Devastation has struck for a Pennsylvania family after a subsidence opened in their backyard, effectively swallowing their fiberglass swimming pool whole. The hole is so wide that not a speck of the pool can be seen, the family says.
After waking up from a noise so loud it reportedly mimicked the sound of thunder, a snowy morning was interrupted by the inground swimming pool disappearing under the soil after the earth opened up.
Homeowner Tracy Quick of Schuylkill County says that she and her family are salvaging what they can from the damage done to their backyard, as images show the destruction teetering just a few feet underneath their nearby shed.
A few days before Christmas, the disaster couldn’t have come at a worse time. Unfortunately, not for the first time for this property; Quick’s family suffered another subsidence opening eight years ago in 2016 just before Thanksgiving that year. “It’s devastating,” she said in a statement to WNEP after the accident.
The cleanup process ahead will be long, involving truckloads of cement to stabilize the house and ensuring it does not fall into the subsidence. Assuming the family can salvage most of what belongs to the shed, the majority of the loss will be the yard and the now-buried swimming pool.
WNEP reports that the family is waiting to see what happens to their house under Mahoney Township, since this is the second — and worst, according to the crews that assisted in cleanup — sinkhole to grace the area. Hopefully the sunken swimming pool will find its way back to the surface before long.
