---
title: "Watch This Distracted Driver Plunge His Scooter Straight Into a Sinkhole"
description: "Is there a better metaphor for 2017?"
date: "2017-08-21"
modified: "2017-08-21"
authors:
  - name: "Kyle Cheromcha"
    job_title: "Editor-in-Chief"
    link: "https://www.thedrive.com/authors/kyle-cheromcha"
url: "https://www.thedrive.com/watch-this/13665/watch-this-distracted-driver-plunge-his-scooter-straight-into-a-sinkhole"
categories:
  - "News"
  - "Watch This"
tags:
  - "China"
  - "distracted driving"
  - "Scooter"
  - "sinkhole"
---

# Watch This Distracted Driver Plunge His Scooter Straight Into a Sinkhole

![](<https://www.thedrive.com/wp-content/uploads/images-by-url-td/content/2017/08/scooter.png>)
*\<em\>www.thedrive.com</em>*

Listen, this year has been a little bumpy. Topsy-turvy. Weird as hell. Whatever your preferred descriptor, you're not going to find a better metaphor for 2017 than a man in China on his phone failing to notice a [massive sinkhole](<https://www.thedrive.com/news/5042/a-sinkhole-just-ate-a-bmw-x5-in-new-york-city>) swallowing the road in front of him and driving his [scooter](<https://www.thedrive.com/video/2089/we-tried-scooter-racing-at-the-office>) straight into the pit.

[*The Guardian* shared](<https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2017/aug/20/scooter-rider-plunges-into-sinkhole-china-video>) CCTV footage of the incident, which went down in the city of Beihai in southern China last week. Beihai is a low-lying port on the country's southern coast, so it makes sense that sinkholes can be an issue, much like they are in our own [Swiss-cheesed southern peninsula.](<https://www.cnn.com/2017/07/14/us/sinkhole-florida/index.html>)

The video starts showing a wide section of pavement on an urban street beginning to sag, then collapsing entirely into a twenty-foot-wide maw that takes up almost the entire roadway. It's hard to tell how deep it is, but the answer comes few moments later when a man on a scooter emerges from the right side of the frame and drives straight into the hole. Distracted by his phone, he barely slows down at all as he takes the plunge and disappears entirely from view.

Even though it looks like a pretty nasty drop, cellphone video [later recorded by a witness](<https://twitter.com/PDChina/status/898426635266936833?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fmashable.com%2F2017%2F08%2F21%2Fsinkhole-rider-china%2F>) shows the man and his scooter fell about six feet, and *The Guardian* reports he escaped with minor injuries. Considering he was caught totally by surprise and wasn't wearing a helmet, he's incredibly lucky.

https://youtube.com/embed/zvoi99X417o

## Author
Overseeing an expert staff of writers and editors from his lair in Los Angeles, Kyle shapes The Drive’s singular approach to covering the automotive industry and car culture. He’s been with the site as a writer since 2017, taking over as editor in 2019. On a daily basis, Kyle is responsible for directing The Drive's editorial news and car review content strategies, setting special coverage priorities, managing complex reporting projects, and ensuring what you read on the page meets our high internal standards for quality and trustworthiness. He is also the executive producer of The Drive's YouTube channel, which was relaunched in February 2024 to great acclaim and has accumulated over 14M new views in its first year back on the scene. He hosts a biweekly series on the channel where he breaks down fascinating and complicated stories from the automotive world.

### Author social links  
[Bluesky](<https://bsky.app/profile/kylecheromcha.bsky.social>)  
[Instagram](<https://www.instagram.com/kylecheromcha>)  
[LinkedIn](<https://www.linkedin.com/in/kyle-cheromcha-1550248a/>)