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Massive sinkhole swallows truck in Japan, trapping driver inside

Huge sinkhole swallows up truck in Japan
Swimming pool-sized sinkhole traps truck driver in Japan 00:51

Japanese emergency services struggled for hours on Tuesday to rescue the driver of a truck that plunged into a massive sinkhole near Tokyo.

Authorities in Yashio City, Saitama, received calls around 9:50 a.m. (0050 GMT) saying that a road had caved in and a lorry had fallen.

"We have been carrying out a rescue operation ever since," a fire department spokesperson told AFP around seven hours later.

He added that they estimate the sinkhole is about 33 feet wide — about the size of a swimming pool — and 20 feet deep.

"Now, we're trying to see if we can pull up the truck using a large crane," he said. "There is risk that the hole will collapse."

JAPAN-INCIDENT-EMERGENCY-SINKHOLE
Firefighters work to rescue a truck driver after his vehicle was swallowed up by a sinkhole at a prefectural road intersection, in the city of Yashio, Saitama Prefecture on January 28, 2025. STR/JIJI Press/AFP via Getty Images

The driver was able to talk with rescuers until around 1:00 p.m. but they retreated after the area around the hole became unstable, the spokesperson said.

The team initially planned to rescue the driver by going into the sinkhole, but two members were mildly injured while attempting to do so.

A sewer system runs through the vicinity of the intersection, and the cause of the road collapse is under investigation, Kyodo News reported.

In 2016, a massive sinkhole appeared on a five-lane street in Hakata, Japan. That sinkhole caused blackouts and traffic delays but crews worked around the clock to fix the gaping hole in the busy street.

Last year, a sinkhole suddenly opened and swallowed an SUV in Seoul, South Korea, injuring the two occupants.

According to the BBC, the world's largest sinkhole is in China — measuring over 2,100 feet deep.

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