Hiker Captures Near-Death Experience of Sliding Down Mountain in China

A hiker is is lucky to be alive after he skidded down the side of a steep mountain in China, following heavy storms that pummeled the area. And the near-death experience was all captured on his 360-degree camera.

Yang Meng, 42, had been hiking in the Fanzengjian mountains in China’s eastern Anhui province on Monday when he suddenly slipped. In the video, which he shared to Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, Yang can be seen suddenly losing his footing and then rapidly sliding down the slick surface of the mountain. Thankfully, after several harrowing seconds, a tree broke his fall.

The video has since been liked by more than 280,000 users on the platform and shared over 445,000 times.

The Anhui province, which is located about 280 miles west of Shanghai, had seen heavy rainfall after the region was recently battered by two strong typhoons, Yagi and Bebinca; the latter being the strongest storm to hit the area since 1949.

Yang later told CNN that he was not seriously injured in the fall, and sustained nothing more than some minor cuts and scrapes, as well as bruising to his leg

"I realized I couldn’t get up at all and was sliding faster and faster, that’s when it hit me—I must be falling off a cliff," he said in he interview on Friday. "When I hit the tree, it felt like a heavy rock crashing down. I was just thinking, 'There’s no way I’m dead.'"

"I guess I came out mostly unscathed. Just a little scrape on my left hand and a small cut on my thigh," Yang recalled, adding that the scary encounter has given him some perspective. "Life is really short, so we need to cherish every day. I won’t let this incident hold me back. If anything, it’s pushing me to explore the world even more."