Mystery Behind Giant Hole in Siberia Clearer as 2nd Discovered

The Moscow Times, Jul. 22 2014

The craters, believed to be formed by an underground explosion, are now filled with
snow and ice. (Marya Zulinova / Governor of Yamal-Nenets Region's Press Service)

Reindeer herders in Russia's Far North have discovered yet another mysterious giant hole about 30 kilometers away from a similar one found days earlier.

Located in the permafrost of the subarctic Siberian region of Yamal, which means "end of the earth" in the local Nenets language, both craters appear to have been formed in recent years and have icy lakes at their bases.

Scientists who examined the first hole theorized that it could have been created when a mixture of water, salt and gas exploded underground, the Siberian Times news site reported.

The area, which has one of Russia's richest deposits of natural gas, was covered by sea about 10,000 years ago, and vast salt deposits were left behind.

"Global warming, causing an alarming melt in the ice under the soil, released gas causing an effect like the popping of a Champagne cork," the news report said, citing an expert at the Subarctic Scientific Research Center.

The first hole is estimated to be about 50 meters wide and 70 meters deep, with water from melting permafrost cascading down its sides into the icy deposit below.

The second hole is "exactly" like the first one, but "much smaller," local lawmaker Mikhail Lapsui told the Interfax-Ural news agency. "Inside the crater itself, snow can be seen."

See also:

Scientists Discover Mysterious Giant Hole in Siberia (Video)

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Sinkhole opens under Florida resort villa

BBC News, 12 August 2013

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A hotel near Disney World in Florida has partially fallen into a sinkhole, the latest such incident in the state.

Dozens of people were inside the 24-unit villa near Clermont as the ground gave way before dawn on Monday, but all were safely evacuated.

Windows broke and cracking was heard as the sinkhole, up to 60ft (18m) in diameter, began to open.

Much of the state straddles a system of limestone caverns that are subject to water erosion, causing them to cave in.

A 15ft-deep crater has opened in the ground beneath the Summer Bay Resort villa, which is about 10 miles (16km) west of Disney World, said local fire chief Tony Cuellar.

Luis Perez, who was staying across the road, told the Associated Press news agency: "You could see the building leaning, and you could see a big crack at the base of the building."

In March, a sinkhole beneath a house in the suburbs of Tampa, Florida, swallowed a man who was in his bed. His body was never recovered.

Sinkholes are common in certain parts of Florida, although most are small.

The state's law requires home insurers to provide coverage against sinkholes.

A 20m bottomless sinkhole opens its maw in Sichuan village

Want China Times, Staff Reporter 2013-03-03

The hole. (Internet photo)

A sinkhole gaping 20 meters across appeared in a village of west China's Sichuan province after 6 days of strangle rumbling noises under the earth, according to Chinese-language news website wccdaily.com.

How deep the hole goes, no one knows. After 15m, the center of the hole continues to plunge down. Rocks drop silently into its depths.

Apparently, the sinkhole had been widening out from a a smaller one since last September, said Huang Dajin, who lives near the pit. First he heard tremors; the small hole sunk wider and deeper until it became the monster hole it is now, after 6 days of the sound of falling rocks and earth, said Huang.

These pits are common in the village but the 20-meter hole breaks the record, said local geologists. The soft earth in the region is vulnerable to rapid erosion from rain, especially after the 2008 earthquakes, so much so that "you can see a sinkhole every 50km in the village," said geologists.

Though the sinkhole, situated relatively far away from residents, will not cause any immediate damage, it should be filled or it will could sink further when the rainy season comes, said geologists.　

References:

Huang Dajin　　黃大金

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2013 - Predictions > (The Archangel Uriel by Jennifer Hoffman)

“…  Earth Changes — The dramatic, chaotic and devastating earth changes that have long been predicted still have some potential of happening; however, we have averted many of them. Some of the earth changes I see for 2013 are natural, others are due to man-made activities. There are several active volcanoes around the Philippines, in part of southeast Asia, in Yellowstone that will cause global concern and a long dormant volcano in Australia that will appear unexpectedly in late August or September.

Of greater concern are the sinkholes that were mentioned in 2012 and will appear in greater numbers in 2013. Many of these are caused by drilling, frakking and other known and hidden activities that disrupt the earth’s substrata. I see these happening in the Middle East, especially Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Iraq and in the United States, around the Gulf Coast, the areas around Ohio, Pennsylvania and Kentucky, Nevada and Illinois (currently, frakking is supposedly not being done in Illinois but I believe that it is poised to start in 2013 and once it does the appearance of sinkholes will be immediate, to the extent that the damage frakking creates can no longer be hidden). Some of these will be very large and open quickly. There will be significant properly losses and some loss of life. …”

Part of Highway 1 near Big Sur crumbles into the sea; road closed indefinitely

Mercury News, by Donald Murphy, Monterey County Herald, 03/17/2011

The southbound lane of Hwy 1 about 2 miles south of Rocky Point
is gone and so is the majority of the northbound lane in Big Sur, Calif.
on Wednesday, March 16, 2011. (Orville Myers/ Special to the Sentinel)

BIG SUR -- Highway 1 was closed to traffic about 12 miles south of Carmel on Wednesday after a stretch of the scenic roadway tumbled toward the Pacific Ocean far below.

About 40-feet of the two-lane highway washed out just after 5 p.m. on a curve south of the Rocky Creek Bridge where the highway hugs the Santa Lucia Mountains. All of the southbound lane was gone as was a chunk of the northbound lane. Soil under the northbound lane was reported sliding as late as 6:30 p.m.

The California Highway Patrol closed the southbound lane of the highway at Palo Colorado Road and drivers going north were stopped at the Bixby Creek Bridge.

No one was injured, a CHP dispatcher said. "Nobody went down. No people got

View Highway 1 closure, Big Sur in a larger maphurt," she said.

It was not immediately known how long the coast road would be closed.

"It could be cleaned up in a couple of days, who knows," the dispatcher said.

Caltrans workers posted signs near Rio Road to the north and near Ragged Point and Cambria to the south warning drivers that the highway was closed.

The road was not completely impassible.

Emergency vehicles would be allowed through "at their own risk," the CHP dispatcher said.

For a while after the closure, people were allowed cross the area on foot, but authorities stopped that as soil continued to erode under the roadway.

The Rocky Point Restaurant north of the closure reported business was down Wednesday night.

"We've had two no-shows. It's totally affecting our business," said bartender Rose Russo. "Two people are stuck in the bar," she said.

One was unable to go south and the other was waiting for his girlfriend coming north from Big Sur.

The Ventana Inn and Spa and the Post Ranch Inn reported that all their expected guests had checked in for the night. At Ventana, a few other people who had been traveling north decided to stay the night after learning of the wash out.

A long closure of Highway 1 would undoubtedly be bad for the tourist-dependent businesses in Big Sur and in the tiny communities along the highway between Big Sur and Ragged Point.

The cause of the slide was not immediately clear. The asphalt nearby looked new and no seeping water was seen. Fresh looking rip-rap was spotted mixed with the earth that fell from beneath the roadway.

"It's basically just nature," the CHP dispatcher said.

Caltrans crews were expected at the slide area early today.

It was not clear late Wednesday if people who wish to cross the slide area on foot would be allowed to do so.

Drivers who wish to get to Big Sur from the north can take Highway 101 to south of King City and the steep and winding Nacimiento-Fergusson Road to the coast.

The slide was reported about 5:10 p.m. by a passer-by who saw the road crumble.

The popular Big Sur International Marathon, in which the runners start 13.1 miles south of the Bixby Creek Bridge and run north along Highway 1, is scheduled for May 1.

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Land Subsidence Forms Giant Hole in Mining Area

CRIENGLISH.com,  Web Editor: Jiang, 2011-02-15

A giant hole formed in the ground as a result of land subsidence which
 occurred at a mining area in Ezhou City of central China's Hubei Province
on the early morning of Monday, February 14, 2011. [Photo: icpress]

A large-scale land subsidence occurred at a mining area in Ezhou City of central China's Hubei Province on the early morning of Monday, resulting in a 5,200-square-meter hole in the ground.

The incident did not cause any casualties as production at the site was halted at the time and the workers all had gone home for the Spring Festival holiday, the Hubei-based Chutianjinbao newspaper reported.

The land subsidence involves three shafts at the Datongkeng mining area in Ding'ao village, Tingzu Township. The pit, measuring 80 meters long, 65 meters wide and 40 meters deep, was most likely formed as a result of mining activities that had hollowed out the ground from below, the report quoted experts as saying.

Police have cordoned off the periphery 100 meters around the pit. Fissures were detected in fields on the hills and other mining shafts near the site of the subsidence.

A man on duty near the site surnamed Li told the newspaper that he saw a strong air current blasting egg-sized rocks out of the shaft around 8.40pm Sunday with sounds resembling train steam whistles. Local residents also reported that they were awoken from sleep by extremely loud sounds and tremors.

Meanwhile, the local government is making plans to evacuate local villagers whose homes had developed cracks, partly due to the overdrafting of groundwater by the mining shafts.

The Tingzhu Township government has sealed the road leading to the site and put in place a round-the-clock monitoring squad, the paper said.

Sinkholes Discovered in the Dead Sea

NTD News, Israel, 2011-02-14

 

The Dead Sea is the lowest place on earth.

It attracts tourists from all over the world, who enjoy its healing waters.

Industries also utilize its minerals. But in recent years, deep holes began forming along its west coast.

In Israeli terminology, they are named “Sinkholes,”  and they can swallow up roads, vehicles and even humans.

We went out to examine this phenomenon, and met a geologist who fell into a sinkhole while he was examining it.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"I was informed that new sinkholes were spotted somewhere. I went to document it and discovered a small sinkhole… while documenting it, it grew larger and drew me in."

So what does it feel like to be swallowed by the earth?

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"I fell into a massive landslide, which kept me on one side, but the other side was burying me. The first thing I recall was striving to get out. It was pitch dark and I couldn’t see anything. I felt as though there was a heavy rock on my head. It was a struggle which lasted for hours, trying to dig my way out; and at one point I managed to climb out of the fall, and from that moment onwards, the anxiety

began."

Raz sat in the depth of the hole for 14 long hours. He was unable to move, and unable to climb upwards.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"The biggest problem was that I was afraid to move much, because everything was very fragile, and each movement could have aroused a new landslide".

Then, Raz found a solution for his anxieties – he began writing.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"Since occasionally there were more landslides, I felt anxious. I found a postcard in my bag, and I also had all my equipment along with me in my backpack, including a pen, so I decided I was going to write a farewell letter."

Writing on the postcard helped him to relax. In his bag there was also a roll of toilet paper, and he kept on writing during all these long hours in the pit.

]Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"Since writing felt good, I decided to keep writing. I found a roll of toilet paper in my backpack, so I took it out and it lasted until the evening".

In addition to writing, Raz made a conscious decision to keep thinking positively all along, and that soothed his anxieties.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"Because otherwise I would be mentally lost, and the first moments were extremely difficult – moments of a very deep, existential anxiety."

After we learned about his downfall in the sinkhole, we tried to understand how sinkholes are created.

Raz claims that rivers, including the Jordan River, that used to flow into the Dead Sea – are being shifted from their courses for various reasons.

The heavy industry in the area also evaporates the sea.

As a result, the sea level drops about 1 meter per year. This eventually leads to the creation of sinkholes.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"The drop in the level of water in the Dead Sea is a result of humans interfering with the water system. The water levels are dropping rapidly, something which probably never existed in natural conditions. Now the systems are imbalanced so there are reactions such as this one, with infrastructures collapsing."

The appearance of sinkholes poses a very concrete danger – A danger for lives, for property and for the economy.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"Sinkholes are dangerous for people. There are people who fell into sinkholes, including myself, but not only me. A car or a bus might also fall into a sinkhole."

The Sinkholes have severely harmed the economy in the Dead Sea area. In such a place, it is impossible to cultivate any agricultural products, or have tourism.

[Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"It harmed the agriculture, and most of the palm plantations in Ein-Gedi had to be abandoned…  there was also a huge tourism project on the beach here, and a lot of money was invested here, but we had to abandon it."

We tried to keep optimistic. Is the situation reversible? Is it possible to repair the Dead Sea and its surroundings?

]Eli Raz, Geologist, Ein-Gedi]:

"You picture a hypothetical situation in which all consumers who use water from the Dead Sea and the Jordan River – will give up their water. This sounds very unlikely."

Reporter:Israela Yablonka        Photographer:Anat Markram

Second sinkhole appears in East Austin street

Intersection at Mildred and Willow streets to be closed for up to three weeks

Statesman, by Ben Wear, AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF, Monday, Jan. 31, 2011

City of Austin crews work Monday at the site of a large sinkhole at Mildred
and Willow streets, one block south of East Cesar Chavez Street. It could take
up to three weeks to repair. (Jay Janner/AMERICAN-STATESMAN)

City crews could need up to three weeks to repair an East Austin intersection after an enormous sinkhole formed Monday a block away from where another such collapse occurred in mid-January .

The road collapse at Mildred and Willow streets just before 8 a.m. was related to a water leak two weeks ago that caused a sinkhole in East Cesar Chavez Street, according to city officials. Water from that hole is believed to have flowed south underground to the Willow area and may have weakened the soil.

The new hole is estimated be about 20 feet wide, 30 feet long and at least 10 feet deep .

The Austin Water Utility , concerned about the integrity of a 66-inch water main about 10 feet under Willow, excavated the intersection over the weekend, then filled in the hole after finding the main undamaged. The hole appeared after crews left.

A 6-inch water main began leaking when the area collapsed, cutting off service to 50 to 60 customers for several hours.

Mysterious sinkhole threatens farmer's house

People’s Daily China, 14:57, January 14, 2011

A mysterious sinkhole suddenly appeared at the vegetable garden of Zhang Shiyin, a villager, in his own yard on Jan. 13, Shuangshan Village, Leshan City of Sichuan Province. The diameter of the sinkhole has increased to about 20 meters and it is severely threatening Zhang's house, but it has not resulted in any casualties until now. (Photo by Chinanews/Liu Zhongjun)

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Island of mud appears near Hingol in Pakistan, shows seismicity

Dawn.com, Suhail Yousuf , November 26, 2010

KARACHI: A soft muddy island appeared a few kilometers from the seashore in Hingol area of Balochistan. According to Pakistan Fisher Folk (PFF), the island is 90 meters (m) high with a span of approximately three kilometers (km).

PFF spokesman, Sami Memon told Dawn.com that the fishermen of Ibrahim Hyderi area described the occurrence after returning from Hingol. Fishermen observed white, slippery hot sand erupting from water, three km away from the beach. Before the upsurge of sludge, fishermen also observed high tides near the coast and several boats were trapped due to the emergence of the island.

Memon told Dawn.com that the island is 30m beneath the water and 60m above the sea level which is a total of 90m in height. According to Memon, the fishermen also registered another island 12 years back which plunged into the sea after four months.

However, the amateur video of the event clearly showed eruption of white hot liquid sludge on top of the island which is still ongoing.

Speaking to Dawn.com, Director of Geolabs at Geological Survey of Pakistan (GSP), Asif Nazeer Rana said the area holds three tectonic plates – namely Eurasian, Arabian and Indian plates which are responsible for high seismic activity due to subduction in the Makran area.

Rana said that the Chaman Transverse Fault could also be responsible for the sudden rise of the island at Hingol because the fault is extremely active, moving at a rate of four centimeter yearly.

The Chaman Fault is the only physical feature of Pakistan which can be seen from space and it was responsible for the horrifying earthquake of 31 May, 1935 in Quetta. Over 30,000 people died in the quake.

Rana said that an earthquake of 4.1 magnitude on the Richter scale was also recorded recently in the Chiltan area due to activity of the Chaman Fault and the series of these events need serious attention. – Dawn.com

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Sea Port in Brazil falls into the sea

All Voices, Brazil | Nov 05, 2010

Dramatic video footage has emerged showing the moment a sinkhole / landslide ripped through the Amazonian port of Chibatão, Manaus, Brazil.

The security camera footage shows the torrential flows of mud that swept through the riverside container terminal in the late morning of Sunday 17 October as maintenance work was being carried out.

Two port workers – 31-year-old Pedro Paulo, and 63-year-old Sílvio Barbosa Silva – were confirmed as missing. However, Carlos Gonzaga, president of Sindicargas, the local stevedores union, said he believed at least 10 people could had been swept to their deaths.

A 300-metre crack occurred along the length of the privately owned river terminal as large areas of the terminal patio gave way and crumbled into the river during the disaster, with containers, chassis and port equipment also swept away.José Ferreira de Oliveira, owner of the port, told local journalists that maintenance work was being carried out to create an embankment when the landslide occurred.

It is understood that the work was intended to facilitate access to a floating pontoon, that served as a berth at the facility, after river levels dropped.The river is at its lowest level since records began in 1902, following the Amazon’s worst drought in decades.

According to the government’s geological service, the Rio Negro was measured at a depth of 13.63 metres, down from a high of nearly 30 metres last year.Derricks and rafts have been used to recover containers and cargo handling equipment as the cleanup operation progresses and the search for bodies continues.

The area of the port affected measures 400 by 200 metres, totalling around 80,000 sq metres. Further large cracks are understood to have occurred in an area of pavement adjacent to the first landslide.

The port of the Chibatão is responsible for about 40% of cargo movements to and from the industrial centre around the city of Manaus, the Amazonian state capital.

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Sinkhole swallows car

The Local, 1 Nov 10 16:00 CET

A large sinkhole opened up overnight in the middle of residential area in Thuringia, sucking a nearby car and part of a garage into its depths and forcing authorities to evacuate residents, police said on Monday.

The crater, measuring some 40 by 15 metres, appeared in the town of Schmalkalden around 3 am, a police spokesperson said. A nearby resident heard the noise and called police.

The hole is believed to be some 20 metres deep, she added.

No-one was injured in the incident, but another vehicle near the hole is in danger of falling into the hole.

Click here for more photos of the sinkhole.

Nine homes containing some 25 residents were evacuated, and a large contingent of police and fire fighters are still securing the site. During a press conference Monday afternoon, police said they did not know when it would be safe for residents to return.

According to head of the Thuringia mining authority, Hartmut Kießling, the sinkhole happened naturally and authorities are working to find ways to fill it as quickly as possible.

Jan Katzschmann, an official from the state geology service, said that a large underground cavity had likely collapsed, and further slides could be possible in the coming days.

Their main concern is stabilising the area, Thuringia Environment Minister Jürgen Reinholz said, adding that the situation remains delicate because the use of heavy machinery to fill the hole may cause further damage.

Germany is no stranger to dangerous ground shifts resulting from old mines.

A similar event occurred in April 2010 in the neighbouring state of Saxony-Anhalt when a massive section of earth abruptly collapsed outside Bernburg, leaving a 40 metre-deep crater.

In January 2010 two homes in the town of Tiefenort in Thuringia were evacuated after a landslide opened up a two-metre crater nearby. That town is located near the site of a former calcium salt mine, and there was another landslide about eight years ago in the same area that was filled with concrete.

And in July 2009, three people were killed when their house collapsed into a lake in the Saxony–Anhalt town of Nachterstedt. The area near the town was extensively mined for lignite, or brown coal, during the 19th century, meaning the ground was shot through with hundreds of tunnels.

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Scientists begin exploring world's largest sinkhole

The Dashiwei Tiankeng in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. [Xinhua]

Scientists begin exploring world's largest sinkhole

By Zhang Fang, China.org.cn, October 19, 2010

The Dashiwei Tiankeng in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region. [Xinhua]

A group of Chinese and British scientists have entered the world's largest tiankengs, a group of giant sinkholes, to examine their air and water quality and look for new species.

Another team of scientists explored the Dashiwei tiankengs, nearby Leye City, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, in 2000 but were limited by technology and equipment. The tiankengs together form a pit 600 meters long, 420 meters wide and between 511 meters and 613 meters deep – or enough to fit two Eiffel towers stacked on top of each other.

Tiankeng literally means "heavenly pit" in Chinese. It is a unique geological feature that usually forms in clusters and are mostly found in Guangxi, as well as neighboring Chongqing Municipality.

The well-known Leve and Fengshang Tiankengs in Guangxi, which have an extensive cave system, was added to UNESCO's Global Geoparks Network at the beginning of this month.

Unexplained crack splits Mich. Backyard

WWLP.com, Wednesday, 06 Oct 2010, 11:48 AM EDT

BIRCH CREEK, Mich. (WLUK) - A Michigan family's property has a sudden unexplained divide.

Divide runs 200 yards through property

A large unexplained crack now runs 200 yards through the Salewsky family's property, eight miles north of Menominee in Birch Creek.

The family thinks it happened Monday around 9:00 in the morning. The ground raised five feet up, taking trees along for the ride.

Some cracks were up two feet wide and five feet deep.

"The house shook, the chairs shook," Doug Salewsky said. "The logs weren't there when I piled them."

Salewsky doesn't know what caused his backyard to split in two and neither do police.

There have been no recent reports of any earthquakes in the area. People specializing in geological surveying are being called in to try and explain the phenomenon.

Chasm: The five metre wide hole mysteriously opened in a road in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia, 30 June 2010.

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Monsoon effect

The Jakarta Post, The Associated Press, Ahmadabad, India | Tue, 08/03/2010 8:32 PM

Monsoon effect: Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Service personnel and volunteers remove scooters caught in the collapsed part of a road that caved in Tuesday in Ahmadabad, India. A spell of rain caused a slab of drainage system to collapse, resulting in the cave-in. AP/Ajit Solanki

Miraculous escape for driver as car falls 20ft into sinkhole at traffic lights during storm

Daily Mail, By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE, 24th July 2010

He's thanking his lucky stars that he was pulled out alive.

Yet, miraculously, the driver of this SUV only suffered minor cuts and bruises when his vehicle plummeted 20ft into a sinkhole as he approached traffic lights.

Lance Treankler was driving his black Cadillac Escalade during torrential rains in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, yesterday, when the road opened up beneath him.

Gaping hole: A Cadillac Escalade sits at the bottom of a sinkhole in Milwaukee after a section of road collapsed during torrential rain yesterday. (Enlarge)

'The road just went out from under me,' Mr Treankler said.

'When I landed, my head snapped back. I went unconscious for a few seconds.

'When I looked up, I saw water run over me.'

Mr Treankler was rescued by a passer-by, 46-year-old Mark Pawlik, who was walking along when he saw the vehicle disappear and a traffic light land on its roof.

Mr Pawlik said: 'The Escalade just went "wham". Everything went down.

'The power line went like "pow" and then I think it was sewer water was just pouring into the hole.'

The 20-foot-deep, 40-foot-wide sinkhole formed when a manhole collapsed, and will require several weeks to repair, a city spokesman said.

Cordoned off: The driver, Lance Treankler, was rescued by a passer-by and suffered minor cuts and bruises. (Enlarge)

Wisconsin's governor declared a state of emergency yesterday after storms flooded homes and opened sinkholes in Milwaukee and closed the city's main airport.

Runways were inundated at the city's General Mitchell International Airport, which was shut down temporarily.

The airport, which handled nearly eight million passengers last year, shut on Thursday night as storms dumped 14cm of rain on the city. One rain gauge in the suburb of Shorewood recorded nearly 30cm of water.

Governor Jim Doyle said:'Yesterday, Milwaukee saw what may be record rainfall.'