Mystery of massive sinkhole that engulfed Surrey street closer to being solved

A massive sinkhole that engulfed a street in Surrey in February started with a burst water main, engineers have said.

For the past six months, repair workers in the village of Godstone have been trying to solve the mystery of its cause. However, they say they are still not ready to blame the burst for the appearance of the hole.

They uncovered a network of abandoned Victorian sand mining tunnels under the ground in June, which residents had been aware of for decades.

Surrey County Council infrastructure manager Lloyd Allen, who oversees the repairs, told the BBC: “We don’t know what caused the water main burst.”

He said the engineers first on the scene after the hole’s appearance realised the water was disappearing underground – an unusually large amount of water to naturally soak into the sand.

Mr Allen said: “So that’s why we started our investigations, talking to the people that lived in the area who know about the mines. It took some months using lots of different techniques to find them.”

Engineers have been plotting the tunnels by driving boreholes into the sandstone, a process he said had been made more complicated by the cables and pipes that sit underground.

He added: “We have to make sure when we’ve finished this thing doesn’t fall down again. Because this is a busy road, normally, with big lorries coming through.”

The road, which isn’t expected to reopen until at least December, has meant that Godstone businesses have lost passing trade.

Local businesses told the BBC they have been “left in the dark” over the repair plans, with one business owner claiming his income had been slashed to a third of what it was because of the hole.

The website reported that the village’s Hare & Hounds pub has seen a 40 per cent drop in customers after the sinkhole separated the pub from the M25 nearby.

After the crater appeared overnight on 17 February, residents were told to “get out as quickly as possible”. More than 30 homes were evacuated as the hole grew up to 19 metres in length, and a second one opened up in the days following.

Godstone residents Nicola and Damian Styles, 46 and 44, said it was a “shock” to be woken by police in the middle of the night.

Mr Styles said: “We just sort of grabbed everything, the clothes on our back and our work laptops, and drove out quickly. We didn’t know how long we were going to be out for.”

Just last week, a section of the pavement reopened, and the sinkhole was downgraded to a “road collapse”.

Shane Fry, who runs DD Services, a garage on the high street, said: “They said they would keep us up to date, but this hasn’t happened. We need to know. It will benefit everyone in the area.”

Will McLean, the owner of a residential windows and doors company, said the sinkhole had “reduced footfall to virtually zero”.

He added: “Financially, it has been massive. In terms of business, we are down 60 per cent to 70 per cent, which is huge – devastating in fact.”