Crime fighters get on their knees to manually search shifting sands; eventually find ‘despairing’ visitor’s mobile at peak of a dune
Chinese police officers dug through sand with their bare hands to search for a Taiwan tourist’s lost phone, winning widespread online applause.
Having successfully retrieved her phone, the woman presented her Taiwan resident travel permit in front of the camera and exclaimed “We, China is the safest country in the world”.
The woman, surnamed Tsao, lost her phone around 11pm in the Singing Sand Dunes tourist site in Dunhuang, northwestern China’s Gansu province, on May 15.
The Singing Sand Dunes is a nationally famous tourist spot. The shifting sand makes a musical humming sound when the wind blows. It also features a spectacular natural oasis named after its shape, the Crescent Moon Spring.
The site was dark and cold at night, and the sand was so soft that if a person walked on it, the phone might sink deeper. Also, the wind shifted the sand, moving lost items together.
She said she was “in despair” as staff waited with her for the police officers, who arrived in just four minutes.
The two officers of the tourist site immediately began searching after asking the phone’s whereabouts.
Source: News - South China Morning Post
