That was my first reaction, but actually what they were doing was reasonable. They saw the hazard and couldn’t be sure how far the sinkhole actually extended. It may not have been safe to drive any further, even in that lane. (The sinkhole was a big cavity in the earth with a layer of asphalt on top hiding it - the truck broke through in that one spot, but it was impossible to know how far it extended.) Just driving around the sinkhole would have been reckless, risking falling into it themselves.
Reasonably, the other driver should have at least slowed down when seeing them stopped. The other driver wasn’t being careful, though. When the first driver saw that, they risked moving forward and pulled over to prevent it happening again.
I had a similar sentiment, feeling the headline was blaming the truck, but I have to admit it’s accurate. The truck may not have hollowed out the street, but it did open the top.
If you worry about the sinkhole expanding, it’s definitely not reasonable to stop next to it. Either you stop a good bit ahead or you keep driving well past it. You may very well be on to something though. The driver may have stopped just to get a good look at the hole and then realized it wasn’t a good idea.
I don’t think the first car driver was thinking “Goodness, it’s a sinkhole. I wonder if it extends into my lane, a bit ahead of where I stopped.” I would be thinking “What the [intercourse] am I looking at? No really, that bit of the road is now black. Is it a hole, or what? This is real, right?”
They probably didn’t get a good look until they were almost on top of it, at which point caution was warranted, even if some earlier caution would have been ideal.
