Getty Image
In what can only be described as a wild scene, an entire section of a city street in Thailand collapsed into a sinkhole on Wednesday, wiping out three vehicles, damaging infrastructure, and prompting evacuations. The road collapsed around 7 a.m. local time. Luckily, this was before the morning traffic rush and there were somehow no injuries reported.
A spokesman for the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration said that the hole that opened up on the street was nearly 100 feet wide. The collapse pulled down nearby power lines and exposed a burst water pipe.
Bangkok city Gov. Chadchart Sittipunt said, the Associated Press reported, that city officials believe the massive sinkhole was caused by a water leak from a burst pipe causing a tunnel at an underground train station that was under construction to collapse.
Videos of the collapse show several cars on the road backing away once the sinkhole started forming. Two cars fell into the hole with no one inside them, while a Toyota Hilux pickup truck remained trapped on a ledge in the middle of the collapse.
The videos also show the foundations of the nearby buildings now being fully exposed. The Mass Rapid Transit Authority of Thailand (MRTA) said on Thursday that they were positioning tens of thousands of sandbags and crushed stone to divert rainwater away from the sinkhole in order to, hopefully, prevent the collapse of the buildings. Bangkok is currently in the midst of its rainy season.
Approximately 50 police officers from the Samsen police station and residents from 20 nearby households were evacuated due to buildings shifting from their foundations. A nearby hospital was forced to close its outpatient services for two days as a result of the road collapse, but the building itself was not damaged.
Thailand Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said repairs to the tunnel and road could take at least a year after visiting the site on Wednesday.