Sinkholes
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Massive sinkhole shuts down highway in Oregon


KGW
Mon, 03 Jul 2017 20:12 UTC
Oregon sinkole
© KOIN
A massive sinkhole shut down Highway 212 in Damascus Sunday evening, according to the Clackamas County Sheriff's Office.

Reported in the 20200 block of Highway 212, near South Wiese Road, the sinkhole is 20 feet wide by 4 feet deep, transportation officials said Sunday.

According to the Sunrise Water Authority, a water main broke, emptying a 1-million-gallon reservoir. Water service was restored to the reservoir.

Sunrise Water Authority urged customers who lost water pressure or service to boil any water that was used for drinking purposes only. All other uses, such as showers, baths, and watering, are safe, the bureau said. The boil water advisory was lifted Monday evening.

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Large sinkhole forms in Liverpool, UK

Kate McMullin
Liverpool Echo
Fri, 30 Jun 2017 11:14 UTC
Edge Lane sinkhole
© Echo
A sinkhole on Edge Lane could take three to four weeks to repair, business owners fear.

The large hole, at the junction of the major commuter route and Beech Street, formed this morning and began at three metres deep and six metres wide.

Throughout the day the hole has continued to grow , as an investigation involving bodies including the council, gas experts and United Utilities gets under way to determine the cause.

John Brown, manager at the Devonshire House Hotel, which is close to the site of the sinkhole, said staff have been told it could be three to four weeks before it is fully repaired.
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Tradesman's ute falls into sinkhole in Perth, Western Australia

Nelson Groom
Daily Mail
Sat, 01 Jul 2017 13:53 UTC
Jim Kennington, 50, was passing a roundabout in Perth's Wanneroo on Friday when disaster struck
Jim Kennington, 50, was passing a roundabout in Perth's Wanneroo on Friday when disaster struck
A tradie refused to let the sinkhole that swallowed his ute after a burst water main dampen his spirits.

Jim Kennington, 50, found himself in a hole lot of trouble when he came to a roundabout in Perth's Wanneroo on Friday and felt his tyres sinking.

But he managed to see the lighter side of things when his mate's began to take him to task for his misfortune, reports The West.

'Everybody's had a little laugh at me today,' Mr Kennington said.

'I tried to reverse out but it weren't going anywhere...So I climbed out the passenger side.'

The Water Corporation said an underground water main burst softened the road, causing the sinkhole.
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Massive sinkhole opens up in Janesville, Wisconsin

Neil Johnson
Gazette Xtra.
Sat, 01 Jul 2017 08:53 UTC
City of Janesville Department of Public works officials and crews discuss a sinkhole that opened up on North Washington Street in Janesville on Friday afternoon.
© Anthony WahlCity of Janesville Department of Public works officials and crews discuss a sinkhole that opened up on North Washington Street in Janesville on Friday afternoon.
City crews worked Friday afternoon to fill a massive sinkhole that broke open on a street on the city's west side after heavy rains earlier this week had washed out the ground beneath the roadway.

Crews at the scene Friday afternoon said it took three truckloads of gravel to temporarily fill a sinkhole the length and width of a large car that broke open at about 3 p.m. Friday, leaving a 15-foot deep chasm on the east side of North Washington Street just north of Highland Avenue and the Mercy Hospital and Trauma Center campus.

Troy Egger, a city of Janesville public works department crew leader, told The Gazette that one of his crew members has worked for the city for 31 years.

He said that worker said he has never seen a sinkhole the size of the one that broke open Friday.
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Fire

'Big bang' and 'pillar of fire' as two new craters form on Yamal peninsular, Siberia


The Siberian Times
Sun, 02 Jul 2017 05:19 UTC
New crater on Yamal peninsular
© Alexandr SokolovNew funnel in Yerkuta is reported to be 8 meters in diameters and about 20 meters deep.
Local reindeer herder witnessed the tundra explosion that led to birth of new hole in river.

Scientists have located two fresh craters formed on Yamal peninsula this year, with the latest exploding on 28 June with the eruption picked up by new seismic sensors specifically designed to monitor such events, The Siberian Times can disclose.

First pictures of the large craters - or funnels as experts call them - are shown here, and add to four other big holes found in recent years and examined by experts, plus dozens of tiny ones spotted by satellite.

The formation of both craters involved an explosion followed by fire, evidently signs of the eruption of methane gas pockets under the Yamal surface.

People in Seyakha village heard a 'loud explosion-like bang' then saw a fire and clouds of black smoke, according to reports.

Deputy director of the Oil and Gas Research Institute, Moscow, Professor Vasily Bogoyavlensky said: 'We heard the news (about the new crater) from a friend who saw a flame of fire and then a rising pillar of smoke.'

The head of Seyakha village, Igor Okotetto, confirmed he had been told about the explosion.

Comment:
In 2014 a mysterious crater-hole was discovered in the Yamal peninsular, northwest Siberia, Russia. It was 'probably caused by methane released as permafrost thawed' according to researchers, and the result of 'internal forces not seen in 8,000 years'. Since then new information has come to light, with witnesses reporting an 'explosion' and a 'glow in the sky' from 100 km away.

This would indicate an extremely powerful explosion occurred from below to form this 'crater-hole', in a region known in the local Nenets language as the 'end of the world'. The recent discovery by scientists of methane 'bubbles' on the remote Belyy Island in the Kara Sea off the Yamal Peninsula coastline may be another alarming sign of increased activity in the depths.
SOTT Exclusive: The growing threat of underground fires and explosions

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Bizarro Earth

New island appears off US Coast

Helen Coffey
The Independent, UK
Fri, 30 Jun 2017 02:52 UTC
New Island
© chadonkaThere's a new island off the tip of Cape Point.
A new island has appeared off the coast in the US, near North Carolina's Cape Point, attracting adventurous tourists and photographers.

The mile-long sand bank first started appearing in the spring. "It was just a little bump in April," visitor Janice Regan told The Virginian Pilot. She and her grandson Caleb, 11, explored it looking for shells on Memorial Day.

Instagram user chadonka posted an aerial image of the new island, showing just how large the new addition is.
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Enormous sinkhole swallows car in St. Louis, Missouri


Associated Press
Thu, 29 Jun 2017 20:03 UTC
St. Louis sinkhole
© Christian Gooden/St. Louis Post-Dispatch
A man who scored what he thought was a prime parking spot in downtown St. Louis said he returned from a Thursday morning trip to the gym with his fiancee to find his car swallowed by a sinkhole.

Jordan Westerberg told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that when the couple came back to his Toyota Camry shortly before 7 a.m. and didn't see the car, they figured it had been towed.

Street workers were gathered at the parking space, a tipoff that something was amiss. That's when Westerberg, 25, found the vehicle in the gaping hole — about 20 feet (6 meters) deep and 8 to 10 feet (2.5 to 3 meters) across — that took up the entire southbound lane of the street, next to a vacant building expected to feature apartments, office space and retail.

Comment: These sinkholes are not an isolated event. See: Sinkholes: The groundbreaking truth

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Large sinkhole opens at Wickiup Reservoir in Oregon


The Bulletin
Tue, 27 Jun 2017 23:54 UTC
Wickiup sinkhole
© KRAL
Officials warn that the ground is 'highly unstable'

A sinkhole opened up on the edge of Wickiup Reservoir over the weekend — possibly due to a collapsed lava tube — but officials say water levels at the reservoir just west of La Pine are expected to remain stable.

Photos shared by the Deschutes National Forest earlier in the week showed water draining into the sinkhole. During a visit to the area on Tuesday, the hole was just above the water line. Crews with the North Unit Irrigation District, which operates the Wickiup Dam, placed sandbags to keep water from spilling in to the hole on Tuesday.

Dave Walsh, spokesman with the Bureau of Reclamation, said the hole is roughly 10 to 12 feet across and about 4 feet deep. He said a geologist who examined it on behalf of the bureau on Monday estimated water was flowing down the hole to parts unknown at around 900 gallons a minute.
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Sleeping woman swallowed by sinkhole in Lianyuan, China

Zhuang Pinghui
South China Morning Post
Tue, 27 Jun 2017 13:43 UTC
Rescue workers call off search for 45-year-old mother due to dangerous conditions.
Rescue workers call off search for 45-year-old mother due to dangerous conditions.
Fears are growing for a woman in central China who was apparently swallowed by a sinkhole while she was sleeping in her bed, local media reported.

The woman's husband discovered his wife missing when he went to check on her on Saturday morning, the Hunan province-based news portal Voc.com.cn reported.

When he entered the room he found a three-square-metre hole in the floor and his wife, 45-year-old Chen Jiaoyang, gone, the report said.

The couple lives in Shizhuling, a village in the city of Lianyuan, which had been hard hit by heavy rains over the previous two days.
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Large sinkhole appears on road in Ulsan, South Korea

Park Si-soo
The Korea Times
Sun, 25 Jun 2017 13:01 UTC
An emergency operation is under way to restore the collapsed road.
© YonhapAn emergency operation is under way to restore the collapsed road.
A big sinkhole swallowed a road in Ulsan early Sunday. There were no reports of injuries or major property damage.

The sinkhole was reported about 30 minutes past midnight, according to Ulsan police and fire authorities. The hole was six meters wide and two meters deep.

An emergency operation is under way to restore the site. Ulsan officials said water leaking from a buried sewer pipe had washed away underground soil.
SINKHOLE
© Yonhap
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