What Will You Find In A Sinkhole? Maybe A Sink

BROOKSVILLE - Mattresses. Bicycles. Shopping carts. Even a light-duty pickup truck, complete with camper top.

These are just a few things residents saw fit to dump into sinkholes in Hernando, Citrus and Pasco counties.

The Southwest Florida Water Management District, known as Swiftmud, just wrapped up a three-year project to collect debris from 18 sinkholes in the three counties.

Crews pulled five tons of trash from nine sites in Hernando County - and that doesn't include the pickup truck, said Chris Zajac, a staff environmental scientist for Swiftmud.

"It's a major relief that it's done," said Zajac, a Brooksville native. "You've got a sense of accomplishment you've done something good with the taxpayers money."

The idea for the project came when a Swiftmud governing board member saw the documentary "Water's Journey" by Florida filmmaker Wes Skiles.

The documentary shows how water travels through the Floridan aquifer and out of springs. In one scene, the narrator notes how divers can tell they're getting close to a sinkhole because of the amount of litter floating in the water.

The board member wondered if this area had similar problems. Zajac volunteered to find out.

Some sinkholes are windows directly to the aquifer, Zajac said. Others have filled in, but the water still percolates through into the aquifer, so any junk in the holes has the potential to pollute the water.

All told, divers pulled nearly 91 tons of trash from the holes. A jaw-dropping 83 tons came from just one sinkhole near Crews Lake in Pasco County.

It took some investigative work to come up with 105 potential cleanup sites in the three counties and the propertyowners. Zajac relied on word of mouth from local divers, residents and the knowledge of county officials.

Many of the sites were on county property. The district used the property appraiser to find contact information for the others. A few land owners refused to participate, and many were skeptical at first, but most cooperated.

Swiftmud had budgeted $200,000 for the project. It came in at $90,000.

Much of the savings were realized after Zajac decided to buy an $800 underwater video camera to seek out junk beneath the surface. That saved many man hours paid to Dive-Tech International of Pinellas Park, whose divers braved often soupy conditions with zero visibility to pull out the detritus.

At Tucker's Sink, off Centralia Road, a diver discovered the submerged pickup truck only after swimming into its windshield. The truck turned out to be registered to a man who'd been dead for several years, Zajac said. The Hernando County Sheriff's Office swiftly took it away. No foul play was suspected, he said.

Divers found a handgun in one sinkhole and, in another, a gun safe that had been pried open.

There were several newspaper boxes: "Every newspaper in Hernando County was represented," Zajac said.

Zajac said he was encouraged by what they didn't find. There were no "unidentified 55-gallon drums" or other containers that could have contained toxic material.

On Friday, Zajac visited Tucker's Sink and another he dubbed Canyon Swallow Sink, Canyon Swallow Road in Royal Highlands. It'd been two years since divers cleared out the area, but save for a few garbage bags at Canyon Swallow, the holes looked pretty clean.

"Hopefully the people are more educated now than years ago when it was 'out of sight, out of mind,'" he said.