More than 11 years ago, a man in the United States disappeared without a trace after a sinkhole appeared under his house.
On the night of February 28, 2013, 37-year-old Jeffrey Bush was asleep in his bed in Seffner, Florida, when the ground cracked beneath his feet.
His brother Jeremy heard a loud bang and ran into the room to see a massive crater 20 feet wide and 20 feet deep.
In order to save his brother, Jeremy jumped into the sinkhole, but the ground continued to collapse around him and he was pulled to safety.
Jeremy said at the time: “The floor is still caving in, the dirt is still sinking, but I don't care. I want to save my brother.
“But there's just nothing I can do.”
He added: “I could have sworn I heard him calling my name to help him.”
Local law enforcement quickly arrived on the scene and engineers lowered microphones into the hole to try to capture signs of Jeffrey.
Local fire and rescue personnel said they saw no signs of life, and a second collapse eventually caused equipment to be sucked into the hole.
The property was subsequently seized due to “severe instability”.
Sinkholes are not uncommon in Florida due to the state's limestone. It is a porous rock that dissolves easily in water, leaving caves in the ground.
The risk of sinkholes is so great that home insurance companies are required by law to offer sinkhole coverage.
Just “a few months” before the sinkhole opened, an inspector came to assess the property and concluded “there was nothing wrong with the house,” Jeremy said.
No sign of Jeffrey's body was found. His body likely sank into the 60-foot water-filled void between the sinkhole and bedrock, according to Philip van Beynen, an environmental scientist at the University of South Florida who studies sinkholes.
He told USA Today that any attempt to recover his body would be unwise because the ground around the hole remains unstable and could collapse further.
“It would be extremely difficult and expensive,” he said.
Eventually, the sinkhole was filled with gravel and the house was demolished.
But without a body, Jeffrey's family never had the chance to formally say goodbye to him, meaning the pain and suffering was endless, Jeremy said.
Two years after the tragedy, the sinkhole has reopened, an event officials described as “extremely rare.”
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