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Sinkhole from abandoned mine swallowing Pike Run in Daisytown

By Mike Jones newsroom@heraldstandard.Com 3 min read
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Mike Jones

Waterways Conservation Officer Jonathan Stark of the Pennsylvania Fish & Boat Commission inspects a sinkhole in Daisytown caused by an abandoned mine that is swallowing Pike Run.

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A DEP worker uses a track loader to drop gravel into a sinkhole created by an abandoned mine that is causing the water from Pike Run to go underground.

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Mike Jones

A section of Pike Run is now dry after a sinkhole caused by an abandoned mine in Daisytown forced the stream to flow underground.

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A DEP worker uses an excavator to drop large rocks into a sinkhole in an attempt to stop the water in Pike Run from flowing underground into an abandoned mine.

A sinkhole caused by an abandoned mine in Daisytown is swallowing Pike Run.

Underground mine subsidence below the stream is believed to have occurred Thursday morning, forcing water to gush into the portal and causing a section of Pike Run to go dry.

A crew from the state Department of Environmental Protection was at the site Monday with an excavator and track loader dropping gravel into the collapse site to serve as a temporary repair in order to restore the stream’s flow. Once that initial step is complete, the specialized DEP crew based in Cambria County planned to pour concrete in the area to permanently plug the hole.

The water from the stream apparently is traversing the abandoned mine and coming out of a hillside about a half-mile away, which is flooding Pike Run Drive near Ventura’s Tavern. The water is re-entering the stream through a nearby storm drain, which appears to allow Pike Run to flow normally from that location as the stream heads east to the Monongahela River.

A state Department of Transportation spokesperson said a section of Pike Run Drive near Ventura Drive in California Borough will remain closed through at least the end of the week until the DEP crew is able to restore the stream’s normal flow and stop the water from resurfacing on the roadway.

DEP spokesperson Lauren Camarda said the breach is thought to be from the abandoned Vesta No. 4 Mine operated by the Vesta Coal Co. before 1920. She added that the DEP crew hopes to finish its work by the end of the week.

“DEP will temporarily divert the stream in order to backfill and seal off the sinkhole and stabilize the stream bed,” Camarda said. “Work was delayed Friday and over the weekend because of heavy storms that caused the creek and underground mine pool to rise.”

The sinkhole in the middle of Pike Run created a buzz in Daisytown that had local residents talking about the unusual sight of a stream disappearing underground.

John Stone, who lives on Pike Run Drive near Daisytown Road in West Pike Run Township, noticed the problem Thursday afternoon when he went to care for his neighbor’s geese, which have a pen along the stream’s banks. He was flabbergasted when he looked to where the stream would normally be flowing and instead saw water cascading into a hole.

“Where in the heck did that waterfall come from?” Stone thought when he saw water pouring from the stream into the abandoned mine. “Where did the bottom of the creek go?”

He contacted authorities, although efforts to fix the problem were hampered by heavy rain Thursday night and again over the weekend. But that rainfall did help to restore the waterway’s flow farther downstream and also seemed to push more water through the abandoned mine so it could re-enter Pike Run a half-mile away.

Waterways Conservation Officer Jonathan Stark of the Pennsylvania Fish & Boat Commission said the subsidence did not appear to affect trout stocking efforts upstream and downstream from the site. He said a weekend youth fishing event in other areas of Pike Run was not affected.

Yellow caution tape was wrapped around the area to keep people away from the area as crews worked around the swirling pool of water descending into the mine. Several dump trucks brought gravel to the area Monday for workers to unload into the sinkhole as part of the restoration efforts.

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