Sinkholes: Hungry, Lurking, and Coming for a Van Near You

Sinkholes, nature’s version of the Morlocks, are fascinating and scary things. They appear out of nowhere, swallowing up homes and vehicles like a muddy repossession agent.

A massive sinkhole currently devouring a major downtown street in Ottawa, Canada’s capital, caused commuter chaos, ruptured a water and gas main, flooded a partly constructed underground LRT station, and took the life of an innocent Dodge Grand Caravan.

The model might have been spared by Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, but this vehicle wasn’t. Ottawa was last in the sinkhole news in 2012, when a man (and his Hyundai Accent) was gobbled up by a malevolent freeway.

Let this be a lesson to all drivers: the Earth is hungry.

See video of the meal after the break.

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National Corvette Museum Makes Sinkhole Permanent Exhibit

Earlier this year, a sinkhole opened up within the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, Ky., taking down eight Corvettes 60 feet below the show floor. Since then, the natural disaster has proven profitable for the museum, prompting its board to make the hole a permanent attraction.

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  • Theflyersfan The wheel and tire combo is tragic and the "M Stripe" has to go, but overall, this one is a keeper. Provided the mileage isn't 300,000 and the service records don't read like a horror novel, this could be one of the last (almost) unmodified E34s out there that isn't rotting in a barn. I can see this ad being taken down quickly due to someone taking the chance. Recently had some good finds here. Which means Monday, we'll see a 1999 Honda Civic with falling off body mods from Pep Boys, a rusted fart can, Honda Rot with bad paint, 400,000 miles, and a biohazard interior, all for the unrealistic price of $10,000.
  • Theflyersfan Expect a press report about an expansion of VW's Mexican plant any day now. I'm all for worker's rights to get the best (and fair) wages and benefits possible, but didn't VW, and for that matter many of the Asian and European carmaker plants in the south, already have as good of, if not better wages already? This can drive a wedge in those plants and this might be a case of be careful what you wish for.
  • Jkross22 When I think about products that I buy that are of the highest quality or are of great value, I have no idea if they are made as a whole or in parts by unionized employees. As a customer, that's really all I care about. When I think about services I receive from unionized and non-unionized employees, it varies from C- to F levels of service. Will unionizing make the cars better or worse?
  • Namesakeone I think it's the age old conundrum: Every company (or industry) wants every other one to pay its workers well; well-paid workers make great customers. But nobody wants to pay their own workers well; that would eat into profits. So instead of what Henry Ford (the first) did over a century ago, we will have a lot of companies copying Nike in the 1980s: third-world employees (with a few highly-paid celebrity athlete endorsers) selling overpriced products to upper-middle-class Americans (with a few urban street youths willing to literally kill for that product), until there are no more upper-middle-class Americans left.
  • ToolGuy I was challenged by Tim's incisive opinion, but thankfully Jeff's multiple vanilla truisms have set me straight. Or something. 😉