A member of Surrey Council’s highways team carrying out an inspection asked the retired company director if he had anywhere else he could go, to which he replied sarcastically: “I guess I could get on a flight to the Canary Islands couldn’t I?”.
On Thursday morning, Matt Furniss, the cabinet member for highways, transport and economic growth at Surrey County Council, said properties surrounding the sinkhole had been declared stable for now.
As cracks continue to spread around a massive sinkhole that swallowed a Surrey village high street, two grandfathers are adamant they will not leave their homes.
Businesses including a barber’s and an MOT garage on the very edge of the sinkhole have been told it could be as long as six months before Godstone High Street can reopen.
Brendon Davis, 87, was caught in a tense stand-off with council workers on Thursday who were trying to evacuate him from the house his grandfather built on Salisbury Road 150 years ago.
