'Heartbreaking' for Oxford as sinkhole expands once again

The 25 millimetres of rain that fell overnight Tuesday has caused the sinkhole in an Oxford, N.S., park to grow by another 30 centimetres as it continues to encroach on an adjacent parking lot.

What started as hairline cracks in the pavement of the parking lot have grown to be five or six centimetreswide and about a metre deep.

"I don't think any of us imagined that it would grow to the size it is now," saidAmyTizzard, regional geologist with the Department of Energy and Mines.

Don Christie, chairman of the committee that oversees the OxfordLions Park, said it's dishearteningto seethe sinkhole has grown once again.

"To see it go like this it just makes a sort of a gut-wrenching ache in your stomach where you think, 'Oh, it's just going to get bigger and bigger and take away the whole park.' So it's heartbreaking is what it is," he said.

The sinkhole now measures32.8 metres by 38.7 metres and pavement from the parking lot isbuckling over the edge.

The hole has already swallowed seven large trees and a picnic table.

At the moment, Christie said there is little the community can do except monitor the situation.

Christie said MP Bill Casey visited the site this week and is expected to ask Ottawa for federal funding to pay for specialized geophysical imaging equipment that will reveal how big the cavern is and whether it's possible to fill it in before the sinkhole swallows more of the park.

"Without knowing how big the hole is and what is safe and what is not, we can't get any ... excavators in. So without knowing that we can't really proceed. So that is the next step," he said.

Christie saidpeople have donated time,equipment and fill but nothing can happen until the imaging machine arrives.

"Well it may not be anybody's life at stake but the life of the park's at stake and the park is a big part of the community so yeah it is important to us and we just hope that we get the machine very soon," he said.

Chain-link fence and security cameras wereput in place this week, and a crosswalk linking thepark to the nearby Irving gas station has been shaded out to deter people from walking across the road to have a look at the growing sinkhole.

Until the equipment arrives, all the community can do is wait and hope the sinkhole stops growing.