Hiker stopped before entering extreme area

Police in Gansu province have turned back a man set on entering the Lop Nur uninhabited area in southeastern Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region after concerns were raised about his safety in the extreme environment.

Wen Lei, a hiking blogger from Beijing, first attracted police attention on Feb 24 after he posted a video announcing his plans to cross the Lop Nur uninhabited area.

Lop Nur is an unforgiving environment with a rugged terrain, extreme low and high temperatures, and little to no mobile connectivity. In recent years, several fatalities have been recorded among those entering the area.

Commenting on when he first heard of Wen's plan, Xu Hairui from the Dunhuang Public Security Bureau in Gansu province, said, "We immediately began searching for Wen, but due to the lack of a signal, we couldn't reach him by phone and had to leave a message online, hoping to stop him."

The next day, Wen replied that he had received the message.

"Based on Wen's footage, we determined he was hiking from central Dunhuang in Gansu toward Lop Nur, about 100 kilometers away," Xu said. "He had reached the desert's edge but hadn't entered the uninhabited area."

Upon intercepting Wen on March 1, Xu asked him if he'd help them shoot a warning video.

"I am a police officer from the Yadan Police Station," said Xu in the video. "While patrolling the scenic area, I found Wen, who planned to hike across the Lop Nur uninhabited area without permission, and we promptly advised him against it."

The video warning has proved popular, receiving over 1.26 million likes so far.

However, it was the location of the police station in the video that caught a lot of attention online.

The station is built into a hollowed-out natural soft stone wall, and is the only police station in the country in a man-made cave.

It's common for tourists who enter Yadan National Geological Park in Dunhuang to often forgo the stunning natural formations and instead seek out the police station.

Police officers spent 17 years building it, starting in May 2001, when the park was first being developed. About 180 km northwest of Dunhuang, the park occupies 400 square km and is the largest known yardang landform.

Yardang, or yadan in Mandarin, are unique formations carved from bedrock or formed through erosion. They look like ridges, towers or dunes that protrude from the ground in arid regions. In the summer, temperatures in the region can reach as high as 45 C while in the winter, they can drop to-25 C, usually accompanied by strong winds — up to 88 km per hour.

Even in these tough conditions, the officers stick to their official task of preserving order in the park and protecting the safety and property of tourists.

"In recent years, the area has attracted more tourists for wild adventures, increasing the number of various accidents," said auxiliary police officer He Chaodun.

"We have become accustomed to being busy rescuing explorers trapped in the desert and searching for lost cameras and mobile phones for tourists."

On Jan 8, they received a report that an off-road vehicle was stranded in the desert wilderness about 10 km from the scenic area, He said. "My colleague Wang Dongdong and I, along with staff members of the scenic area, immediately went to the rescue."

Despite the limited location information, they finally found the tourists after several hours' searching from different directions.

The officers reminded travelers to drive cautiously on their journeys and not to enter natural reserves recklessly to avoid accidents.

Since the station's establishment, the officers have completed over 200 rescue missions and saved more than 20 people who found themselves in danger.

Contact the writers at zhouhuiying@chinadaily.com.cn