(Alta, CA) Man dies in plunge after huge sinkhole opens in his home

[UpInArms]

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0604240180apr24,1,4542628.story

ALTA, CALIFORNIA -- A large sinkhole opened in the middle of a house, killing a 27-year-old man who plummeted 10 feet and was covered by the rubble, officials said Sunday.

The two-story home, built in the 1980s, might have been sitting atop a decades-old underground mine, authorities said. Recent rains possibly softened the ground under the home, in an isolated area near Lake Alta, northeast of Sacramento.

"It's unbelievable," Placer County Sheriff's Department spokeswoman Dena Erwin said. "From the front of the house, it's absolutely normal. Then, in the middle of the house, is this enormous hole."

<snip>

The man's wife also was in the house at the time and called 911. She was uninjured, Erwin said.

...more...

Wow! I had just read another article about a town in Oklahoma -

Slow death consumes Oklahoma mining town

PICHER, Okla., April 24 (Reuters) - The death of their small town is not coming easily for the people of Picher, Oklahoma. But it is coming.

For 23 years now, the 1,500-plus residents of this historic mining community in northeast Oklahoma have known they were in trouble, trapped by growing evidence that waste from mining operations the area once thrived on was poisoning the air, the water and the land.

They have known about the lead contamination, the learning disabilities suffered by area children, the declining property values, and the cavernous holes found around the area, including one dubbed by locals as "hell's half-acre."

They have known their community was considered one of America's worst environmental disasters and have held tight to hopes that federal and state efforts could clean up the area and get rid of the dozens of 50-foot-tall (15-metre-tall) piles of lead and zinc mining waste known as "chat."

But hope died on Jan. 31 when the U.S. Corps of Engineers invited the townsfolk to a school auditorium and told them that a study of crumbling underground mine shafts showed entire swaths of their community could literally cave in at any time.

...more...

[SpiralHawk]

1. krappy konstruction karma

I'd bet a doughnut this house was built by a Bush republicon

[Taxloss]

2. It's hard to imagine a house that could survive a cave-in like this.

These things do happen - whether the house should have been built in that location is another question, but the sinkhole would have been bad news for Fort Knox. Its construction is frankly irrelevant.

Besides, it sounds like the house actually stood up reasonably well!

I would focus my inquiry on the area's surveyors. And whoever granted planning permission.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

3. A lot of old mines in that area.

And a lot of them aren't on any map. The gold rush was not exactly a highly regulated endeavour.

[Demeter]

4. Too Bad It Wasn't My Ex

Would have been the Faustian ending he's been asking for, these 20 years....

[Blue_Tires]

5. very sad

[AlCzervik]

6. This isn't all that far away from where i live and i read this morning

that the hole is actually getting deeper, it's now 30 feet and they can't remove the body because the place is too dangerous, they also reported the hole is moving beyond the load bearing walls of the house. I can't even imagine the horror this must have experienced, really sad.

[theHandpuppet]

7. You know what's the especially cruel kicker?

Some insurance companies won't pay up over sinkhole disasters like this. "Act of God", they call them. So this woman may not only have lost her young husband, she may not be able to collect insurance on the house. I knew a family in rural Northern Virginia who lost their land and house when a huge sinkhole suddenly appeared right under their home. As it kept growing the county condemned the house and land and the insurance company wouldn't pay up, saying it was an "act of God". The sinkhole was so dangerous the family wasn't even allowed to try to recover any of their possessions. Last I heard they were still trying to fight it in court, though they had already been denied and were in the appeals process. That just sucks.