Hole swallows house and cars

Press, 11 May 1981, Page 1

Hole swallows house and cars

NZPA Winter Park, Florida A giant sinkhole yesterday gulped down a house, six expensive imported cars, a camping vehicle, part of a car lot, and swallowed the deep end of a municipal swimming pool and the backs of business buildings in Winter Park, central Florida. “It started last night, and it started growing really fast this morning.” a police dispatcher said yesterday. “When I was out there about an hour ago, it was at least two city blocks

wide. You could not get close enough to the < Ige to see the bottom.” Observers said the spreading hole, which severed water and power lines for a few hours, was up to 350 metres wide and 60 metres deep by nightfall and was still growing a few centimetres an hour. Sinkholes are common ”i much of Florida and often result when underground water tables are lowered, allowing soil to dry out and shrink.-They also may form ’hen water dissolves limestone layers. <

An underground stream was believed to be the source of this cave-in. Engineers estimated it would take 10,000 truckloads of dirt to fill the hole, and city officials said they probably would request Federal aid. Residents and owners of homes and businesses near the sinkhole were warned to leave until it stopped growing and they hastily rented trucks and began moving furniture and belongings. The engulfed ’ ouse was described as a small, wood-frame cottage.

For most of the afternoon it was mostly intact, resting at a slant inside the hole, but later in the day it slipped from sight. The residents were home when their house was threatened, but got away safely and took a few possessions with them. The cars, ail said to be expensive Porsches, were from a car yard on one side of the sinkhole. City and utility crews worked to reroute severed water, telephone, and power lines and the police

kept curious spectators from getting too close to the edge. By evening, the hole had eaten away the er.rth round the swimming pool, and eventually took the deep end with it. About 200 homes that ist electricity had restored by nightfall, but about 1600 homes remained without a telephone service.

“Maybe we will just wait for the sides to stabilise and then Winter Park will have a new lake,” said the city manager, Mr David Hardin.