THIS is the terrifying moment window cleaners working on a 51-storey building in Beijing were tossed around on their ropes by high winds.
Nerve-shredding videos shared widely on social media show around a dozen people dangling from one of the Chinese capital’s tallest buildings.
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Strong winds battering the city saw the workers swinging from side to side from a high altitude on the CCTV (Chinese Central Television) Headquarters.
The BBC’s China correspondent Stephen McDonell posted on X (formerly Twitter): “Think yourself lucky you’re not a window cleaner on Beijing’s CCTV tower.
“Here they were dangling on ropes swinging through the air this afternoon after a flash storm hit.”
The CCTV Headquarters building stands at 768ft tall, slightly shorter than the Canary Wharf Tower in London, making it one of Beijing’s tallest skyscrapers.
The workers can be seen dangling from the central part of the structure that connects two towers on either side.
Newspaper Shanghai Daily posted on X: “High-altitude maintenance workers were seen swaying in the strong winds outside the CCTV Headquarters in Beijing‘s Central Business District on Thursday. Hoping for their safety.”
Other social media users noted the exceptionally strong winds across the Chinese capital city today.
A widely shared video saw pedestrians swept off their feet by the gales as debris was sent flying and lightning flashed in the background.
Former editor-in-chief and Chinese Communist Party Committee Secretary of Global Times Hu Xijin noted on X that the “sudden strong winds and heavy rain appeared without any warning.”
Like many cities around the world, Beijing has often faced increasingly extreme weather events in recent years.
In 2023, the Chinese capital was hit by a major heatwave that saw record-breaking temperatures scorch the city of 20 million people.
It comes just weeks following major flooding hit southern China, which saw tens of thousands of people evacuated and more than a million homes left without power.
The heavy flooding caused landslides in the southern province of Guangdong, which sits far to the south of Beijing.
Guangdong is China’s most populous province at home to more than 125 million people – and borders the semi-autonomous regions of Hong Kong and Macau.
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