ZR1 Blue Devil Corvette: Sinkhole Ate Eight Classic Cars, Recovery Begins [Video]

A classic ZR1 Blue Devil corvette has been recovered from the sinkhole that swallowed eight classic vehicles whole.

In a related report by The Inquisitr, the Kentucky corvette museum sinkhole devoured a 1962 black Corvette, a 1984 PPG Pace Car, a 1992 White 1 Millionth Corvette, a 1993 Ruby Red 40th Anniversary Corvette, a 2001 Mallett Hammer Z06 Corvette and a 2009 white 1.5 Millionth Corvette, which were all owned by the National Corvette Museum. But General Motors owned two of the vehicles, including a 993 ZR-1 Spyder and the 2009 ZR1 Blue Devil corvette that was just recovered.

Amazingly, even though the ZR1 Blue Devil corvette had been buried in the sinkhole almost a month the recovery team was able to drive it almost immediately. The corvette apparently suffered a few scratches and dings, but Chevrolet already plans on restoring all of these classic cars at a Michigan plant.

When they cranked the engine of the ZR1 Blue Devil corvette, manager Bob Hellmann said, “It’s something that I’ll treasure for the rest of my life. I tell ya.” The recovery team’s project manager, Mike Murphy, also expressed his thanks at the unexpected boon:

“It’s just a big relief to get that first one out. Anything you do it for the first time, you know, it’s a big relief.”

Workers are using two huge cranes to reach down into the sinkhole to clear out concrete debris as well as the remaining cars:

“[That portion of the job will be] much trickier as a 5-ton slab of concrete is partially resting on the front of the car. Two cranes will be used to simultaneously lift the car and the concrete.”

Besides the ZR1 Blue Deveil corvette, the next vehicles to come up will be the 1993 Ruby Red 40th Anniversary Corvette and the 1962 black Corvette. The museum plans on streaming the corvette recovery process live from a webcam but currently the streaming video is down.