
Aside from the Guatemala sinkhole 2010, there have been others that made headlines in the past few decades. A sinkhole basically “happens when water erodes solid bedrock, carving an underground cavity that can then collapse.” Click here to see them all.
The Guatemala sinkhole fits into a broader use of the term, which refers to any sudden slump of the ground’s surface. Instead of solid bedrock, much of Guatemala City rests atop a layer of loose, gravelly volcanic pumice that is hundreds of feet thick.
[via NationalGeographic]