E-mail updates
Follow on Twitter
Subscribe to RSSView more videos at: http://nbcphiladelphia.com.
It seemed like any other Sunday for Doris Jenkins. The Bethlehem Township, Pa., resident got up bright and early to walk her dog. As soon as she stepped out of the house, however, she immediately saw something that would change the lives of her and her family forever.
"I came around the corner and said, 'Oh my God!'" said Jenkins. "My daughter's car was there. I woke her up and told her to get the car out of there!"
A sinkhole had opened up right in the driveway of her house on 2nd Street. Doris, her daughter Inga Jenkins and her granddaughter Claudia Jenkins were forced to evacuate their house.
"I wasn't thinking that this was how I was going to spend my Sunday afternoon," said Inga while in tears. "It's pretty upsetting to see your driveway start to fall into a hole."
Bethlehem Township Assistant Fire Chief Ron Ford told NBC10's Claudia Rivero that crews have been in the neighborhood all week repairing a break in a sewer line. Ford said it's unclear whether that work caused the sinkhole.
"We won't be sure how much damage it caused until we get the hole dug out and see where we are with the damage," said Ford.
The Jenkins' home has cracks in the foundation and possible damage to the roof. Too dangerous for the family to live there, the home is the only one in the neighborhood that has been evacuated so far.
"We have to evacuate because of the fumes," said Claudia Jenkins.
Luis Echeverria / AP
A look at some of the most amazing sinkholes around the world.
"My daughter and I are going to a hotel for two weeks," said Inga. "We'll see what happens."
No other homes have been affected at this time, authorities said.
There was another report of two small sinkholes that opened up earlier this week on 2nd Street.
NBC10 reported on several sinkholes in the Lehigh Valley area over the last year. Several dozen Allentown families were forced to find temporary housing after a sinkhole opened under their street. In 2011, 54 graves were threatened by approaching water from a sinkhole.
Leave a Comment:
Coal mines ?
Fracking?
I think we are going to have SO many problems from fracking: sinkholes, fires, polluted ground water.
I wouldn't want to own an insurance company right now. Natural disasters are going to cause them all to go out of business.
Sorry to be so negative, but I don't get good vibes from how we're handling global climate change and becoming energy independent. Hope I'm wrong...
whether this one is caused by mining or not remember that sooner or later all those gaps in the earth will eventually fill back in on their own. Same for oil drilling and any other mining we do. The Earth constantly settles back down to fill in areas we remove.... it is inevitable.
The Spirit of Tecumseh walks.
The Spirits of the Ancestors, the Iriquois and Lenape, Munsee and Shawnee, the Susquehannock, watch and wait.
Sinkholes have been around PA for a long time. I remember my grandmother telling me a story about a lady she worked with, walking with her daughter on a country road, and the ground opening up, swallowing the little girl.
Fracking may cause many of the abandoned coal mines to collapse.
So intellegent & independent just were do you think you will get gas to drive your car if there is no fracking? Do you even realize how many products you use in your daily life that are petroleum based?
So Sheryl what about us going green? We've ravaged our planet ( and this country) enough dontcha think? That evil Obama had a good plan for this country, but those invested in oil have maybe stopped this, ya think? The longer we put this off, the more we'll be surprised...
Spartans.
Sheryl, you do realize that you don't fuel your car with natural gas, don't you? Oh wait...
Only in Florida... wait... PA.
After hearing about this story and other ones recently, I called my insurance agent and asked if I could buy sinkhole insurance. She laughed and said "No, DC is too unpredictable."
Sheryl, fracking is for extracting natural gas, not crude oil. But you are right, we all need to take responsibility for the fuels we use and what impact that has on our planet. However, I think we can all agree that we'd rather not live in a world where the ground can swallow our homes on a regular basis, or where we have no access to non-poisoned water.
Or Black Holes star to develop in the hearth ?
There is no possibility it's from fracking. Let's just get rid of that one right now. I'm certainly not in favor of the practice, but it happens so far underground that there is no possibility of a sinkhole opening on the surface as a direct or indirect result of fracking. Period.
What I found a little strange is that the home is clearly damaged yet the hole is relatively small in diameter, and is a fair distance from the house. That leads me to conclude that there's a LOT more to that "hole" than meets the eye. I think it's wise that the home was evacuated, because I think the weakened area of ground is much larger than that represented by the hole on the surface. I'm no expert, but I wouldn't ordinarily think that digging a similar hole that far away would have any significant impact on the house itself...so who knows how far the fragile ground may extend. Pretty scary thought, actually.
Perhaps we should ban the practice of building neighborhoods over old mine tunnels, as this same thing is possible over large areas of America?
Fracking is fracked up.
The future generations will look at us as primitive, stupid and not concerned. Just thinking about how we went without abandon looking for oil and never considered what we were doing to the environment. Oh well what the frack, we will be gone.
aquatone:
At least you got something right.
2012
Session: The M5.8 Central Virginia and the M5.6 Oklahoma Earthquakes of 2011
Are Seismicity Rate Changes in the Midcontinent Natural or Manmade?
ELLSWORTH, W. L., US Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA; HICKMAN, S. H., US Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA; LLEONS, A. L., US Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA; MCGARR, A., US Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA; MICHAEL, A. J., US Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA; RUBINSTEIN, J. L., US Geological Survey, Menlo Park, CA
A remarkable increase in the rate of M 3 and greater earthquakes is currently in progress in the US midcontinent. The average number of M >= 3 earthquakes/year increased starting in 2001, culminating in a six-fold increase over 20th century levels in 2011. Is this increase natural or manmade? To address this question, we take a regional approach to explore changes in the rate of earthquake occurrence in the midcontinent (defined here as 85° to 108° West, 25° to 50° North) using the USGS Preliminary Determination of Epicenters and National Seismic Hazard Map catalogs. These catalogs appear to be complete for M >= 3 since 1970. From 1970 through 2000, the rate of M >= 3 events averaged 21 +- 7.6/year in the entire region. This rate increased to 29 +- 3.5 from 2001 through 2008. In 2009, 2010 and 2011, 50, 87 and 134 events occurred, respectively. The modest increase that began in 2001 is due to increased seismicity in the coal bed methane field of the Raton Basin along the Colorado-New Mexico border west of Trinidad, CO. The acceleration in activity that began in 2009 appears to involve a combination of source regions of oil and gas production, including the Guy, Arkansas region, and in central and southern Oklahoma. Horton, et al. (2012) provided strong evidence linking the Guy, AR activity to deep waste water injection wells. In Oklahoma, the rate of M >= 3 events abruptly increased in 2009 from 1.2/year in the previous half-century to over 25/year. This rate increase is exclusive of the November 2011 M 5.6 earthquake and its aftershocks. A naturally-occurring rate change of this magnitude is unprecedented outside of volcanic settings or in the absence of a main shock, of which there were neither in this region. While the seismicity rate changes described here are almost certainly manmade, it remains to be determined how they are related to either changes in extraction methodologies or the rate of oil and gas production.
Wednesday, April 18th / 3:45 PM Oral / Pacific Salon 4 & 5
This story is funny. This wouldn't have made page 6 of the local paper let alone NBC's web site if it weren't for the incident in Florida. Then you get all the nuts coming out blaming fracking. Listen up folks. You have somewhere in the neighborhood of 300 million people in the US. Odds are things are going to happen. Deal with it and get a grip. It's my understanding that sink holes are mostly caused by soft limestone eventually eroding away from ground water and collapsing, taking the topsoil down with it. Happens all the time.
@Conjuring Cat,
"Sheryl, you do realize that you don't fuel your car with natural gas, don't you? Oh wait..."
It would be wise if that was an option (yes I know that we do have a little infrastucture but not enough) but either way you are wrong with your intent.
@elspeth1,
"Sheryl, fracking is for extracting natural gas, not crude oil."
NOT Juuuuuust ;)
"In the last few months, with the continuous demand for new energy sources, and with the increasing attention for the so-called Marcellus Shale, oil companies are sparking up conversations for new sources of employment by means of fracking for oil. The concept of fracking or more appropriately, hydraulic fracturing, is the process of initializing and furthering fractures on rock formations underground, with the help of a pressurized liquid. The process helps in releasing energy sources such as petroleum and natural gas as well as other gases for extraction."
Article Source: h-ttp://EzineArticles.com/6582869 READ MORE AT h-ttp://ezinearticles.com/?Fracking-for-Oil:-How-Does-It-Work?&id=6582869
"That has won the Democratic president rare praise from oil and gas lobbyists, while frustrating environmentalists and others who have seen Obama as a protector of the environment. The head of the American Petroleum Institute, the trade group for U.S. oil and natural gas companies, recently said the administration now has "a better understanding" of the industry.
The evolving nature of Obama's relationship with the oil and gas industry was evident in his State of the Union address in January, shortly after his Keystone decision. Obama touted the potential of natural gas and said that drilling for it could create nearly 600,000 jobs nationally by the end of the decade.
Industry supporters have estimated that oil and gas drilling in Ohio could mean more than 65,000 new jobs and nearly $5 billion in investment in the state's economy by 2014."
Source: h-ttp://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/16/us-usa-campaign-ohio-fracking-idUSBRE84F17520120516
It's cool that you care but please try and care enough to be properly informed. Our wells produce both gas and oil and we are in N.E. Ohio. In fact Big Sky Energy's (an Ohio energy company) specialty is going after oil.
Regards,
Brandon The Progressive Liberal
Debi
All that science stuff you posted ...you know ...
Seems like it was written by some scientists ...you know ...
Those same people who have an agenda ...to draw out public money ....for their stupid grants ...
That is why those science fellows post all this unreadable scary stuff just so they can get their grubby little hands on our tax dollars.
I'd much rather trust the energy industry you know ...because those science people - they are just after the money.
DickCranium:
So are you claiming fracking will not exacerbate the problem of sinkholes?
Well it certainly wasn't fracking that caused the massive sinkhole in Dick's head where usually the brain is supposed to be ...
Its almost as if we human are living on a thick chunk of loose and non-homogenous pile of rock and dirt a few miles thick! Who could have known that there is "stuff" under the floor we can visible see...
Did you say "Dick's Head" GungaDin? I am flagging you for being inflammatory. Let's be civil here.
@2FAST4U1701, thank you for the update on fracking. In NYS, the Marcellus Shale reserves have drawn interest only from natural gas companies. There has been no discussion here, yet, about extracting crude oil. Since there is still quite a bit of tort action from various groups and moratoria on drilling in many municipalities, the future of fracking in New York is still very much in question. Perhaps that is why there is no discussion here regarding crude oil extraction. Or perhaps the shale in this part of the country is not considered oil-rich. At any rate, it is always good to be informed, so thank you. Incidentally, domestic oil and gas production is often championed by those seeking energy independence. What we hear locally is that with natural gas prices at record lows, the gas is likely to be sold internationally in order to maintain profits.
ROFL @ RichardHarrow
I love your character in Boardwalk Empire by the way.
US infrastructure is disintegrating but politicians say we must have ALL money go for defense.
.
Ban Sink holes!
Stupid comment of the day.
Chris, you beat me to that one.
Same song....different post....will you idiots never stop? Boring! Yawn!
Makes you post, doesn't it?
"Hey look! I made a funnee! I made me a joke about them-thur gun-grabbers who wanna"--
"Chris, get up out of the damn basement! Lunch is ready!"
"Yes, ma..."
If sink holes are banned, then only holes will have sinks. The only thing to stop a bad sink hole is a good sink hole with a gun.
1 guy dies in a sinkhole and now we're gonna start doing news stories on them making families move? does msnbc even know how often that happens? to cover them all you'd have to do several stories per day. in other words THIS ISN'T NEWS!
Scorsese is doing a movie !
Sinkholes will most likely be forming at an increasing rate due to continued mining and fracking. Not only will the frequency rise, but also the severity. Massive sinkholes engulfing entire homes like the one in Tampa might one day be as common as murder in the U.S.
Get a grip. Lets fact hunt together....
The sinkhole in Tampa did not engulf an entire house rather just a bedroom 10x12 area; another media misinformation scare tactic to get readers to read. The house was demolished for safety in a controlled manner. Mining and fracking have been going on for decades and now all of a sudden sinkholes are the result? Doubt it. If that were true, half of West Virginia and Pennsylvania would be falling into the sink holes. Could it be that sink holes are natures way of settling after water has been removed from the earth. More likely. Sinkholes have more to do with underground water disbursement than anything else.
Hatr_Hurter--sorry, but MSN (and most news coverage in general) follows the old "if it bleeds it leads" but there must not have been enough bleeding in today's news cycle. Why else would they be running a SECOND story on Valerie Harper (TV's Rhoda) having inoperable brain cancer? Sad for Valerie, but NEWS? I mean, she's older than I am and I am old! Old people get sick and die.
Mining? Nope. Fracking? Nope. Sewer Line? Probably. Get a grip people.
Thank you...At least someone read the whole article.
Maybe mother nature drank one too many beers and burped? With so many nutjobs complaining about the story. Maybe reading the facts first would help ... but probably not?
Why?? HATR HURTING Why ??? Why do you comment on stories that aren't even news? Simpleton.
RV in GB is right. The 5th and 6th paragraphs talk about asst. fire chiefs & sewer lines. Get a grip people!
The sewer work may have something to do with this one, but right now that is conjecture. If sewer work was also done in the other townships and cities in PA that they mention in the article, we may know the culprit. But fracking is also a reasonable guess, at least for some of the sinkholes. Fracking, as it is done now, is far more disruptive to underground water distribution than it has ever been before. Zen, you are right to say that fracking has been done for decades, but not in the manner in which it is done now. They are not only able to go somewhat deeper, but current technology allows for extensive horizontal drilling miles underground. This disrupts the existing geological formations on a scale we have not seen before.
Sinkholes have been a problem in Florida for some time. They have been pumping out water to sevice south Florida and then the ground collapses.
Once in a life time deal! We’re witnessing the birth of a black hole!
Leftists media is scare mongering.
Scientists are scare mongering.
But the coal, Oil and Gas industry is telling us that everything is good. We are all safe. We are okay. We are fine.
Right wing logic (or lack thereof) is gonna be the death of this country !!!!
They've been reporting on sink holes for many years.
If you don't feel that it's news worthy - then don't click on the link. Nobody forced you to read the story.
Other people might find it news worthy. Especially if they live in that area.
Did someone pee in your Cheerios this morning?
Florida has real sinkholes. The north and widwest have washouts from pipe breaks. Out west they have drainage conduits too small and the overwash from storms will take out a road. All this is called "sinkholes" in the media, where sensationalism, and uneducated staff "go for it" with the cowboy reporting plan. Pipebreaks are not sinkholes. It's bad meintenance, cheaply done. Then there is the one in Guatemala about a 1000 ft deep, 100 foot round, and as perfectly circular as if drilled. Now that's a sinkhole.
LOOney--actually, if the headline had mentioned sink holes, I probably would not have clicked the box.
But they do nebulous 'interest piquing' headlines that lure you in!
Actually, IReadyou, Missouri, Texas, Alabama, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Pennsylvania are all states that commonly have natural sinkholes in addition to Florida. It's because those states are regions where the type of rock below the land surface (limestone for example) can naturally be dissolved by groundwater circulating through them. Florida is no more susceptible to sinkholes than these other states.
With as old as the water mains are in Detroit [some are even reported to be made of wood] with the wide open Salt Mines under the city, I keep waiting for the news flash that a water main break dropped the city into the salt mines ...
abanksone
Your logic is not appreciated, it interferes with wild speculation and theories.
I worked professionally with a family in Allentown at one point who had their home condemned due to a sink hole. This was back in maybe 2003? Coincidentally there was a lot of work going on under their street, and the street was shut down. I believe they were repairing pipes at the time. The family was a first generation immigrant family, and I feel like they were really brushed off and got hosed in how things panned out :( They were told the work under the street had nothing to do with the sink hole, and they had to live in a hotel for at least a month until things got remedied and they got into a new place. I always wonder what shook out in terms of liability, because I feel like this family was really being taken for a ride. Super nice folks.
That ought to teach them to come here legally. If they were illegally in the states, there is all sorts of federal funding to buy them a mansion and I am sure Obama will keep that fund well stocked.
123 - And if you believe that, have we got a deal for you! Ridiculous!
Pennsylvania has worse problems then sink holes. They have burning coal vains under the ground where whole towns have had to be moved.
Jvalen13, I never knew that coal could be called vain. I think that was done in vain. English has many words that sound identical, such as vain and vein. Hopefully, you are aware of the difference.
There is a documentary called "The Town That Was" very interesting. A great example of the governments "wait and see" practices.
I love the way you supposedly educated idiots will cut someone down for mispelling words or misusing a word instead of considering the content of their comment, this only makes you look arrogant and mean spirited.
Coal's so vain... I bet you think that mine is about you, don't you, don't you...
Carley Simon?
Carly Frackin' Simon !
it's Bush's fault!
Uh-uh!!! It's Obama's fault! Wait, it's Clinton, since he balanced the budget. No! It's Reagan's fault, since he as the Great Orator talked the sinkhole into showing up! Wait!! It's ......
The earth is imploding.
Black Holes born in earht...
The Romulans have deployed the RED matter. We're doomed!
Ask Al Gore, Global Warming for sure !! end of the world coming soon
it is because Al Gore invented the internet!
Earth spirit saying get off me or I eat ya............
Last time Earth had a friend named asteroid that came and took care of it..........
Get your car out of there! thanks mom!... you get the car out of there.
Those were my thoughts too! Great, mom, put your daughter in harms way!
I know, I wouldn't have told my daughter to get the car out of there and if she would've tried I'd have grabbed her and told her let it go. I'd be afraid she'd go down the hole. The car can be replaced and even if it couldn't who cares! The daughter's life is priceless compared to any car. I thought the same thing when I read that.
What a blessing, a problem to prison overcrowding. Fill the holes with the excess prisoners.
Sparta!!
Good idea , get a patent !
And--how many feet is it that a big part of central states has sunk, because they sucked out a large part of "ground" water for irrigation, I have seen it from the air as well in Kansas.
Bundgaard--that MIGHT not be the earth in KS Sinking--we are also, in the midwest, LOSING about 1 inch of topsoil every ten years due to erosion caused by over farming to squeeze out every last BIT of federal subsidies.
And then the excess gets sold to third world countries to feed THEIR overpopulation, and I just keep wondering which country, when WE run out of enough farmland to feed JUST our own people, will overfarm their land to feed US?
I came from a mining town in northern California; there are approximately 3000 miles of mine shafts under Nevada County and I would not be surprised if one day the entire town of Grass Valley fell into a sink hole. They are a natural occurrence but I am very sure that by depleting our aquifers and pumping every last drop of oil out of the ground we are speeding up the process. When there is a void that large something has to give.
Erin N in Idaho--ever seen the movie (Clint Eastwood) adaptatin of the Musical "Paint Your Wagon"?
A booming gold mining town has so many tunnels under it that it eventually collapses, wiping out all the bars and 'ho' houses, and basically, destroying the economy of the area.
Blame it on Obamas dog, or GOD. It could be liberals that make the sinkholes to dispose of all our guns in.
No, this comment is even more stupid than the one above. Going for some kind of award?
This is what you get when you F**K with Mama Nature!
I look's like the Liberal Government is sucking the state dry at it's roots
Looney right! Everything is political. Did your dog burp today? That would be the fault of liberals too. Why waste everybodys time with your nonsense?
Holy Crack!!! No,no...Sorry I mean Holy Hole!!! wow...
Repent! Judgment day is near!
Sinkholes are pretty common. However, the name Claudia isn't very common-I was surprised the granddaughter and the news reporter both are named that. Very pretty name.
I knew a sinkhole named Claudia back in college.
Sounds like, "THE BLACK HOLE"
I clicked on this article just to see if there were any morons blaming on fracking. You didn't disappoint. I knew this would be blamed either on the oil and gas industry or George Bush. The worst state in the country for sinkholes is Florida and there has NEVER been a well fracked in Florida.
You idiots saying fracking caused this are mentally delinquent. Liberals dolts never cease to amaze with their level of stupidity.
Seems like the eastern end of the u.s. is turning into swiss cheese. Meanwhile, down in Antarctica they are wondering how the penguins are going to survive the obvious warm up and loss of ice. The garden is changing folks!
Oil, gas & water take up space underground, and act as cushions to the earth's layers. They have been being removed for years..this is only but one of the end results.
Good common sense, all is mater, is some matter go, other will be take his place, matter support mater, change positions, like the continents, the oceans from Pangea