The small sinkhole discovered on the side of the road near Nasandhura Palace Hotel last Friday was caused by low quality sheet piling work of the seawall, the Housing, Transport and Environment Ministry has said.
Ministry officials said that they had sent down divers into the area following the discovery, and that the divers had found two “holes” in the sheet piling in the area. Mohamed Zahir, the Director General of the Ministry, said that the problem had been caused because those who had done the sheet piling work had been “careless”.
“In one place the sheet piling was two feet above the seabed,” he said. “In another place there it was around four feet above the seabed. That is why the soil had flowed out from under it causing a depression.”
