ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – At the north end of Orange County, a water-filled sinkhole dubbed the “Mystery Sink” sits as the deepest point in the entire state.
And being so close to Interstate 4, most drivers have likely passed by it without even noticing.
According to the Orange County Regional History Center, the hourglass-shaped hole is roughly 150 feet around and is estimated to be 500 feet deep — perhaps even more.
That’s far deeper than other notorious sinkholes like Deep Lake or the 1981 Winter Park sinkhole.
But you’re not likely to hear about it.
Old newspaper clippings show that in 1970, a 16-year-old boy went scuba diving in the lake with a local diving instructor — Hal Watts — who had leased the right to use the hole to teach about deep-water diving.
The pair were searching the lake for a lost safety vest, but Watts eventually realized that the teen was no longer with him. Watts reportedly spotted the teen’s light below him, but it disappeared before he could find the teen.
Watts blacked out, and by the time he came to, he was unable to find the boy, and the teen was presumed drowned.
This kicked off a massive search to recover the 16-year-old’s body.
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Three days later, another diver — Bud Sims — was helping with the search, but he became tangled in the lines that were being used to find the boy’s body, according to the sheriff’s office.
As a result, he panicked, losing his mouthpiece and swimming quickly toward the surface, deputies said.
In a TV boat floating above the dive team, the crew “heard and felt a thud” before spotting a light that drifted down deeper into the lake. Investigators said that Sims had died before he even struck the boat.
At the time, Watts — who had joined the dive team in the search — raced after Sims, though he suffered from the bends and was forced to stay below the water until first responders could get him to a recompression chamber.
Ultimately, neither the teen nor Sims’ bodies were ever recovered, and with two lives being claimed by the sinkhole, it was closed to the public for good, with a large, barbed fence being constructed around the area.
Nowadays, the sinkhole still sits on private land, meaning that no one is allowed to go out there without permission.
The owner declined to speak with News 6 about the sinkhole, and out of respect for the owner’s privacy, News 6 has chosen to withhold the exact address for this site.
If you’re interested in exploring some of the stranger parts of Central Florida’s history, you can instead visit ClickOrlando’s Florida Fables page by clicking here.
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