We’ve had our share of sinkhole videos on here before, as they’re always luridly fascinating and terrifying reminders that, somehow, if the Earth feels like randomly opening up beneath your car and just swallowing it like a titanic amoeba, it can do that. It seems like the Earth wanted an Indian-market Hyundai Venue, because it sure as hell took one over the weekend.
This happened at a parking lot in the Ghatkopar West area of Mumbai on Sunday morning, and, so you can watch this guilt-free, I’ll mention that no one was injured:
#WATCH| Car sinks into the ground in Mumbai’s #Ghatkopar amid heavy rainfall pic.twitter.com/i3bbmqaN6x
— TOI Mumbai (@TOIMumbai) June 13, 2021
Holy crap. That’s terrifying. The person talking that just says “oh, shit” pretty much sums this all up perfectly: Abig chunk of concrete parking lot just somehow yields away into nothingness, revealing a watery chasm beneath, which then swallows that Hyundai down like a Tatooine Sarlacc at lunchtime.
What’s especially strange is how the cars parked but a few feet away aren’t affected at all.
Just imagine coming out to this parking lot, keys to your new Hyundai in hand, trotting up to the spot where you parked and doing a crushingly slow burn as you look to the void where your car should be, then that water-filled hole, and just letting your brain do the maths. Oof.
The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) is in charge of maintenance of the area, though this appears to have taken place on private property. From their statement:
“The incident took place in a private society compound. Nobody got injured in the incident as no one was inside the car. We are helping in pumping out water from the well and have asked the society to cordon off the well area after removing the car.”
It seems that the parking lot may have been built on a reinforced concrete over a well? That doesn’t really seem like a fantastic idea.
The car seems to have been dragged out of the well now, and the dangerous area cordoned off, though I have yet to find an explanation why the car’s brake lights — including the CHMSL — appear to be on, if no one was inside.
A water-induced electrical short? I hope so.
Also, I wonder if a rear-engined car, like a Tata Nano, might have avoided sinking in, since the hole was under the heavy nose of this car. I guess that probably doesn’t really matter, though.