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Holes under buildings spark residents' fears

FIVE buildings in a high-end residential complex in Hefei City, capital of east China's Anhui Province, have been found to have been built on a 3-meter deep hole filled with garbage and sewage, causing panic among the residents.

The complex has 28 buildings and 1,600 families and was built in 2007. Apartment owners of the No. 6 building found a 3-meter deep hole under their building recently.

Four other buildings in the complex had the same problem.

Workers have been draining water from the hole for five days. The drained water was mostly sewage as the building was near a septic tank, the Voice of China reported. The sewage could erode the base of the building over time and make it unstable, according to geotechnical engineering forum Yantubbs.com.

The elevators in the affected buildings can't be used due to fears of electronic shock as sewage had penetrated the elevator shafts.

Experts said the backfill in the basement was not compacted. Thus, the loose material, including construction waste, collapsed due to gravity after several years, which created the void.

In the place where backfill soil should be is a 1,000-square-meter hole. No water prevention measures can be seen in the basement, according to the report.

Apartment owners are frightened that they and their families are in danger if they continue to live in the buildings.

A team of investigators organized by the city's construction quality supervision station said the structure of the building was "safe" because the basements of the buildings had been erected on a concrete base.




 

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