On August 22nd 2014, Excelsior, a Spanish language new source in Mexico announced that a giant crack had opened up and split a rural road in half, about 50 miles west of the city of Hermosillo, in the state of Sonora.
The crack, which is 28 feet deep, is 16 ft wide in some parts and runs nearly two thirds of a miles. The civil protection unit believes that the crack may be the result of a minor Earth quake that took place on August 17th 2014. However, geologists from the University of Sonora who were investigating the crack, believe that it is the result of farmers who had built a levee stream to contain rain water. They think that as the levee began to leak, an underground stream developed which softened the Earth above it and caused the ground to collapse.
Expreso, a local Mexican newspaper stated that social media reports claimed that there was a heavy rainfall before the crack appeared. The USGS said that the quake that occurred on August 17th was a magnitude 5.0, which was strong enough to open the rift. However, the geologist from the University of Sonora stated that when a rift is created by an Earth quake, one side is usually raised higher than the other. Both side of the Hermosillo rift are at the same level.
The head of the National Autonomous University at Mexico's Regional Station of the Geology Institute, Martin Valencia Moreno has come forward to assure the public that there is no cause for alarm. He feels that the appearance of the rift is something to be sensationalized by the media.
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