Sink holes. Anyone know...

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
...of any that have "come up" at WDW?

No, I'm not even talking about Horizons. I know that was a common rumor about why the demo of that attraction. From everything I've read, a sink hole was NOT the case. If I'm wrong, I'd be interested to know. I just don't see them going back and building over a fresh (in terms of sink holes) one.

This morning on Yahoo news I was reading this article about a recent sink hole in the West Central Florida area (I think?). Sink holes are something I'm fairly familiar with having grown up in Central Florida. I totally remember the big one they refer to in the article from 1981. That was in Winter Park. Swallowed up part of Roger Holler Chevrolet. That was right after we moved to Orlando from Pensacola. I know sink holes come up all over all the time. It's pretty common. So I got to thinking about it and surely there's been some sink holes open up on the Disney property over the years especially considering how vast the property is. I can't think of anything noteable off the top of my head where any roads, resorts, parks, or backstage areas have been affected. I'm curious if anyone else might know of any occurances that maybe "used" land on the WDW property had one surface. What, if anything, does Disney do as preventative measures? (<---not sure that's even possible, really) Surely if nothing has ever occured they've at least thought of it. Soil/ground studies?

Just wonderin'. Methinks perhaps I thinks too much of trivial stuff, huh? LOL!
 

PhotoDave219

Well-Known Member
Just a rumor of one along Seven Seas Lagoon between TTC/Contemporary.

Apparently, the story goes that they were putting in test footers (or something) for a hotel and the next day they were gone. Its rumor/urban legend, but thats the only one I know of.
 

Goofyernmost

Well-Known Member
Didn't Martins film tribute to ToT mention that they had to move the location of ToT somewhat because of a sink hole? I don't have any idea what causes one (well, I kinda do) but how they can determine that building just a few yards away from one is sure not to sink itself.
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Just a rumor of one along Seven Seas Lagoon between TTC/Contemporary.

Apparently, the story goes that they were putting in test footers (or something) for a hotel and the next day they were gone. Its rumor/urban legend, but thats the only one I know of.

That's interesting! Not sure if that particular story is urban legend but it has some amount of merit. Hubby works in engineering/construction/etc. When we lived in Southeast Louisiana there was some bridge, can't remember which there's so many, that there's a stories of driving piles and when they smacked 'em they disappeared. Like gone. I suppose it's possible. All that area was marsh and wetlands.


Didn't Martins film tribute to ToT mention that they had to move the location of ToT somewhat because of a sink hole? I don't have any idea what causes one (well, I kinda do) but how they can determine that building just a few yards away from one is sure not to sink itself.

The article I linked explains sink holes in layman's terms pretty well. Think of a piece of swiss cheese. The holes are made up of a porous rock at dissolves in water. The water table in Florida is high. So the holes in the cheese (ground) dissolve and the void collapses. That's basically it.
 

marni1971

Park History nut
Premium Member
ToT was moved due to one. World Showcase lagoon has one, as does the east pond by Odyssey. There's one in the vicinity of PotC/JC. The Ventitian site is unstable, not sure if its due to a sinkhole or just soft ground.

And no, Horizons didn't have one. But Energy does.
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
ToT was moved due to one. World Showcase lagoon has one, as does the east pond by Odyssey. There's one in the vicinity of PotC/JC. The Ventitian site is unstable, not sure if its due to a sinkhole or just soft ground.

And no, Horizons didn't have one. But Energy does.

ToT. Interesting! Where did they initially want to place it?

WS Lagoon & pond by Odyssey. Makes sense. So many of the little bodies of water, ponds and lakes, you see around Central Florida are from sink holes. I was sorta wondering about all the little ponds & bodies of water we see around WDW property. Some are bound to be sink hole openings.

PotC/JC. Trying to picture where there's an opening here. Or is it filled? Need to go look at a satellite view more closely.

Energy. Really?! Now THAT I didn't know! Is it underneath or just nearby??? Again, satellite view for a looky-loo!

Knew you'd be a great source on this one, Martin! Any info on if there's any ground/geo studies or efforts in that direction???


Disney figured it out and it's the same science that they used to create Nextgen. Instead of land dissappearing it's guests cash.....

LOLOLOL!!! Guess that's why this is happening in Florida...where the the state of things is so porous it just sucks the bucks right out from under ya... LOLOLOL!!!! That's funny!
 

WDW Monorail

Well-Known Member
Energy. Really?! Now THAT I didn't know! Is it underneath or just nearby??? Again, satellite view for a looky-loo!

There are pumps working to keep the are under and around Energy from becoming another pond.

Also, there are some areas of the property where trees are planted in an almost perfect circle filling in areas that had caved in.
 

luv

Well-Known Member
That sinkhole thing was so sad. Just swallowed a guy up while he slept. His brother was in the house and heard him scream. He saw the mattress sticking out of the hole, grabbed a shovel, jumped in and started digging. Said he thought he could hear his brother yelling for help.

But the sinkhole was starting to swallow the brother, too...and rescue people pulled him out. "The cops snatched me out of the hole - told me I couldn't be in there; the hole was still caving in. And I - I didn't care. I just wanted my brother..."

Heartbreaking.

They'd had the house inspected like a year earlier - no signs! Very scary.

And, again, so very sad. :( I can't imagine many more frightening ways to die. My heart goes out to that family and the poor man who died.
 

sweetpee_1993

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
That sinkhole thing was so sad. Just swallowed a guy up while he slept. His brother was in the house and heard him scream. He saw the mattress sticking out of the hole, grabbed a shovel, jumped in and started digging. Said he thought he could hear his brother yelling for help.

But the sinkhole was starting to swallow the brother, too...and rescue people pulled him out. "The cops snatched me out of the hole - told me I couldn't be in there; the hole was still caving in. And I - I didn't care. I just wanted my brother..."

Heartbreaking.

They'd had the house inspected like a year earlier - no signs! Very scary.

And, again, so very sad. :( I can't imagine many more frightening ways to die. My heart goes out to that family and the poor man who died.
It is a crazy story and definitely tragic. Bless that family. I don't recall ever hearing of one causing a fatality. I haven't lived in Central Florida for many years, tho. Unless the story goes national I wouldn't hear.
 

articos

Well-Known Member
The reason for the long raised promenade and distance between World Showcase and Future World in Epcot is due to both unstable ground and the sinkhole by Odyssey. When sinking the initial pilings for the monorail beam in Future World, the construction crew lost large concrete piers that just kept sinking into the ground. There are stories of pilings being set one day, then the crew came in a few days later and the pilings had literally disappeared.
 

lego606

MagicBandit
The reason for the long raised promenade and distance between World Showcase and Future World in Epcot is due to both unstable ground and the sinkhole by Odyssey. When sinking the initial pilings for the monorail beam in Future World, the construction crew lost large concrete piers that just kept sinking into the ground. There are stories of pilings being set one day, then the crew came in a few days later and the pilings had literally disappeared.

There's a truck next to Test Track that sunk due to one of these
 

R W B

Well-Known Member
Very interesting topic indeed! Only sink I know of is the one outside of Lafayette, La (2 hours from me) and people think it's going to cause an explosion one day. We'll see.

Sweet_pee- Do you know where at in Louisiana that bridge is you were talking about?

Lego606- Are you serious? That's awesome! (As long as no one was hurt)
 

RedDad

Smitty Werben JagerManJensen
Makes me appreciate those geotechnical engineers even more! A lot of people don't realize what a challenge it was (and is) to build and maintain so many unconventional structures in what was essentially a swamp.
 

Rob562

Well-Known Member
The only one that I recall ever opening up in a Guest area was one of the highway offramps in the I-4/US-192/World Drive interchange area had one open up 10+ years ago, was pretty much the width of the ramp. Luckily there weren't any cars that were involved (I think it opened in the early morning hours).

I have an aerial pic of it somewhere on my other computer from a news helicopter reporting on it at the time.

EDIT: November 1998. No pic with the article, though.
http://news.google.com/newspapers?n...IAfAAAAIBAJ&sjid=vn0EAAAAIBAJ&pg=3130,7310661


-Rob
 

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