Pilot Who Crashed into Beijing Tower Struggled With Mental Health — Wrote About Ending His Life | Today’s news
The pilot who crashed a small plane into Beijing’s tallest skyscraper was suffering from mental health problems and wrote suicide notes in his diary, according to Chinese authorities.
A 66-year-old pilot died in the incident, which injured 13 people. He reportedly flew a light aircraft into the 528-meter (1,732-foot) CITIC Tower in Beijing’s Central Business District at 5:55 p.m. (0955 GMT) on Friday.
“…caused by personal reasons”
According to an official statement from the Chaoyang District Government, the pilot, surnamed Liu, was divorced and living alone in Beijing.
The government said that in his diary, Liu made several references to “ending his life” and “suffered from insomnia and anxiety for a long time.” “It was an incident threatening public safety for personal reasons,” the statement added.
Liu reportedly worked as a freelancer and obtained a sport pilot license in 2021 and a private pilot license in 2024. According to the statement, he took off from a general aviation airport in the suburbs of Pinggu County on the afternoon of the incident and conducted both supervised and solo flights.
During his last solo flight, Liu “deviated from the designated area and lost contact with the airport” before the crash, he added.
He was piloting a two-seater light propeller-driven aircraft.
No photos, videos from CITIC Tower
CITIC Tower is shaped like a Chinese wine vessel and attracts local crowds. It is considered a good luck charm and young people often wish it luck – from exam results to employment. They either stop to look at him or share photos of him online along with a quick prayer.
As China applies strict censorship, not only have photos and videos of Friday’s crash been scrubbed, but unrelated photos and memes of the skyscraper have also been removed from Chinese social media platforms.
According to AFP, whose journalists saw a hole in the windows of one of the upper floors of the building, it said that police at the scene stopped journalists and onlookers from taking pictures of the building.
“Massive Security Breach”
The plane crash has raised questions about aviation safety in heavily guarded Beijing, where the CITIC skyscraper is located about seven kilometers from Zhongnanhai, the government building that houses China’s top leaders.
There is a permanent no-fly zone of roughly 100 km2 (39 sq mi) over Beijing’s political core – covering Tiananmen Square and Zhongnanhai.
China analyst Bill Bishop described the incident as a “massive security breach” and wrote on X: “Just seconds into the flight and (the crash) could have been at Zhongnanhai… (it would have been) an earthquake in Beijing’s security system.”
Chinese authorities have so far published only a 60-word report in the state-run Beijing Daily detailing the basic facts.
