Massive Sinkhole in Chicago Swallows Three Cars (Time)

A sinkhole opened up in a street in Chicago’s South Side early Thursday morning large enough to engulf three cars and send one driver to the hospital, the Chicago Tribune reports.http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/04/18/watch-massive-sinkhole-in-chicago-swallows-three-cars/

Merko Krivokuca was driving his silver pickup down South Houston Avenue when the vehicle fell in to the 20-to-40-foot-wide sinkhole. His father said he was taken to Northwestern Memorial Hospital to be treated for some scratches. Two more cars also fell into the gaping hole, while a fourth was towed from the edge just in time.

Witnesses in the neighborhood told the Chicago Tribune that it sounded like a car accident.

Krivokuca was lucky enough to walk away with just scratches — unlike Tampa, Fla., resident Jeff Bush, 37, who was at home on Feb. 28 when a 60-foot-wide sinkhole opened beneath his bedroom, swallowing him whole. Engineering experts said it was too dangerous to try and retrieve Bush’s body; the house was razed and gravel was poured into the sinkhole, the Associated Press reported.

Chicago fire, water, streets and sanitation departments respond to a sink hole which swallowed three vehicles and exposed a 24 inch gas line at the 9600 block of south Houston Avenue on Chicago’s south side, April 18, 2013.