Sinkholes

Despite the many hurricanes, floods, earthquakes, and landslides that occur in Fiji. Sinkholes are actually rare to find, as far as areas that are inhabited. They can be caused by the rough waters of strong hurricanes that go through the land or even from the immense floods that could help build up the erosion.

One event of a sinkhole took place on the main island of Viti Levu in the Kings Road, which is one of the main highways for the island. The road became closed in order to allow contractors to carry out the repair works more easily and urgently.

It was determined that a majority of the wastewater pipe sections at Kings Road had collapsed and deemed unsafe. The repair work became especially complicated due to the repair teams having to safely move through and around buried utility services which were laying above the collapsed wastewater main. Bailing trucks had to be brought in so the wastewater could be diverted from the nearby pumping stations as well as the repair site.

Fiji plans to repair this landslide event on kings road by replacing the entire section with "approximately 24 meters of steel pipe".




Kings Road closure between Nabua Roundabout and Centrepoint traffic lights due to burst main and sinkhole (fijivillage.com)

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