[There was a video here]

A Chinese woman reportedly died in one of the most horrific ways imaginable on Sunday after she fell through the platform at the top of a mall escalator. The woman managed to toss her two-year-old son to safety just seconds before being swallowed whole inside the contraption.



According to the Associated Press, security camera footage of the tragedy shows the woman—identified as 30-year-old Xiang Liujua—slowly riding up the escalator in a mall in Jingzhou , China, while holding her son’s hand. Once she reaches the top, the metal floor buckles, causing the woman’s legs to become ensnared in the downward moving metal steps. As she frantically struggles to free herself, Xiang passes her son to three onlookers, who tried to grab her hand before she was sucked into the machine.



According to the state-run People’s Daily’s, the woman’s body was finally removed from the machine four hours later.

