Sinkhole risk in Daggett County, UT: Mostly deep or small

Mostly deep or small

Some soluble rock, mostly deeply buried or in a small share of the county.

On soluble rock: 5%
At or near the surface: 5%
Buried under cover: 0%

The next step for one property

Sinkholes are uncommon here; watch for new depressions after heavy rain or leaking pipes.

That works out to roughly 33 of Daggett County's 697 square miles on soluble rock, 33 of them with the rock at or near the surface. With about 956 residents (1 per square mile), much of the land is open, and the mapped rock may sit far from where people actually live. The figures come from 257 map points about 1.6 miles apart, so a pocket smaller than that can be missed or overstated.

Two things to read before deciding: why gypsum and salt move faster than limestone, and how these percentages are measured.

Counties around Daggett County

The nearest county rated sinkhole country is Emery County, UT, about 145 miles southwest. 5 of the 6 closest counties land in the same band, so this is a regional pattern rather than a local quirk.

Uintah County, UT 53 mi south · 4% at surface
Uinta County, WY 61 mi northwest · under 1% at surface
Sweetwater County, WY 62 mi northeast · 3% at surface
Duchesne County, UT 64 mi southwest · 3% at surface
Moffat County, CO 70 mi east · 8% at surface
Summit County, UT 76 mi west · 6% at surface

What Daggett County is built on

The largest mapped soluble unit here is the Permian (2) sedimentary rocks in Uinta Mountains-Uinta Basin region (sandstone), Permian in age, covering about 3% of the county. Next is the Jurassic (1) sedimentary rocks in Uinta Mountains-Uinta Basin region at 1%.

2% of the county sits on gypsum or salt, which dissolves in years rather than millennia. That share matters more than its size suggests.

The county also lies over the Green River Basin, a deep salt or gypsum basin. Deep beds rarely cause surface collapse on their own, but wells and mining into them have.

Against the rest of Utah

Daggett County ranks 23 of 29 in Utah for soluble rock at the surface, and sits above 62% of US counties on that measure.