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80 foot deep sinkhole appears in Fairbanks man's yard, Alaska

Matt Buxton
Fairbanks Daily News-Miner
Sat, 05 Jul 2014 10:02 UTC
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© Matt Buxton / News-MinerAl Schultz peers down a sinkhole on July 4, 2014, while his granddaughter Keirra watches from the driveway. The hole appeared in the front of his home in the Gold Hill area of Fairbanks.
A Gold Hill resident got a nasty surprise after returning from vacation this week when he discovered a sinkhole diving to depths of a stomach-churning 70 to 80 feet in his front yard.

Al Schultz on Friday had cordoned off the roughly 4-foot wide hole that appeared in a roadside ditch and covered the opening with wood planks. Schultz didn't have a clear solution to the problem.

"I called about three excavation companies and with the holiday got one to come out and look at it," he said. "We tied a truck hitch to his rope and threw it down there."

But the contractor's rope was too short and the hitch dangled somewhere down the hole, Schultz said. To reach the bottom, Schultz tied another length of rope to the contractors' rope.

They measured 82 feet.

But just what it looked like down there, they didn't know, and Schultz couldn't get a quote for the fix at the time.

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Patio falls into 10-foot deep sinkhole in West Town, Chicago


abc7chicago.com
Fri, 04 Jul 2014 10:12 UTC
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Firefighters evacuated two buildings in West Town after a patio leading to the main building collapsed into a sinkhole 10 feet deep.
Chicago firefighters evacuated a coach house and four-story building in West Town after a patio collapsed into a 10-foot deep sinkhole early Friday morning.

The Department of Buildings says it is now working with the building owners who, officials said, are taking full responsibility and control of the situation. Tenants are being relocated as crews evaluate the patio.

Tenants said the collapse at 1 a.m. Friday at 1421 West Chicago Avenue sounded like a bomb. An entire concrete section between the main building and a coach house fell 10 feet into a what the landlord described as an unused, old, underground walkway. Patio furniture and air conditioning units also fell into the sinkhole, which measures 20 feet wide and 20 feet long.

No one was on the patio when it collapsed and no one was injured in the incident. Firefighters had to evacuate three people from the coach house since the patio was their only entrance. Fire crews broke through the back of the carriage house to do that.


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Boy injured after car drives into sinkhole in Burlington, Illinois

Elena Ferrarin
Daily Herald
Wed, 02 Jul 2014 06:16 UTC
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A giant sinkhole swallowed a car in Kane County after Monday night's storms
Knowing that her son was able to take a few steps from his hospital bed to a chair Wednesday morning was an immense relief, his mother said, but the enormity of his injuries also overwhelmed the Elgin woman.

Benjamin Hernandez, 15, was seriously hurt a day earlier when the car driven by his mother plunged into a sinkhole on a rural road south of the village of Burlington.

San Juanita Pineda was delivering newspapers in the pre-dawn hours and did not see the sinkhole that was 10 feet in diameter and deep enough that her Ford Taurus was lodged below ground level. A short time later, a pickup truck drove over the car in which the two were pinned.

Benjamin is in the pediatric intensive care unit of Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood with a spinal fracture, a broken rib and a broken jaw, his mother said. He also lost some teeth.


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Blue Planet

Canada: Sinkhole closes west Quebec highway


CBC News
Wed, 02 Jul 2014 19:08 UTC
Quebec Sinkhole
© CBC NewsPolice closed Highway 148 in both directions after a 10-metre wide sinkhole opened Wednesday morning in the highway's eastbound lane.
Pontiac Mayor Roger Larose says he warned the province a month ago about problems with a highway culvert that likely caused a large sinkhole to appear on Highway 148 on Wednesday.

On Wednesday morning a large sinkhole 10 metres deep and 10 metres wide formed on Highway 148's eastbound lanes, closing the highway in both directions between the communities of Quyon and Luskville, both of which are part of the municipality of Pontiac.

Pontiac Mayor Roger Larose said Wednesday he and his staff told the provincial government a month ago that the culvert was blocked.

He said workers did come to fix the problem, but said the culverts should have been monitored.

"They should have been aware of this before us. They aren't organized and I sure am not impressed," said Larose.

A spokesperson with Quebec's transportation ministry told CBC News recent heavy rains and the Canada Day storm may have contributed to the sinkhole's formation over the culvert.

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Schoolgirl survives fall into 25ft deep sinkhole in Shuttlewood, UK

David Raven
Daily Mirror, UK
Wed, 02 Jul 2014 05:43 UTC
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Daisy-Mae Jones, 7, fell the equivalent height of a two-storey house and incredibly walked away with just cuts and bruises

A seven-year-old girl miraculously survived falling 25ft into a sinkhole.

Schoolgirl Daisy-Mae Jones, fell the equivalent height of a two-storey house while she was playing in a field near her home.

Her terrified mother Janine struggled to find little Daisy-Mae at first because of the thick grass, and the search party were led by the schoolgirl's cries for help until they found the hole.

A nearby builder helped to rescue her - and incredibly, she walked away with just cuts and bruises.

Describing the horrifying ordeal, mum Janine, 39, of Shuttlewood, Derbys., said: "Her friends came to tell us what had happened but the grass in that field is tall and thick, so it took a while to find her.

"We just had to keep calling her, and listening out. When we found her she was crying and covered head to toe in clay and mud. It was terrible."
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Sinkhole opens up on road in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia


channelnewsasia.com
Wed, 02 Jul 2014 14:17 UTC
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© @wanluv36A yet-completed tunnel sunk on Wednesday, causing part of a road in Kuala Lumpur city area to sink.
Part of a road at the intersection of Jalan Pudu and Jalan Hang Tuah sunk on Wednesday, after an underground tunnel being constructed, collapsed.

Traffic in Malaysia's capital city was disrupted on Wednesday (July 2) after a road sunk due to the collapse of an underground tunnel being constructed.

According to a report by Malaysia's The Star, part of the road at the intersection of Jalan Pudu and Jalan Hang Tuah sunk after the tunnel, which forms part of the Pudu underpass project by Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL), collapsed at 10.38am. There was another cave-in at 12.20pm.

Two excavators were in the tunnel when the incident happened, but no casualties were reported, said Kuala Lumpur Fire and Rescue Department Assistant Director (Operations) Azizan Ismail said. He predicted the road would collapse further along the tunnel lines, the report stated.
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Highway shut down after sinkhole opens up in northern Alberta

Julia Parrish
edmonton.ctvnews.ca
Mon, 30 Jun 2014 10:44 UTC
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RCMP shut down Hwy 754, after a sinkhole was found, and spread, near kilometre 74 of the highway, on Monday, June 30.
RCMP in northern Alberta had to shut down a highway in the area, after a sinkhole was discovered near the roadway.

Desmarais RCMP said on Monday at about 7 a.m., officers were alerted to the emerging sinkhole near Highway 754.

Officers responding to the call found the sinkhole near kilometre 74 on Highway 754 - and traffic on the roadway was reduced to one lane, as the sinkhole had started to spread underneath the northbound lane of the highway Monday morning.

Later that day, RCMP said the entire roadway had been closed, as the sinkhole had continued to expand the width of the highway.
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Four people buried by landslide in China


Daily Telegraph
Sun, 29 Jun 2014 09:58 UTC
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© China News Service/Zhong XinFirefighters try to rescue the missing people after a landslide in southwest China's Yunnan Province on Monday, June 30, 2014.
A landslide on Saturday afternoon in southwest China's Yunnan Province is captured on camera

Amateur video footage shows a large section of steep terrain give way above a village in Daguan County in China's Yunnan Province.

Four residents of the village of Tuohe were out collecting herbs at the time and were buried under tonnes of debris.

Rescuers rushed to hunt for survivors as large boulders continued to tumble down the hill. One victim was pulled out alive but the other three are still missing.


Source: ITN
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Moon

Tourist destination? Turkmenistan boosts tourism at burning desert crater locals call 'door to hell'


RT.com
Sun, 22 Jun 2014 10:12 UTC
turkmenistan gas crater
© AFP Photo/Igor SasinA picture taken on May 3, 2014, shows people visiting "The Gateway to Hell," a huge burning gas crater in the heart of Turkmenistan's Karakum desert.
An ominous gas crater that has been burning in a Turkmen desert for more than 40 years is a perfect site for boosting tourism in the country, local officials and academics say. The man-made pit, known as "the Door to Hell," earlier faced backfill.

Tourism may not be the strongest side of the Central Asian republic's economy, as only around 10,000 visitors come to Turkmenistan yearly, according to official stats - most of them from Iran, Germany and the US. However, local tourism officials say they found a promising tourist attraction - and it is really hot.

Amid the arid Karakum desert, covering most of the country and known for its extreme temperature changes, one can find a huge sinister-looking pit known as Derweze or Darvaza - commonly referred to by the locals as "the Door to Hell."
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Sinkhole partially swallows car at Perth casino, Australia

Chloe Ross
ninemsn.com.au
Mon, 23 Jun 2014 15:39 UTC
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A social media post showed the front and back tyres of a white Hyundai stuck in the hole.
An unlucky driver was left stranded at a Perth casino after a sinkhole partially swallowed their car.

The sinkhole, which opened up in the Crown Casino carpark yesterday morning, developed after heavy rain at the weekend, WA Today reports.

Nine News reporter Scott Cunningham said the bitumen had collapsed in two places, trapping the two left wheels of the driver's side.

"The bitumen has caved in, there's probably a metre-and-a-half drop I suppose where you can see that the sands just all cave in, around and underneath the wheels," he said.

"There's just one car that appears to be stuck there at the moment, security has fenced-off the area around it."

A photo posted by the reporter to social media showed the full extent of the damage.

As the sinkhole is on private property, the casino will be responsible for its repair.

Source: Nine News, WA Today
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