WATCH: Massive Sinkhole Destroys Road in Guangzhou

By Ryan Gandolfo, December 3, 2019

UPDATE (December 4, 2019 3.44pm CST): Guangzhou Metro announced via Weibo that police have confirmed the identity of the third victim, a 53-year-old man, surnamed Luo, from Hunan province. No other details on the victims have been provided, as of press time.

Three people are trapped after a huge sinkhole opened up on a road in Guangzhou’s Tianhe district. The road collapse occurred on Sunday, December 1, and was said to have a maximum depth of 38 meters. The sinkhole site is just a couple kilometers west of Guangzhou East Railway Station.

Site of the road collapse. Screengrab via Apple Maps

At the time of the collapse, a sanitary truck and an electric bike fell into the pit. The truck held two passengers, a 52-year-old father and his 27-year-old son, who is married with a one-month-old child. The other victim’s identity has not been confirmed. In the two days following the incident, a search and rescue mission has been underway to find the trapped victims.

Watch below to see the road collapse and the ongoing rescue efforts (VPN off):

The sinkhole occurred at the intersection of Guangzhou Dadao Bei and Yudong Xi Lu in the vicinity of Guangzhou Metro Line 11’s Shahe Station, which is currently under construction. On December 1 at 8.13pm, Guangzhou Metro issued a statement via their official Weibo account, saying that the road collapse occurred during the construction of Shahe Station, and apologized to those affected by the incident. The post also included a four-step action plan to ensure peoples’ safety. The Ministry of Public Security has ruled out that the sinkhole occurred because of a tunnel boring machine, which are used to excavate tunnels.

Image via @游茹游芸1101/Weibo

In a separate post on the morning of December 2, Guangzhou Metro said that steel casing pipes were installed in the area of the sinkhole – which helps protect various utility lines from getting damaged.

At a press conference held on December 2, Guangzhou Metro officials said that the search and rescue mission has been hindered as the size of the sinkhole expands. According to the Paper, officials at the press conference said that in order to prevent more sinkholes, they’ve started filling up the area of the collapsed road to build a platform to conduct a comprehensive search and rescue mission.