© Dimitris Ketsetzidis/YouTubeA still from a 2019 YouTube video of the glass bridge at Longjing in Jilin province. Dimitris Ketsetzidis/YouTube
- A Chinese tourist clung to a glass bridge as the panes smashed in high winds, local media reported.
- The 330-foot-high bridge spans a mountain ravine in northeastern China, and was hit by 93 mph gusts.
- The tourist was uninjured, but people have raised concern about the increasingly popular attraction.
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A Chinese tourist was stranded 330 feet high on a glass-bottomed bridge in high winds Friday when floor panes blew off and smashed, according to local media.
State-controlled news outlet Xinhua reported that the bridge, built over the Piyan mountain ravine in the northeast province of Jilin, was damaged in gusts of up to 93 miles per hour.
Pictures shared on social media show a before-and-after view of the bridge, with a tourist clinging to its metal framework. Much of the framework is twisted and buckled, while only a few glass panes - the only standing surface -remaining.
This tweet appears to show the before-and-after:
The tourist held on for 35 minutes while firefighters and police attempted to rescue him and he eventually crawled to safety, Xinhua reported. Nobody was injured, but the tourist was moved to a hospital and is receiving psychological counseling, the outlet said.
You can watch one tourist's experience of walking across the bridge on a less windy day here:
Glass-decked bridges are an increasingly popular novelty in China, with at least 60 built since 2016, the outlet reported. Regions have sought to outdo each other with world records.
The Zhangjiajie bridge in Hunan province is 1,410 feet long and is often overwhelmingly crowded with tourists, as Insider reported. But that record was beaten in 2020 by the Huangchuan Three Gorges bridge in Lianzhou, southern China, which is more than 1,700 feet long.
© Google mapsA satellite view of Zhangjiajie bridge, one of the longest and most popular glass-bottomed bridges in China. Google maps
The Piyan mountain bridge accident has some commentators asking about these bridges' safety records, with one person with the username "Li" saying on social media: "This is exactly why I dare not step on a bridge like that," Xinhua reported.
The bridge at Piyan mountains has been closed and the local authority, the Longjing city government, is to launch a safety review of all its tourist attractions, Xinhua reported.
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