THIS is every tourist’s worst nightmare.

Soaking in the breathtaking views from a glass walkway that juts out from the side of a cliff more than 1000 metres above the ground, and then, the unimaginable happens — it starts to crack.

That’s exactly what happened to tourists who were left screaming from the Yuntai Mountain walkway in China’s Henan province.

Witnesses said the 68-centimetre-wide glass pane shattered when they walked over it, and panic caused a mini stampede towards the end of the path.

Lee Dong Hai, who was on the walkway at the time, shared his moment of terror on the social media site Weibo.

“My foot shook a little. I looked down and I saw that there was a crack in the floor,” he wrote.

“A lot of people started to scream. I screamed out, ‘It cracked! It really cracked!’ and then I pushed the people in front of me so that we could run out of the way.”

It was closed to the public following the incident.

A spokesman from the Yuntai Mountain tourism bureau told People’s Daily Online that the cracks occurred when a tourist dropped a stainless steel mug onto it.

However, there are three layers of glass, and only one broke. The glass is said to be capable of holding 800 kilograms per square metre.