In the suburbs of Lansdowne, a sinkhole appeared out of nowhere on Saturday afternoon and swallowed the nose of a car.

Well, not exactly out of nowhere.

A nearby resident was on the phone to the City when the situation happened.

According to witnesses, the driver of the car and his elderly passenger took a dive into an area that the resident had already demarcated as a potential danger zone.

Uzair Cajee said he was driving past when he saw the scene, with this from iol and their article titled “Panic as sinkhole swallows car in Rondebosch”:

“They just made it out in time with a little assistance from a passerby when the car then plunged a little deeper,” said Cajee.

He said that a resident, who lives near the scene, had earlier suspected trouble and took precautions.

Cajee added: “He actually placed three of those orange cones where he thought the sinkhole would appear. He went into his house and called the City of Cape Town to lodge a complaint.

“But his gardener came running in while he was still on the line to tell him that a car had just gone into the sinkhole nose-first. The sinkhole had appeared next to the cone.”

How’s that? Right in the middle of an intersection.

Hoisted from the hole by a tow truck, the car’s only visible damage was a crack on the left fender. According to a local ward councillor an investigation is now under way – but it is unsure who will be paying for the damage.

Who do you think should be responsible?

[source: iol]