'China is living in the future': Drone airlifts man stuck in Guangxi floods - watch viral video

A man, trapped on the rooftop in Southern China because of floods, was airlifted by a neighbour's drone last week.

On Tuesday, a man was trapped on the rooftop and was calling out for help. The rescue speedboats could not reach the site because of the fast-flowing water. At that point, the drone came to the rescue, Telegraph UK reported.

Several videos were being circulated online showing his neighbour, who saw him calling for help from the roof of his crumbling two-storey house in the city Liuzhou, devised a rescue plan using his agricultural drone to save him.


The drone was capable of carrying weights of up to 100kg and was normally used to haul bricks and cement or spray pesticides.


Neighbour, Lai, fashioned a makeshift harness by tying a sandbag to one end of the drone’s lifting rope and attaching a safety buckle, local media said.

He flew the drone to the man and instructed him over the phone to sit on the sandbag and tie his hands and feet to the drone’s rope with the safety buckle.

In the footage, a drone is seen flying at a height of 65 feet while the man was hanging. The drone flew from between trees and pylons before safely dropping the person on the road. Mr Lai had learnt how to drive a drone in August said that what he did was illegal but at that time he just wanted to save the person.

“I know that manned drones are illegal, but at the time I was worried about the house collapsing and was eager to save people, so I don’t recommend that you imitate it,” he told The Beijing News.

"In the past two days, heavy storms have caused 13 major rivers across Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, and Hainan to rise above warning levels, according to the Ministry of Water Resources, as reported by state television."