All families set to return home after evacuation

Every resident affected by a sinkhole in Surrey is set to return home, a local authority has said.

Lloyd Allen, Surrey County Council’s infrastructure team manager, said those impacted by the collapse in Godstone High Street could return to their homes this weekend.

But he warned this depended on a “couple of issues” still under investigation, such as whether the water quality was up to the right standard.

Mr Allen said the local authority was still trying to establish what caused the collapse in February, but “quite a lot of anomalies” had been found underground.

He said a GPR survey, which involves sending radar pulses through the ground, had shown anomalies in the area.

“We are calling them anomalies at the moment because until we investigate further, we don’t actually know what they are,” he said.

Mr Allen suggested they could be a “series of tunnels under the road”, “deep sewers”, or “potentially soakways from properties”.

He said the council would continue its investigations over the coming weeks to determine what is happening underground.

But he warned the work, involving specialist engineers and digging boreholes, could take “several months longer”.

Authorities declared a major incident after the ground opened up on Godstone High Street on 17 February, with police telling people living in William Way to “get out as quickly as possible” at the time.