DAISETTA, Texas — The giant Texas sinkhole that formed last week is now a lake big enough to become the home of an alligator.
Area residents believe the reptile was washed into the 600-foot-diameter crater by water from surrounding swamps.
Ground water is seeping into the hole, and its exposed walls are about 30 feet high, the Houston Chronicle reported in its online edition on Friday.
Sightings of an alligator in the sinkhole were confirmed Friday when a Texas Railroad Commission worker snapped photographs.
Danny Diaz, a Texas Parks and Wildlife game warden, said a patch of crude oil floating on the east side of the crater might irritate the alligator’s skin, but the reptile is using the water on the other side.
The sinkhole in the small southeast Texas town of Daisetta began as a 20-foot hole in the ground but rapidly grew to 900 feet across at its widest point and 260 feet deep.
It has swallowed up oil tanks and barrels, tires, telephone poles and several vehicles in the town of about 1,000 residents 60 miles northeast of Houston.
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