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The first sign the local man received of his situation was when a neighbor urgently banged on his door and told him his cherished Mini had plunged into a hole.

"I went out expecting a minor dip under a wheel or something like that. But when I walked out to check it out, I understood, oh, that truly is a proper hole," he explained.

His automobile had dropped into a 3-metre wide opening, possibly caused by a collapsed mine shaft, and McKenzie has spent 25 days stuck in a bureaucratic "nightmare" trying to determine how to extricate his Mini.

The Main Problem: Unclaimed Property

The complication is that the property has no registered owner. The local council has stated it can't remove the fences cordoning off the hole until property rights had been confirmed. "It's quite a difficult situation," said McKenzie, 36, a freelance designer. "There's bureaucracy at every turn."

McKenzie has resided in the area in Redruth for about a decade and in fact has a designated spot beside his house, but it is too narrow to be useful so he started leaving his car outside a local bakery. He had checked with both the shop and the local authority that he would avoid receiving a parking fine.

"I'd finally felt like I was making progress, I had a dependable small vehicle that was fuel-efficient and simple to keep on the road. It meant I could finally focus on trying to save up to take my daughter on her dream trip to Japan one day. She's always wanted to go."

The Incident and Aftermath

Then came that knock on the door on Saturday 1 November. "My neighbour was very alarmed. The officers arrived and closed the area off. We all had to stay in the homes because we couldn't leave without going past the hole. The highways people arrived, erected the barrier up, and then they came out and put a additional barrier up around it as well."

It is thought the hole may be an unfortunate legacy of Pednandrea Mine, a disused copper and tin mine.

McKenzie thought he would be separated from his vehicle for a short period. But that short time have now become weeks.

A Possible Resolution

An conclusion may be in sight. The authorities has stated it will cooperate with McKenzie to – temporarily – remove the fences to permit the Mini to be recovered. He commented: "They are willing to work with my insurer's retrieval crew and try to arrange a date and an suitable way of getting it out that ensures no anybody at risk."

The vehicle has been badly damaged and is probably to be written off. "At least I can say my Mini met its end in style – not everyone can say their car was eaten by the ground beneath them," McKenzie remarked.

Authority Statement

A representative from the local council said it felt sorry with McKenzie. But it added: "This collapse did not happen on council land. We have made the area safe and advised the vehicle owner that we will organize to temporarily remove the fence to enable him to recover the vehicle.

"Since no one owns the land, our barriers will remain in place until land ownership has been established, and we will persist to monitor the vicinity to guarantee everyone's security."