Mother Nature displays her awe-inspiring force in many ways. Some can be serene and beautiful. At other times, this display can take an outwardly destructive turn. When this happens, little is immune to the damage and ill effects that are to follow. On February 12, 2014, the world learned that even some of the most historically significant Corvettes ever produced could not escape nature’s fury.
Opened in 1994, the National Corvette Museum sits approximately one-quarter of a mile from the GM Bowling Green Assembly Plant that has turned out every Corvette produced for nearly the last forty years. The National Corvette Museum serves as a historical catalog, displaying and archiving some of GM’s most valuable Corvette masterpieces and highlighting key points of America’s favorite sports car’s rise to infamy.
The Skydome segment of the museum is home to a number of highly prized Corvettes, many of which are of irreplaceable nature. Among the Corvettes housed in the Skydome are concept and research models that never became commercially available, anniversary and milestone cars, and non-production, one-off performance vehicles.
At approximately 5:38 A.M. on the morning of February 12, 2014, the fate of the iconic Corvettes contained within the Skydome was called into immediate question, as a 25-30 foot deep sinkhole opened up under the dome’s foundation. Corvette owners, collectors, and enthusiasts alike scoured the Internet and clung to reporting newscasts, in search of answers regarding how extensive the scope of damage to the museum’s collection had been.
