Giving Compass' Take:

• Chris Bodenner explains how drought and development - which are human-caused and human-exacerbated - create sinkholes which appear without warning and can be deadly. 

• How will climate change - including increased droughts and flooding play a role in sinkhole creation in years to come? How can funders help communities prevent loss of life and capital? 

• Learn how climate change impacts public health


The largest retirement community in the world, The Villages is also one of America’s safest and most leisurely places to live. Sumter County, populated almost entirely by Villagers, is 62nd among 67 counties in Florida for violent crime—likely because the median age is 66.6, the oldest of any U.S. county.

But Villagers are increasingly fearful of a growing, surreal threat: the ground suddenly opening up and swallowing them whole. In mid-February, seven sinkholes opened across the street and into a golf course, forming a zig-zag crack across the facade of one house and causing four homes to evacuate. One is now condemned.

The Villages is smack in the middle of Sinkhole Alley—a swath of counties in Central Florida that carry the greatest risk.

Among the six recorded deaths from sinkholes in Florida history is Jeffrey Bush, who was sleeping in his bedroom when a sinkhole sucked him 20 feet underground. His body was never recovered.

The main trigger for sinkholes is water—too much of it, or too little. The normally moist soil of Florida has a stabilizing effect on karst. But during a drought, cavities that were supported by groundwater empty out and become unstable. During a heavy rainstorm, the weight of pooled water can strain the soil, and the sudden influx of groundwater can wash out cavities. Central Florida was in a severe drought at the beginning of 2017, followed by the intense rainfall of Hurricane Irma that hit The Villages in September—and a deluge after a drought is the optimal condition for a sinkhole outbreak.

Man-made development, it turns out, is the most persistent factor for increased sinkholes. Earth-moving equipment scrapes away protective layers of soil; parking lots and paved roads divert rainwater to new infiltration points; the weight of new buildings presses down on weak spots; buried infrastructure can lead to leaking pipes; and, perhaps most of all, the pumping of groundwater disrupts the delicate water table that keeps the karst stable. . “Our preliminary research indicates that the risk of sinkholes is 11 times greater in developed areas than undeveloped ones,” says George Veni, the executive director of the National Cave and Karst Research Institute who conducted a field study in Sinkhole Alley.

Read the full article about sinkholes by Chris Bodenner at Smithsonian.