A giant sink hole that appeared in a road in Wisbech will remain for the next few weeks before it can be fixed.
The hole appeared in Weasenham Lane on the outskirts of Wisbech about five weeks ago.
A Cambridgeshire County Council spokesman said: “Anglian Water did their investigations first and now we are doing our investigations.
“We are hoping that the carriageway will be open in the next few weeks.”
A principal geologist at the British Geological Survey said that in the language of geologists, the process that causes sinkholes is “the creation of a void which migrates towards the surface”.
In the language of the layman, when there’s not enough solid stuff left underneath to support what is left of the loose stuff above, the whole lot of a section of ground collapses, they said.
Natural sinkholes occur when acidic rainwater seeps down through surface soil and sediment, eventually reaching a soluble bedrock such as sandstone, chalk, salt or gypsum, or a carbonate rock such as limestone beneath.
The water gradually dissolves small parts of the rock and as the process continues, the loose soil and sand above is gradually washed into these cracks and voids.
Depending on how thick and strong that top layer is there will come a day when the surface layer will simply give way.
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