Sinkhole takes bite out of Japanese city

Parts of a main street collapsed in the heart of Fukuokain southern Japan on Tuesday, creating a massive sinkhole and cutting off power, water and gas supplies to parts of the city.

Stoplights andsidewalks tumbledmore than 10 metres as the earthcrumbled in downtownFukuoka, which has a population of morethan 1.5 million,snarling transport and disrupting power supply at aninternational airport.

Nobody was injured when the sinkhole opened with a boom shortly before dawn, but several multi-storey commercialbuildings teetered dangerously at the edge of the abyss as it grew.

By afternoon, the hole was 30 metres long and 15metres deep, swallowing an entire four-laneintersection in the middle of the business district, and appeared to still be growing.

"I saw a stoplight fall. It was really scary," one man toldFuji TV.

Subway construction nearby

The cause of the collapse is under investigation, Fukuoka officials said, but they linked it to subway construction nearby. A smaller sinkhole occurredin Fukuoka in 2014 at another location of the subway construction.

Fukuoka is about 1,000 kilometressouthwest of Tokyo. The massive cave-in appeared in the city's bustling Hakata district, a major business and entertainment center, with muddy underground water flowing into the hole.

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The incident prompted some residents to be forced out of nearby buildings. Officials were concerned that further erosion inside the sinkhole could prompt nearby structures to collapse.

"An accident like this is unheard of, one that should not have happened,"FukuokaMayorSoichiroTakashimasaid. "We must prevent secondary accidents, and will do our utmost to restore important infrastructure."