Growing sinkhole swallows 2 Florida homes

100-foot wide sinkhole leaves families displaced

DUNEDIN, Fla. – Crews continue to work to fill in a sinkhole in Dunedin that grew to be about 100 feet wide and more than 50 feet deep.

For people like Michael Dupre, his wife and his daughter, they made it out of their house after noticing its screened-in room plunging into a pit in the ground.

"And a few minutes later, the whole thing collapsed back down there," he said.

Sinkholes like this one in Dunedin, a city of about 35,000 people just north of Clearwater, are hardly rarities in Florida. Hundreds pop up in the Sunshine State each year, like the one in August that gobbled a condo building in the town of Clermont.

The sinkhole opened up behind the homes in Dunedin. The sinkhole was so large it was a able to to swallow a boat at one home and then a bedroom and pool of another. Both homes are now condemned.

The Dupres won't be able to go back into their home at that point, however. They will be staying at a Holiday Inn Express that graciously put them up for two nights, then asking friends to let them stay over until they figure out what to do next.

"It's all new for us," Dupre said. "... We're trying to do our best."


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