Date of update: 04/02/2024 16:07
The date of publishing:
04/02/2024 15:52
Three people died in China’s Jiangxi province on Sunday after being blown from their high-rise apartments by strong winds, local media reported, citing Business Insider.
The people lived in the same waterfront neighborhood in the southern city of Nanchang and were sleeping around 3:00 a.m. when the strong storm destroyed the outer walls of the rooms they were in, Hubei’s Jimu News reported.
In a message shared on a neighborhood chat group, picked up by Jimu News and other regional publications, the three victims were identified as a 64-year-old woman, her 11-year-old grandson and another 60-year-old woman .
Local authorities confirmed the three deaths.
As of Tuesday morning, state media had not reported on the unusual circumstances of the three deaths, but national broadcaster CCTV said four people had died and more than 10 were injured that morning because of the weather.
The death of the 60-year-old woman caught the attention of people on social media where pictures of the wall destroyed by the storm were posted. The images have been viewed 300 million times on Weibo, China’s version of X.
Footage of her room on the 11th floor, shot by regional media, shows a floor-to-ceiling window destroyed. An empty bed frame and tattered curtains can also be seen in the clip.
The woman’s partner, identified only as Wan, told local reporters that he woke up at around 3am to the storm to find that gusts had broken the glass panels of the balcony.
Wan said he and his partner slept in different rooms that night and he went to wake her up. “I rushed to her room but she wasn’t there”he said.
Later, the woman’s body was found at the base of the block, her daughter said.
The 64-year-old woman and her grandson, identified as Liu and Xu, were sleeping in the same room and were blown out of bed by the wind along with the mattress. They lived on the 20th floor.
On Monday, the Nanchang Emergency Management Office announced that strong winds and storms would continue in the region for the next three days.
The three deaths drew attention to the quality of construction in the neighborhood and to the real estate developer. Xinmin Weekly reported that a former manager of the firm was convicted of bribing local officials from 2004 to 2019 for project approvals.
The former manager, Li Mengping, was sentenced in June to 10 years and two months in prison.
The affected district in Nanchang was completed in 2015, according to local sources.
Publisher: DC
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