The sink hole, the bigger sink hole, and the return of the sink hole.

My neighbors and I have been laughing about the sink holes we've all gotten. Since it's new construction, it's very common to have a sink hole appear where some ground wasn't completely settled. So the other day, the kids show me the sink hole they found. It was about 1'wide x 1'wide x1'deep. So we got some dirt, and filled it in together. The next day I go outside and much to my surprise, the sink hole is slightly bigger--4 feet wide by 4 feet wide by 10 FEET DEEP!! The dirt I added the day before is a mere sprinkle atop this gaping cave (you can actually see it in the picture--a small amount of darker brown dirt in the middle). It tunnelled down diagonally going from one end of the house to the patio.You probably think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not, and the pictures don't even do it justice. I called our builder, James Ray, who has been wonderful to work with and he immediately got on it. His repair supervisor, Chuck, sent a guy out to fill it up. (Everything in our house and yard is under a one year warranty, which is awesome) Well, the guy throws the dirt down there and fixes it in a couple of hours. In my opinion, while I was watching, I was thinking he should've caved the tunnel in, added dirt on top, and used a settling machine. But, oh well, I'm sure he knows what he's doing. So then we woke up to 15 inches of snow 9 days ago (that'll be a whole other post). Over 3-4 days, the snow melted and when it was gone, our sink hole was back. Not as deep, but wider (the last two pictures). I guess my instinct was right. So I call Chuck and tell him the problem--He sighs, "I guess if you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself." So he came out and settled it with an enormous amount of water, making the sinkhole even bigger. It's drying out and sinking a little more, then this week they'll add more dirt, settle it for hopefully the last time, and put sod on it for us. If you're wondering how our sink hole got so big, it's because we have a basement (none of our neighbors do) and it was dug during the winter, so when they back-filled it, there were chunks of ice and snow mixed in. They used water and a settling machine in the spring, and did a good job--they just missed a spot. Marissa was concerned--Mom, can our whole house sink into a hole?