Sinkhole risk in Republic County, KS: Pockets of it

Pockets of it

Soluble rock at the surface or under thin cover in part of the county.

On soluble rock: 19%
At or near the surface: 19%
Buried under cover: under 1%

The next step for one property

Check the parcel against your state survey sinkhole map, and ask for an inspection if cracks, depressions or sticking doors show up.

That works out to roughly 136 of Republic County's 717 square miles on soluble rock, 133 of them with the rock at or near the surface. With about 4,613 residents (6 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 400 map points about 1.3 miles apart, so a pocket smaller than that can be missed or overstated.

Two things to read before deciding: the signs to look for and how an inspection works, and how these percentages are measured.

Counties around Republic County

The nearest county rated sinkhole country is Dickinson County, KS, about 71 miles south. 4 of the 6 closest counties land in the same band, so this is a regional pattern rather than a local quirk.

Cloud County, KS 24 mi south · 22% at surface
Thayer County, NE 24 mi north · 2% at surface
Washington County, KS 30 mi east · 15% at surface
Jewell County, KS 31 mi west · 32% at surface
Nuckolls County, NE 32 mi northwest · 52% at surface
Jefferson County, NE 36 mi northeast · 5% at surface

What Republic County is built on

The largest mapped soluble unit here is the Greenhorn Limestone and Graneros Shale (limestone), Late Cretaceous in age, covering about 17% of the county. Next is the Carlile Shale at 3%.

Against the rest of Kansas

Republic County ranks 62 of 105 in Kansas for soluble rock at the surface, and sits above 74% of US counties on that measure.