A giant underground pipe mysteriously rises more than 30 feet and runs through a road in Japan: “I can

A giant underground pipe rose more than 32 feet from a construction site in a busy area of ​​the Japanese city of Osaka, nearly reaching an elevated highway overnight, unseen by any witnesses.

The unexpected growth of the steel pipe was reported to police early Wednesday by a pedestrian who saw pieces of asphalt falling from the cylinder, disconcerting people passing by and causing traffic congestion.

An office worker who passed by the scene told NHK public television that he could not understand how it had happened. Another man who works nearby said he initially wondered if a new road support had been built overnight.

City officials said the rising pipeline scattered concrete debris beneath the elevated highway, but no injuries were reported, the Japan Times reported.

The pipe, with a diameter of 11.5 feet, rose as high as 42 feet at one point, according to Osaka’s building department, forcing road closures.

“Cars will probably be blocked for a while,” a man who works nearby told the Kyodo news agency.

The unexpected rise of the pipe from the ground occurred at a sewer construction site where workers had been connecting an existing sewer line to a channel designed to contain excess rainwater to prevent flooding.

The pipe was being used as a containment structure to prevent the surrounding soil from collapsing during the operation, officials said. Shortly before, workers had drained water from the pipe, which may have caused the empty device to float, they said.

Ryozo Kawakita, a resident who lives nearby, told the Japan Times that he could not get his vehicle out due to road closures.

“I can’t believe this,” he told the outlet.

It had been lowered to just several feet off the ground Thursday after firefighters cut a hole in the side and injected water to push it back to the ground.

City officials said they plan to cut the last 5.2 feet of the pipe that remains visible, an operation that would result in the road being closed for several more days.

Sinkholes are more common on the streets of Japan. Last year, a huge sinkhole swallowed a truck in a city outside Tokyo, catching the driver indoors for more than 24 hours.

In 2016, a a huge sinkhole appeared on a five-lane street in Hakata, Japan. That sinkhole caused power outages and traffic delays, but crews worked around the clock to fix the gaping hole in the busy street.