It's possible that the water line was first compromised by the void that then caused a leak making it eventually collapse. You can't always tell what came first. Again, heavy rain was a factor.
https://6abc.com/king-of-prussia-pa-east-dekalb-pike-sinkhole-henderson-road/13487270/

Water acts like a drain opening, flushing open voids and allowing material above it to fall in.
 
There was one on the web the other day being lifted out of a gully by a helicopter,
it did not turn a hair, just dangeld there watching the ground fall away, I would thing
they had given them a shot of something to calm them but don't know.
 
Here's a BBC R4 programme about salt. It's a book extract, only 14 minutes long, which touches on salt production in Cheshire among other places.

The current Cheshire Salt works caverns are immense. They stand deep enough to contain the Eiffel Tower.

Salt mining in central Cheshire goes back centuries. Bridges and roads, and especially railways, have to be maintained with special attention to subsidence. Sinkholes are common.

Material World: Salt

Historically, those who controlled the salt controlled the power. The world's monopolies may have changed, but salt remains vital to our existence. Beyond the dinner table, it sits at the heart of the chemicals industry and lifesaving sanitation.

'Material World: A Substantial Story of Our Past and Our Future', written by Ed Conway, explores which materials we have relied upon to build civilisations and how we will use them to forge our future.
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escargot said:
Here's a BBC R4 programme about salt. It's a book extract, only 14 minutes long, which touches on salt production in Cheshire among other places.

The current Cheshire Salt works caverns are immense. They stand deep enough to contain the Eiffel Tower.

Salt mining in central Cheshire goes back centuries. Bridges and roads, and especially railways, have to be maintained with special attention to subsidence. Sinkholes are common.

Material World: Salt
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Snail talking about salt....:rofl::bpals:
 
JamesWhitehead said:
Friends have just bought a house on that road! o_O

Edit: I just had the pleasure of telling them about the sink-hole! When I think of Cheshire, I think of salt-mines. Hopefully, it is less drastic than that and Tarporley is not a traditional salt-mining town.
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It's Cheshire, a former inland sea. The salt is everywhere. :nods:
Even where a sinkhole can be attributed to a collapsed drain, as with the current huge A556 one, the underlying cause may be subsidence.

This is why many believe the HS2 project won't reach Cheshire. Too expensive to keep propped up.
 
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