Major incident declared after 65ft sinkhole swallows UK high street

Surrey County Council has declared a major incident after the huge sinkhole appeared in the small village of Godstone on Monday.

Police evacuated properties near the village high street and put a 100-metre-cordon around the sinkhole, which had grown to around 65ft by Tuesday lunchtime.

The BBC reported that a second sinkhole had opened nearby on Wednesday, with residents told to avoid the area and not return to their homes.

Surrey Police said that the village had been closed between Oxted Road and Bletchingly Road on Monday after an SSE water pipe burst on the high street.

A spokesperson for SSE said they were working with emergency services to “fix [the issue] as quickly as possible”.

They also apologised for water outages experienced by some homes in the area, which have since been restored but could still appear discoloured, the provider warned.

The local council has now declared a major incident in the village, allowing the local authority to mobilise all of its available resources including partner agencies to solve the problem.

Noosh Miri, whose home is right next to the sinkhole, said she believed it had been caused by the pressure of heavy traffic on the village’s geology. She told the BBC: “You often get the rattles in the house as [heavy lorries] are driving through.”

Nicola and Damian Styles, 46 and 44, who live on the high street, told the PA News Agency they were woken by police knocking on their door after midnight on Tuesday morning.

They were told by officers to evacuate their home because there was a risk of a gas explosion. Mrs Styles said: “It was a shock. My sister lives in Purley, so we just drove there in the middle of the night.”

“We just sort of grabbed everything,” her husband added. “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.”

The couple returned to their home on Tuesday afternoon, but admitted they don’t know whether they’ll have to evacuate again – describing their situation as “playing by chance” as the sinkhole outside continues to “get bigger”.

Kevin Boll, 62, who lives at one end of the high street, said he stayed up until 1am on Tuesday waiting for an update after police told him he might have to evacuate his home.

He said: “It was about a quarter to midnight, and we were all going to bed, and my stepdaughter was in the bathroom ready to shower and, literally, all the water went off.

“I came down and there were police here, there were fire engines… Within minutes, they were here and there was a dirty great big hole in the floor up there. Massive.

“They’re saying they’re handling it – but it’s going to take a while. No one has seen this coming at all.”

The area between Oxton Road and Bletchingly Road remains closed, with no timescale for when residents will be able to fully return home with no further prospect of evacuation.