The National Corvette Museum Sinkhole has Led to a Spike in Attendance

When the sinkhole under the National Corvette Museum’s Skydome exhibit, the earth swallowed up 8 rare and/or historic Chevrolet Corvette coupes and convertibles while doing a massive amount of damage to the museum and the area land under it. This unexpected collapse of the Skydome floor has caused hundreds of thousands of dollars (if not more) in damage when you consider the actual damage to the cars, the cost of extracting the cars, the cost of fixing the hole under the museum, the cost of fixing the floor of the Skydome and all of the other “little expenses” that pile up when dealing with a structural collapse like the one in Bowling Green Kentucky. As automotive tragedies in which no people are injured, the Corvette Museum sinkhole was very likely the biggest event in the history of the American automotive world and even after the floor of the Skydome has been fixed and all of the Corvettes swallowed by the hole have been repaired by General Motors – this is an incident that the automotive world will not soon forget.

The only piece of good news surrounding the National Corvette Museum sinkhole tragedy is that this event has scored a ton of media attention for the museum and all of that coverage has led to a big spike in attendance at the Bowling Green facility. According to National Corvette Museum officials, the period of time from February 13th through March 13th of 2014 has seen 700 more visitors to the museum than were received during the same period back in 2013.

While this is a tragedy in the automotive world unlike nothing that we have seen in the past, there are plenty of people out there – both those who love the Corvette and those who simply want to see what the aftermath looks like – who want to see the damage first hand. Much like people watch NASCAR for the wrecks while never wanting to see anyone get hurt – gearheads around the country hate that the museum sinkhole ate 8 Corvettes but they still want to see the hole and the cars that are being pulled out of the hole.

To feed this high level of interest, the National Corvette Museum has set up a special limited time display that currently features each of the first five Chevrolet Corvettes pulled out of the sinkhole. As each car is extracted from the hole in the Earth, the cars will be moved to this special area as-is before being shipped to Michigan later this year for a full restoration of all 8 cars by General Motors.

Since the National Corvette Museum sinkhole opened up and destroyed the collection of historic Corvettes, a variety of groups have stepped up to either contribute a large sum of money to the museum or to set up donation programs to help raise money to cover the expenses incurred as the cleanup continues. The National Corvette Museum website has a “button” that allows you to donate money to the repair efforts and those of you who are interested in making a donation to the site, you can click here to visit the NCM website.

Image: National Corvette Museum

Other Corvette Museum News:

• Two of the National Corvette Museum Sinkhole Cars Shouldn't Be Fixed
• National Corvette Museum Update: Could Be Weeks Before More Cars Come Out
• The PPG Pace Car Corvette is Out of the Sinkhole - Nearly Cut in Half
• Sunken Corvette Museum Cars to be Displayed Before Repairs
• General Motors Will Repair the Damaged Cars at the National Corvette Museum