It happens.
We had a pond/swimming hole on the farm in Virginia
when I was a little.
My mom used to take me there every day to play and swim.
One day when we went to swim, it was gone.
Mom was thankful we weren't in the darn thing when it
disappeared or we might have gone with it.

Even now when I visit, I can see where it used to be.
The cows now graze on the grass in the depression in
the ground where I spent so much time swimming and playing in the water.

In the middle of the rainest summer in years a large swamp disappeared almost over night. The only possible answer could have been the blasting from the limestone quaries in the area finally cracked the bedrock enough to drain the swamp.

Those are just amazing stories. I never knew it was A) possible or B) common enough people I know have related stories. Learn something new every day!

What I didn't know is, the lake formed 30 years ago in much the same way, overnight.

A disappearing lake would probably worry me alot. After the tsunami disaster in southeast Asia I realized that curiousity could get you killed. Although I'd be curious about the vanishing lake I'd probably stay far, far away.

Here's a fact I was shocked to learn while watching a science show last night about continental drift, volcanoes and vulcanism. Almost the ENTIRE Yellowstone Park is a volcanic caldera! That's a fifty-mile wide caldera. According to scientists it's actually the largest single disaster-waiting-to-happen far worse than any other scenario or combination of scenarios. When Yellowstone blows (yes, when) it will be of monstrous proportions that would literally drive all life species to the brink of extinction. Unlike say, the Hawaiian Islands, the lava dome underneath Yellowstone is huge and brooding.

Gosh, I've got to swear off these disaster-waiting-to-happen science shows. They usually don't bother me, but they imparted the additional information that Yellowstone blows about every 600,000 years and it's now been 606,000 years since the last blast. Oh no, Mr. Bill!

Here's a link to the first one I heard about.

Here is a link that might be useful: Russian lake disappears..Could it be Americans?

These are all examples of us not having as much controll over nature as we like to think. Which reminds me did anyone know Mars is having global warming just as we are. It was in Reuters a few weeks ago.

We can't worry about all this stuff tho or we'll end up in a straight jacket. LOL
vickie

I lived for some time in Missouri, and most Missourians know of New Madrid because we also felt the occasional tremors from this fault. It ripped several states apart and sunk whole huge sections of lands to form new lakes and at the same time drained others. I inserted a link about that disaster.

If you live on property with your own water source in this area of the country, you are very sensitive to things like drilling and blasting. We get a lot of both, since this is mining country. Whole water systems run under the ground, just like rivers run on top of the ground. They're traped in permeable rock between two impermeable layers of rock. Any jolt, like a quake or blasting can fracture the impermeable rock and play havoc with a well. Happens all the time.

Here is a link that might be useful: New Madrid Quake

Found an interesting site ... even has a cool graph :)

I often wonder what types of dry pockets we are leaving under ground from all the oil we have pumped also ?

Here is a link that might be useful: land subsidence