A Chinese paraglider who was accidentally propelled more than 8,000m high by an updraft has been banned from the activity for six months after a video of his ordeal went viral.
Peng Yujiang began from an elevation of about 3,000m in the Qilian Mountains in northern China, where he intended to test secondhand equipment he purchased without making a proper flight, an investigative report by the Gansu Provincial Aviation Sports Association showed.
However, about 20 minutes into his practice he was caught in a strong updraft, which sent him soaring more than 5,000m high, in line with flight paths and nearly the height of Mount Everest.
Photo: Screen grab from the Chinese Weather Enthusiasts’ Sina Weibo account
Video from Peng’s mounted camera showed him above the clouds and covered in icicles as the temperature dropped to a reported minus-35°C, as he tried to control his equipment.
“My hands were frozen outside. I kept trying to talk on the radio,” Peng said in a video filmed shortly after landing.
Authorities praised Peng’s survival, conceding it was an accident.
Photo: AFP
A “normal person cannot be exposed at 8,000m without oxygen [so] this is not something that can be done voluntarily” the state-owned English-language online magazine Sixth Tone quoted a sports bureau official as saying.
However, Peng, who has about five years’ experience paragliding, never intended to leave ground level and so had not registered any flight plans, meaning his ordeal was “not subject to relevant approvals,” the report said.
In response he was banned from flying for six months.
The bureau report, based on an interview with Peng, said he was in the air for more than an hour, and had stayed in radio contact with his friend, Gu Zhimin, who was still on the ground.
The report said he had attempted to descend, but his efforts were “ineffective,” and as he flew higher, he became confused and briefly lost consciousness.
Peng eventually landed about 30km from the launch site, where he was met by Gu and another friend.
Gu later posted a video of Peng’s flight and comments on the ground to Douyin, China’s domestic version of TikTok, where it soon went viral.
The video sparked shock and admiration from viewers, some suggesting he had broken records, but it also drew the ire of authorities.
“Gu Zhimin posted a flight video without permission, which had a bad impact,” the report said. “He was grounded for six months and asked to write a report to deeply reflect on the negative impact of his behavior.”
Any record broken by Peng’s flight would not be officially counted, because his flight was not registered, the bureau said.
His flight nears the world record of 9,946m set by German paraglider Ewa Wisnierska in 2007, when she was caught in a similar updraft while paragliding in Australia. Wisnierska was unconscious for about 40 minutes, only learning how high she had flown after safely landing and checking her flight data.
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