Two Chinese Window Cleaners Killed By Strong Winds

A witness shows a video clip taken when the two workers are blown to the sky by a gust of wind on July 24, 2015. The workers were hanging onto a lifeline on a high rise building in downtown Xi'an, the capital of northwest China's Shaanxi Province.

Shaanxi window cleaners die after gust of wind sends them flying into building: Two window cleaners at a high-rise in Xi'an, Shaanxi province died last Friday afternoon after a strong wind sent the dangling workers flying back and forth mid-air until they crashed into the building. The two workers were among about a dozen others who'd been cleaning the exterior of the 270-meter high Greenland Center commercial building when a strong wind picked up at around 5:20 p.m., according to a witness cited in an SCMP report.

“The men’s ropes might have become tangled after they were first blown around by the wind,” said the witness. The two workers cried for help and struggled in the wind for around 20 minutes before they were thrown against the building. “It was just like two pieces of clothes hanging there. I think the two died immediately,” he said.

The photo taken by a witness shows the smashed windows of a high-rise building in downtown Xi'an, the capital of northwest China's Shaanxi Province on July 24, 2015. Two workers hang to work on the building crashed into the windows in a strong gust of wind on Friday.

The workers were on the 12th and 15th floors at the time of the incident, People's Daily reports. Local police confirmed that the cleaners died amid bad weather.

While it pretty much goes without saying, window cleaners have a terrifying job. In April, a viral video showed the moment a strong bout of wind sent an elevated working platform swinging through the air until it was flung against a window on the 91st floor of Shanghai's World Financial Center. The two window cleaners on the platform fortunately managed to walk away with only minor injuries.