Giant Sinkhole Eats Texas Town

A gigantic sinkhole is gobbling up a small East Texas town, the New York Times reports. The hole—dubbed "Sinkhole de Mayo" by the residents of Daisetta—opened up suddenly, and quickly grew to the size of several football fields, swallowing trees and trucks. Many of the town's thousand residents have already packed their bags. The hole opened when an underground salt dome collapsed, possibly due to increased saltwater from nearby oil drilling.

"This may become stable any day, or it could collapse in six months," said a geologist. “Stopping it is a very difficult thing to do.” (More sinkhole stories.)