Leaking Pipe Causes Tractor to Collapse into Florida Road
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Ablestock/Thinkstock(BREVARD COUNTY, Fla.) — A four-decade-old, rusty underground pipe collapsed in Florida on Monday, taking a tractor down with it.
David Dandurand, an employee of the Brevard County Public Works Department, was towing a mower behind his tractor on a road in Titusville when he pulled over to let another car pass by.
Once he continued, he felt the very ground that he was trying to mow start to sink beneath him.
“Here I go, I’m on a ride,” Dandurand told ABC affiliate WFTV. “That’s all I could do is ride it down.”
Dandurand and his tractor rode down into a hole that eventually went six to seven feet deep and extended across both lanes of the road. Brevard County officials say the hole was the result of a culvert, a drain or pipe that allows water to flow under a road, that started leaking. The drain, officials say, was built in the 1970s and simply gave way under the weight of the tractor.
While the tractor sank, Dandurand escaped without injury and the towed mower was undamaged.
“Better me than a school bus,” he said. “It would have been bad news if it was a school bus, or someone going over with a camper.”
The road remains closed as crews inspect the damage. Officials have not yet released an estimate on when the road will reopen or the estimated cost of repairs.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio