On September 17, 2026, Mr. Liu was descending the facade of a building in Foshan, China, suspended from a 120-meter rope, when he reached the second-floor platform and noticed something was wrong: some of the rope was missing. More than 10 meters, to be exact.
The worker had started from the 30th floor and could no longer complete his descent. When the mystery was investigated, the culprit turned out to be a resident in his 70s who lives on that very second floor. His explanation was as simple as it was baffling: he didn’t know it was safety equipment and needed a rope to hang his laundry.
Luckily, no one was hanging from that rope when it was cut. Liu decided not to report the elderly man because of his age and, after speaking with the building management, asked for compensation of just 400 yuan, about 60 dollars.
Chinese social media erupted, with more than 61 million views, and some even called it attempted murder. What would you have done in his place?