A small plane slammed into the tallest skyscraper in China’s capital. Hours later, it was like nothing had happened.

On Friday afternoon, a small plane evaded some of the world’s strictest aviation controls and crashed into Beijing’s tallest skyscraper, the 109-story CITIC Tower that dominates the city skyline, killing the pilot and injuring 13 people.

The crash sent shards of glass and plane wreckage falling hundreds of meters onto streets below, causing panic in the heart of China’s most protected city as office workers left for the weekend.

After a short while it was as if nothing had happened.

All mention of the incident and shocking images of the incident were deleted from Chinese social media. The government did not initially publicly acknowledge that any incidents had occurred. State media, including the country’s national broadcaster CCTV, which is headquartered opposite the crash site, made no mention of the shocking incident.

This is thanks to the work of China’s censorship army and the obsessive control that Communist officials have over information about events they believe could bring particularly negative attention or consequences.

The information gap left a number of unanswered questions for those who witnessed the incident or saw reports about it. It has not been known for almost a day how many people were injured in the incident.

On Saturday afternoon local time, Beijing government-affiliated media reported that the “single-engine, double-seat light sports aircraft crashed into a high-rise building during flight” and that the pilot, the only person on board, died at the scene and 13 people were injured. It was stated that the incident was “under investigation”.

It is not yet known whether the accident was accidental or intentional.

Perhaps most worrying for authorities, questions were also raised about how the pilot managed to fly over China’s fortified capital, where most of the Communist Party elite live and where even flying drones is effectively banned.

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The CITIC tower is 528 meters high (equivalent to 1,732 feet). The building, which has been Beijing’s tallest building since 2018, dominates the skyline.

It is home to China’s state-owned conglomerate CITIC Group and tech giant Alibaba, and the surrounding neighborhood is a prime location in Beijing and frequented by foreigners and diplomats. Embassies of countries from the UK to Vietnam and big names in global finance such as the China offices of the World Bank and IFC are just steps away.

The accident occurred during rush hour on Friday afternoon. Footage shared online in the brief window before censors took action showed a small plane crashing into the upper floor of the building, also known as China Zun, leaving debris and the tail of the plane raining down over the city.

Online images showing the aircraft’s registration code appeared to point to a domestically produced light sport aircraft, the Sunward SA 60L Aurora, owned by a local general aviation company that offers services such as pilot training, personal recreational flights and aerial photography.

CNN saw crowds evacuated from the skyscraper gather in the streets near the entrance, along with fire trucks, police cars and ambulances.

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Anna, who lives in Beijing and asked that only her name be used, said she went to the site after hearing about the accident on the internet.

“I was two stops away… and saw this post… but it will be deleted soon. So I came here.”

The footage later went viral on social media outside mainland China.

Domestically, a search for “Plane crash in Beijing” on Weibo, the Chinese version of X, returned no relevant results.

It is common practice for Chinese authorities to act quickly to censor or impose an information blackout and heavy police presence on any incident that has the potential to destabilize social stability.

Roads near the CITIC Tower were closed on Saturday and police were present around the area. Only people who could prove they worked in the area were allowed in. Delivery drivers were stranded outside, waiting for employees to come out to pick up their orders, according to a CNN reporter.

A Beijing municipal press official said in a telephone interview on Saturday that “the incident is currently under investigation and an official statement will come, without saying when.”

Unverified flight data published online from Flightradar24 appeared to show the aircraft on a severely deviated flight path after taking off from Beijing’s Shifosi airport.

Flying any light aircraft in Beijing requires approval from both the Civil Aviation Administration of China and the People’s Liberation Army Air Force. Beijing enacted sweeping regulations last month to effectively ban casual recreational flying and consumer drones.

Deadly and highly publicized events in China are sometimes followed by official information gaps that can last for years.

Beijing has yet to make an official statement more than four years after the country’s deadliest air disaster in decades, when a China Eastern Boeing 737-800 airliner crashed in the Guangxi region, killing 132 people.

Joyce Jiang and Fred He contributed reporting.

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