Beijing, China. A small aircraft crashed into CITIC Tower in Beijing on Friday, according to two bystanders who spoke to Reuters, as police closed roads around the skyscraper and stopped passersby from filming the scene. Two glass panels on a high floor were damaged, and there was no immediate official comment.
Crash at CITIC Tower
The building, also known as China Zun, is a 108-storey skyscraper in Beijing’s central business district and serves as the headquarters of the state-owned conglomerate CITIC Group.
Reuters reported a heavy police presence at the site, with some approach roads closed to cars. Police prevented some people from taking pictures, asked others to delete images they had taken, and moved people away from the building.
Witness accounts
A courier near the building told Reuters he rushed to CITIC Tower at about 6 p.m. local time after hearing a loud crash from a nearby location as an aircraft about the size of a car hit the building.
“It was so loud – louder than fireworks,” he said.
The courier said he had recorded a video showing the aircraft sticking out of the building, but later deleted it because he was afraid of being caught by police.
Another courier told Reuters he went to the scene after seeing unverified social media images that appeared to show wreckage of a small aircraft on a road next to the building.
Official response and online posts
There was no immediate official comment on the incident. Beijing’s municipal government did not immediately respond to a faxed request for comment from Reuters outside business hours.
Social media posts showing the building on Friday were quickly removed from Chinese social media. A search for the building’s name on the Xiaohongshu app returned only posts dated Thursday.
