THOUSANDS of people are at risk of losing their homes as a terrifying sinkhole forced a Brazilian city into a state of emergency.

Shocking images from the city of Buriticupu, in the northeast of the Amazon Rainforest, show how the area is being swallowed up by the earth.

Several buildings have already been destroyed by the gigantic sinkholes that have already started to form.

Around 1,200 of the 55,000 residents of Buriticupu, in the Maranhão state, are at risk of losing everything as the swallow hole widens.

Terrifying photos from the at-risk city show rows of homes right at the edge of these growing sinkholes.

Several houses have already been abandoned and destroyed by the horror holes.

Authorities in the city were forced to issue an emergency decree earlier this month in the face of the sinkholes growing threat.

It said: “In the space of the last few months, the dimensions have expanded exponentially, approaching substantially closer to the residences.”

These sinkholes are a dramatic escalation of a problem the area has been dealing with for three decades.

Rain has caused the soil to slowly erode, due to its sandy nature.

Poorly planned building work has also affected the ground.

These huge soil erosions are known in Brazil as “voçoroca” which has indigenous origins and means “to tear the earth”.

This huge issue has recently become significantly worse due to heavy rainfall.

Antonia dos Anjos, who has lived in Buriticupu for 22 years, shared his fears for the future.

This local believed that more sinkholes could appear in the Amazon city.

He said: “There’s this danger right in front of us, and nobody knows where this hole has been opening up underneath.”

The secretary of public works in Buriticupu, Lucas Conceiçao, said the municipality did not have enough money to find a solution to these terrifying holes.

He said: “These problems range from the erosion processes to the removal of people who are in the risk area.”