Sucked through glory hole

Updated March 07, A bird that was sucked into a massive "glory hole" in a Californian reservoir survived a turbulent metre drop and flew away unharmed after being shot out "like a bullet". Water began flowing into Lake Berryessa's Morning Glory Spillway, which is known by locals more colourfully as the "glory hole", following recent heavy rains. In a video posted online, a cormorant can be seen drifting for a few seconds along the water as it is pulled toward the metre-wide, metre-deep drain.

The moment a lone duck was sucked into a foot-deep drain at a reservoir in northern California , and reportedly survived, has been captured on video. Known locally as the "Glory Hole," the giant spillway is designed to capture excess water at Lake Berryessa reservoir in Napa County. Rick Fowler, the lake's water-resources manager, filmed the bird as it drifted toward the fast-swirling vortex and dropped down into the hole. The viral video sparked a debate about the fate of the bird, with some experts predicting it must have died, but Mr. Fowler said he saw it survive the foot fall. The reservoir manager ran over to the edge of the dam, where the Glory Hole deposits the excess water and watched the waterfowl fly off to safety. It looked like a rag doll — like it was dead.

The moment a lone duck was sucked into a ft-deep drain at a reservoir in northern California — and reportedly survived — has been captured on video. It looked like a rag doll — like it was dead. Mr Fowler said the drenched bird — which he believes was actually a cormorant — shook off the water and flew towards a safe spot on the creek. Brionna Ruff, a spokesperson for the Bureau of Reclamation, which owns the spillway, had told local press the distance of the fall and intensity of the water pressure had probably killed the bird. But Mr Fowler insisted the waterfowl had lived to fly another day.

Some say it looks like a toilet being flushed; in more generous interpretations, it is a beautiful inverted fountain. In a rare occurrence, the water level in the Lake Berryessa reservoir, 75 miles north of San Francisco, has risen so much that it is pouring into a ft-deep circular pipe constructed in its corner. The 72ft diameter pipe, known as Morning Glory Spillway, or simply Glory Hole, takes in water like a drain, once the reservoir is filled over capacity, and shoots it into a creek below the Monticello Dam.