KEN Luck truly lived up to his name when his patio collapsed into a ten-foot-deep hole in the garden.

A minutes before it happened, Ken had been standing on the very spot.

He’d sat down for a quiet lunch with his wife Jean when they felt a tremor and heard a loud noise coming from their back garden.

Electrician Ken, 57, went to investigate and was stunned to find a crater 20 feet across and ten feet deep where his patio used to be.

He said: “It sounded like an earthquake. Moments before, I had just walked back inside the house from the garden, over the patio. I could have been badly hurt.

“Last year, we held a wedding reception in the garden and about 100 people attended, so it was lucky it didn’t collapse then. Me and my wife are still in shock.”

Next, Ken and Jean, 55, ran to the end of their garden, in Lodge Lane, Grays, worried their whole bungalow might collapse. They phoned Thurrock Council’s out-of-hours emergency team, then insurer Liverpool and Victoria.

A structural engineer checked the house and found a smaller hole near the back door. He believes water must have seeped through the small gap and gradually eroded a layer of chalk beneath the patio.

The couple have been advised to move out for at least eight weeks while rebuilding work is done.

The Lucks are currently staying at the Thurrock Hotel, Aveley, and were full of praise for their insurance company.

Nikki Etherington, a Thurrock Council spokesman, said: “Following a call, we arranged for one of our inspectors to visit and check drains had not caused the problem. The inspector confirmed they were not the cause.”