THE BRAND-NEW GLASS WALKWAY ON Yuntai Mountain in China, which just opened last month, looks terrifying—it’s transparent, so you can see all the way down to the foot of the mountain 3,543 feet below.
But don’t worry: the glass is bulletproof! It could never crack! It’s perfectly safe! And if you believe that, we’ve got a (slightly damaged) bridge to sell you.
Yesterday, a tourist dropped a stainless steel travel mug on one of the bridge’s glass panels, which cracked across. Another tourist reported on Chinese social media that he felt the bridge shake under his feet, and looked down to notice a fracture in the glass. His panicked shouts started a stampede of sightseers furiously trying to get onto solid ground.
Of course, nobody would build a glass bridge that was actually likely to dump people to their deaths. Like bulletproof glass, the Yuntai walkway is built of several layers, some of which are softer and more flexible to resist shattering. A bridge spokesperson says only one of three layers cracked, and nobody was actually in danger of being dashed on the rocks.