This astonishingly unnerving photograph was posted today on the Flickr.com feed of the Guatemalan government and shows a seemingly bottomless sinkhole that opened up on Sunday in Guatemala City as a swath of Central America was drenched by tropical storm Agatha. Click here for the high-resolution version, if you dare. The storm only briefly hit tropical storm strength on Saturday as it came ashore from the Pacific Ocean over the weekend, but the death toll had risen to 115 at last count. Here’s a street-level view.
I heard about the image through the Twitter feed of Steve Silberman, a writer for Wired and other magazines. Here’s a lot of background on Florida’s many sinkholes.
President Álvaro Colom’s government has declared a state of public calamity in the Escuintla, Sacatepéquez and Guatemala departments, according to news agencies, in part because the Pacaya volcano near the capital erupted Friday, injuring many people and killing a television reporter.
Source: By ANDREW C. REVKIN
