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AN URGENT search is continuing for a grandmother believed to have fallen down a sinkhole while searching for her beloved pet cat.
Elizabeth Pollard, 64, was reported missing early on Tuesday, December 3, with fears growing she fell into an abandoned coal mine close to her home.
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Authorities in Unity Township, Pennsylvania, have warned that the abandoned mine is too unstable for them to continue to safely search underground.
A car belonging to Pollard was found along with her unharmed five-year-old daughter around two hours after she went missing.
The sinkhole is in the village of Marguerite, around 40 miles east of Pittsburgh.
Emergency crews believe they have narrowed the search down to a newly-formed sinkhole above the mine.
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“What happened at that point, I don’t know, maybe the slurry of mud pushed her in one direction,” Pleasant Unity Fire Chief John Bacha said.
“There were several different seams of that mine, shafts that all came together where this happened at.”
Trooper Cliff Greenfield said they are still actively searching for Pollard.
“We are hopeful that she’s found alive,” he said.
Electronic devices and cameras are being used as crews continue surface digging, Chief Bacha said.
Search dogs are also expected to be used.
A pole camera with a sensitive listening device detected nothing after being lowered into the hole.
Another camera showed what could have been a shoe around 30 feet below the surface, according to Pennsylvania State Police spokesperson Trooper Steve Limani.
Sinkholes are common in the area due to subsidence caused by coal mining activity, which ceased in the 1950s.
Pollard was last seen by her family after going out at about 5 pm on the night of Monday, December 2, to search for Pepper, her beloved pet cat.
At that time, temperatures would have dropped well below freezing.
Her relatives called police at around 1 am Tuesday morning when she still hadn’t returned.
Pollard’s son, Axel Hayes, said his mother was “a great person overall, a great mother,” adding that she was a cat lover who at one point had ten as pets.
“Every cat that she’s ever come in contact with, she has a close bond with them,” he said.
He added that his mother had worked for many years at Walmart but hadn’t been employed recently.
“I’m just hoping right now that she’s still with us and she’s able to come back to us,” he said.
