Giant sinkhole opens up in front of hospital in Naples

The giant hole opened up around dawn in front of the Naples hospital

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A huge sinkhole has opened up in front of a hospital in Naples where coronavirus patients are treated.

The giant sinkhole swallowed several cars and local officials said it was a miracle that no one was hurt.

The ground collapsed beneath a car park in front of the Ospedale di Mare at around dawn, with reports suggesting it was caused by the explosion of a gas or oxygen pipe.

Some patients and medical staff in the hospital initially thought they were hearing nearby Mt Vesuvius erupt, according to Italian media reports.

Had the subsidence happened a couple of hours later, there would almost certainly have been casualties, officials said.

Firemen and police were on the scene to make sure that no one had been injured in the blast.

An aerial view of the sinkhole in front of the Ospedale del Mare hospital in Naples

Credit: Shutterstock

Firefighters were trying to “exclude the presence of any people” in the area affected by the sinkhole, the fire service said on Twitter. The cars that fell into the sinkhole appeared to be unoccupied.

The disaster cut off water and power to parts of the hospital, which lies on the eastern edge of Naples.

Vincenzo De Luca, the governor of Campania region, of which Naples is the main city, said he had breathed “a sigh of relief” when he was told no one had been hurt or killed.

An even bigger sinkhole opened up in Rome in February 2018, swallowing several cars.

Again, no one was hurt when the chasm opened up near a building site in the Balduina district of the capital.

Italy recorded another 18,000 Covid-19 cases on Thursday, down from 20,000 on Wednesday. The total death toll from the coronavirus is now more than 77,000.